In New Polls, Americans Give Pretty Much All Elected Officials in Government Thumbs Down

Several new polls this week report that Americans
are in a remarkably sour mood leading up to the election this
November.

Basically, Americans aren’t pleased with the economy, with the
president, with America’s direction or place in the world, with
Congress, or even with their own elected leaders. The
gist of America’s reaction to basically everything about the
government and the economy right now
is, “Ugh.“  

Some highlights from the
latest NBC/Wall Street Journal
poll:

Majorities are not satisfied with how things are going on
multiple measures. 64 percent are dissatisfied with the state of
the economy, compared to just 35 percent who are satisfied. That’s
the worst result since 2008.  62 percent are not satisfied
with America’s role in the world. And 79 percent aren’t satisfied
with the country’s political system

Overall, 71 percent say the country is headed “off on the wrong
track.” Another 60 percent say America is “in a state of
decline.”

Americans are especially unsatisfied with President Obama. His
disapproval rating is now at 54 percent, as high as it has ever
been, and his approval rating just hit 40, down a point from the
previous month.

The public isn’t too fond of Republicans either. Only 19 percent
had positive feelings toward the congressional GOP, compared with
54 percent who were negative. Democrats in Congress were also
upside down on approval, with 31 percent expressing positive
feelings and 46 percent coming in negative. Congress as a whole
gets a 79 percent disapproval rating.

Really, the public isn’t fond of anyone in Congress these days,
including their own representatives. A different poll by The
Washington Post and ABC News
found this week that more than half—51 percent—of Americans
disapprove of their own congress critter. That’s a record.

This obviously isn’t great news for anyone in Congress, but my
sense is that it’s worst for Democrats, who are linked, whether
they like it or not, to President Obama and the public’s feelings
about the direction of the nation as a whole. And the WSJ/NBC poll
seems to suggest that things are tilting, slightly, in the GOP’s
direction, with 44 percent saying they’d prefer a generically
Republican controlled Congress and 43 percent saying they would
prefer Democrats in charge.

November is going to be pretty interesting.