Why it doesn’t matter, electorally speaking, that the public hates Congress more than Barack Obama.

Writing stuff like this actually does no favors for Democrats…

President Obama has hit another low in another poll, but so have many of his critics in Congress.

The latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll gives the president an approval rating of 40%, a record low; Congress has a rating of only 14%, also a low.

…and this is why: it produces a false equivalence.  Democratic incumbents in trouble aren’t going to be happy to see Barack Obama showing up… but Republican incumbents in trouble – yes, there are some – weren’t going to get ‘Congress’ to come out to campaign for them.  They’d get specific (and popular) Republican politicians to do that.  I understand that you can’t really compare Barack Obama’s popularity against every member of Congress and not have the result be utterly cumbersome, but I think framing the discussion this way doesn’t really lead to correct conclusions.

Moe Lane

Via

One thought on “Why it doesn’t matter, electorally speaking, that the public hates Congress more than Barack Obama.”

  1. Yeah, the more interesting combo there is Obama versus ‘your congressman’. Of course, until this last move I was in the ‘disapprove of your congressman’ category, but after I moved I’m no longer in SOPA Smith’s district.

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