Political Perspective A Year Out

Many recent polls have been reported in news outlets and dissected by pundits the last couple of months. And even though last April, we anticipated and forecasted a drop in Presidential job approval and a very high likelihood that President Bush may be behind at some point (every President running for re-election since 1972 has been behind at some point), political commentators perceived the numbers as bad news for the Bush Team and declared “the sky is falling” once again.

Where the public is today

In the two most recent Gallup polls (released October 13 and October 27), President Bush’s approval ratings were at 56% and 53% respectively – a slight rise from the approval of a month ago at 50%. In the most recent ABC News/Washington Post poll (released 11/2), President Bush’s job approval rose to 56%. As a reminder, in 1996 Bill Clinton was re-elected with a job approval of 54% right before Election Day. Further, Ronald Reagan and Clinton both had approval ratings a year out from Election Day in the forties (Reagan was at 49% and Clinton at 46%) – roughly 6 to 8 points below where President Bush is today.

One major reason why President Bush’s approval numbers have had such lasting power is that a majority of the public sees this President as honest and trustworthy, a strong leader, and believes that he cares about them. A second important reason for the sustained nature of these positive numbers in the wake of consistent negative media coverage concerning Iraq and the economy is that the public sees the President as presenting a clear and positive message on dealing with the public’s concerns. In contrast, the public has not seen, read or heard any positive effort by the Democrats dealing with issues. A third important consideration is the public trusts President Bush more than the Democrats on handling the economy, terrorism and foreign policy.

Voter approval on handling of the economy is a further area highlighting where President Bush stands in a historical context. In the latest public polling, President Bush maintains an approval on the economy in the mid-forties – exactly what Clinton had at the end of 1995 and above what Reagan had in 1983. Former President Bush’s approval on the economy at this same time in 1991 was 28% and fell to the mid-teens in 1992! In looking at Gallup polls for the past 30 years, approval on the economy is a dominant factor in whether some Presidents are re-elected while some are voted out of office.

A couple of factors that have contributed to this difference on economic approval are that the public is more optimistic and much less angry than in 1992. In fact, for the first time in months Gallup shows that the public is slightly more optimistic on the direction of the economy than pessimistic by a margin of 47% to 43% - a net positive of +4%. At this same time in 1991, optimism on the economy was very low at 19% to pessimism at 69% - a net negative of -50%.

This is driven to an extent by economic good news. Today, the stock market on average is rising and the initial jobless claims’ four week moving average is below 400,000, as well as housing starts, GDP growth, etc.

Where we are headed

Though at this time this is good news for a campaign headed into an election year, this race is likely to be very tight and go down to the wire. The country is very evenly divided, and with Democratic partisans lined up solidly against President Bush, this race will stay very close. In fact, the most recent Gallup poll had President Bush leading an unnamed Democratic opponent by three points. This number has been relatively stable the last couple of months. Some public polls show President Bush leading by more, some by less, but all show a very close race. As I have repeated time and again, this race will be decided within a four- or five-point margin, not the 18- to 20-point margins like 1984 or 1972.

After the Democratic nominee is all but certain in the late winter/early spring, it would not be surprising for us to fall behind for a bit. First, this is just the nature of a divided and polarized electorate. Second, once the Democratic nominee is all but assured, that person will receive a deluge of positive press at least for a couple of weeks, and this will temporarily be reflected in public opinion polls.

Further, just as in 2002, the economy will likely be a dominant issue going into 2004 as well as the war on terrorism. We pointed out in a memo prior to Election Day 2002 that the number one issue was the economy, and at the time Democrats and their operatives overwhelmingly agreed. And the primary reason Republican candidates won in 2002 is that the public had more trust in them on Election Day in handling the economy than Democrats.

So, my suggestion is to try and put all the “numbers” and speculation in their historical context, and expect a campaign that will likely be behind at various points over the next year. We must remind our key supporters around the country that all the numbers reflect a closely divided electorate, and less about flagging or soaring support for President Bush whose support in a historical context has been consistently positive. All polls are snapshots and our supporters should be encouraged to place them in perspective, and look at other internal numbers in public polls. For example, CBS News recently conducted a poll, and one number not prominently featured was that President Bush went from being even with a generic Democrat to up twelve!