For this stage in the game, still less than 3 months into his Presidency – the approval rating gap between Democrats and Republicans is the highest in modern history. 

For all of his hopes about bipartisanship, Barack Obama has the most polarized early job approval ratings of any president in the past four decades. The 61-point partisan gap in opinions about Obama’s job performance is the result of a combination of high Democratic ratings for the president — 88% job approval among Democrats — and relatively low approval ratings among Republicans (27%).

By comparison, there was a somewhat smaller 51-point partisan gap in views of George W. Bush’s job performance in April 2001, a few months into his first term. At that time, Republican enthusiasm for Bush was comparable to how Democrats feel about Obama today, but there was substantially less criticism from members of the opposition party. Among Democrats, 36% approved of Bush’s job performance in April 2001; that compares with a 27% job approval rating for Obama among Republicans today.

The partisan gap in Bill Clinton’s early days was also substantially smaller than what Obama faces, largely because Democrats were less enthusiastic about Clinton. In early April 1993, 71% of Democrats approved of Clinton’s job performance, which is 17 points lower than Obama’s current job approval among Democrats. Republican ratings of Clinton at that point (26%) are comparable to their current ratings of Obama today (27%).

What does this say to me?  It says that George Herbert Walker Bush was not disliked, and there was not this huge uprising in the Democratic ranks in the early 90′s.  I think Democrats have become so rabid and hate-filled in regards to the last president that many of them have now moved into the liberal/progressive realm and hate any and all Republicans.  There was some commentary earlier today on redstate proving this insanity and how many liberals are calling for the extinction literally and figuratively of conservatives, first and foremost, and then Republicans.  I foresee a big crash and burn effect when Obama becomes a major disappointment, which he already is becoming both in more overseas commentary and here in the states for moderates and independents (the reason he won).  Many liberals are still flying high on the “haterade” of the Bush years and will soon wake up with a horrible hangover.  It’s still early… let’s see what happens in the next few months!

Pew Research Study here… (Pew is usually liberally biased as well)

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02/12/09

This week Obama and his traveling minstrels have been holding tent revivals across the eastern states.  As savior of the world, he has made women swoon and young men shout to the heavens praising his name.  In his camp meetings Obama has made clear that his plan for us will create jobs, save homes, and put money in our pockets.  He promised everything to his children like any good messiah would.  Right?

While he was bringing his message of salvation, his closest disciples were cramped together chiseling out the final details of his commandments.  As they descended from the mountain we find enscribed on the tablets: $46 billion highway, bridge and mass transit construction.  (If you are an equipment operator or a ditch digger, this is good news.  I’m college educated, I wonder if I could be a ‘digger of ditches’).  Also bestowed upon us is a 60 percent subsidy to help the unemployed pay for COBRA.  (I’m still trying to find out if that is retroactive for those thousands of people whose grace period for applying for COBRA has expired).  The provision for helping prospective home buyers is all but cut.  The $15,000 tax credit for anybody buying a home over the next year was dropped; instead, first-time homebuyers can claim an $8,000 credit; but you have to act fast!  It only lasts until the end of August.  (Since the banks aren’t loaning money, good luck with that one folks).  Out of the $790 billion dollars being spent for this stimulus and the $2 plus TRILLION dollars Geithner wants to spend and the more than $2 trillion already spent to get us out of this “crisis,” Obama’s loyal minions can expect to receive, on average, $13 per week from late spring until January.  Then it gets scaled back to $8 per week.  Last week our savior told the world that with his plan his sheep “will be able to get that car repaired, pay bills, buy groceries.”  He later told us, not to go to Las Vegas.  I don’t know about you but I am taking my $13 and investing it.  Thirteen lotto tickets.

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02/10/09

Last night all of us were treated to Obama’s first news conference as our president.  While most of the media is calling it a success I am puking up my cheerios.

As usual, he performed quite well while reading his teleprompters.  He showed his inexperience and inability to stay on point when he began taking questions from the so-called press.  A few of the questions came from actual journalists while others came from bloggers and columnists.  This was the first press conference where those who are not a part of the White House Press Corps were allowed.  However, in case you missed it The Washington Post’s Michael A. Fletcher asked the most pressing question that is on every American’s mind, “What do you think about the admission by baseball star Alex Rodriguez that he once used steroids?”  Idiot.

Obama’s prepared statement was, thankfully, quite short.  For those who are not fluent in ObamaSpeak,  I have provided the short transcript of his statement with what he really meant in red italics.

OBAMA: Good evening, everybody. Please be seated. Hello my little pretties. Thank you for worshiping me.

Before I take your questions tonight, I’d like to speak briefly about the state of our economy and why I believe we need to put this recovery plan in motion as soon as possible.  Before I take questions from my biggest fans like The Huffington Post and Helen Thomas, who really aren’t even journalists, I would like to manipulate you into blindness about my socialist package.

I took a trip to Elkhart, Indiana, today. Elkhart is a place that has lost jobs faster than anywhere else in America. In one year, the unemployment rate went from 4.7 percent to 15.3 percent.

Companies that have sustained this community for years are shedding jobs at an alarming speed, and the people who’ve lost them have no idea what to do or who to turn to.

They can’t pay their bills. They’ve stopped spending money. And because they’ve stopped spending money, more businesses have been forced to lay off more workers. In fact, local TV stations have started running public service announcements to tell people where to find food banks, even as the food banks don’t have enough to meet the demand.

As we speak, similar scenes are playing out in cities and towns across America. Last Monday, more than 1,000 men and women stood in line for 35 firefighter jobs in Miami. Last month, our economy lost 598,000 jobs, which is nearly the equivalent of losing every single job in the state of Maine.

And if there’s anyone out there who still hasn’t bought what I am selling doesn’t believe this constitutes a full-blown crisis, I suggest speaking to one of the millions of fools who are mesmerized by me Americans whose lives have been turned upside-down because they don’t know where their next paycheck is coming from.

And that is why the single most important part of this economic recovery and reinvestment plan is the fact that it will save or create up to 4 million jobs, because that’s what America needs most right now.  Please don’t ask me where I got that number from because I have no idea; it just sounds good.

It is absolutely true that we can’t depend on government alone to create jobs or economic growth. But I am going to try and convince you otherwise. That is and must be the role of the private sector. I hope you can’t see me laughing my ass off right now. But at this particular moment, with the private sector so weakened by this recession, the federal government is the only entity left with the resources to jolt our economy back into life.  Resources we are going to get by borrowing from other countries and plunging your grandkids into unrecoverable debt.

It is only government that can break the vicious cycle, where lost jobs lead to people spending less money, which leads to even more layoffs. And breaking that cycle is exactly what the plan that’s moving through Congress is designed to do.  I hope no one remembers it was government that actually created this cycle.

When passed, this plan will ensure that Americans who’ve lost their jobs through no fault of their own can receive greater unemployment benefits and continue their health care coverage.  Government will ration health care as it sees fit.

We’ll also provide a $2,500 tax credit to folks who are struggling to pay the costs of their college tuition and $1,000 worth of badly needed tax relief to working- and middle-class families. These steps will put more money in the pockets of those Americans who are most likely to spend it, and that will help break the cycle and get our economy moving.  I’m going to give you back a small portion of your wages.  Be grateful I’m not taking all of it to give to people who don’t pay taxes.

But as we’ve learned very clearly and conclusively over the last eight years, tax cuts alone can’t solve all of our economic problems, especially tax cuts that are targeted to the wealthiest few Americans. We have tried that strategy time and time again, and it’s only helped lead us to the crisis we face right now.  Nevermind that I was a Senator at the time and it was my democrat cronies who made sure that Bush’s plans failed.

And that’s why we have come together around a plan that combines hundreds of billions in tax cuts for the middle class with direct investment in areas like health care, energy, education, and infrastructure, investments that will save jobs, create new jobs and new businesses, and help our economy grow again, now and in the future.  I am trying to keep a straight face as I spout fabricated numbers to you fools.

More than 90 percent of the jobs created by this plan will be in the private sector. They’re not going to be make-work jobs, but jobs doing the work that America desperately needs done: jobs rebuilding our crumbling roads and bridges, repairing our dangerously deficient dams and levees so that we don’t face another Katrina.  I hope you haven’t read the portion of my bill which requires all projects be given to unionized companies.

They’ll be jobs building the wind turbines and solar panels and fuel-efficient cars that will lower our dependence on foreign oil and modernizing our costly health care system that will save us billions of dollars and countless lives.  The global warming scam is working!

They’ll be jobs creating the 21st-century classrooms, libraries, and labs for millions of children across America. And they’ll be the jobs of firefighters and teachers and police officers that would otherwise be eliminated if we do not provide states with some relief.  But no money in this bill will be paid to renovate or repair any school building where any religious activity takes place.

Now, after many weeks of debate and discussion, the plan that ultimately emerges from Congress must be big enough and bold enough to meet the size of the economic challenges that we face right now.  Nancy has been plotting this takeover for several years and it is has only taken two weeks for my glorious skills of rhetoric and spinning to ram it down your collective throats.  What fools you are!

It’s a plan that is already supported by businesses representing almost every industry in America, by both the Chamber of Commerce and the AFL-CIO.  It is a plan supported by those few who have the most to gain. It contains input, ideas and compromises from both Democrats and Republicans. I don’t care if the general population is profoundly against it.  I am the messiah and my will WILL be done!

It also contains an unprecedented level of transparency and accountability so that every American will be able to go online and see where and how we’re spending every dime. Since everyone knows that everything on the internet is true we are going to post how every dime is spent and hope you believe our bull. What it does not contain, however, is a single pet project, not a single earmark, and it has been stripped of the projects members of both parties found most objectionable.  Holding back my laughter right now is about to make me fart.

Now, despite all of this, the plan’s not perfect. because the republicans took out some of my plan. No plan is. I can’t tell you for sure that everything in this plan will work exactly as we hoped since I didn’t get everything I wanted, but I can tell you with complete confidence that a failure to act will not hatch my evil plan of socializing this country only deepen this crisis, as well as the pain felt by millions of Americans.

Now, my administration inherited a deficit of over $1 trillion let me blame Bush for everything one more time in case my plan fails miserably, but because we also inherited the most profound economic emergency since the Great Depression, doing little or nothing at all will result in even greater deficits, even greater job loss, even greater loss of income, and even greater loss of confidence.  Let me hypnotize you with my cadence and eloquence so that you will believe this crap I’m spewing.

Those are deficits that are not as bad as what I am proposing but you are too stupid to know better could turn a crisis into a catastrophe, and I refuse to let that happen. As long as I hold this office, I will do whatever it takes to make you completely dependent on me and my loyal followers as we take over the world put this economy back on track and put this country back to work.

I want to thank my beloved Nancy for hatching this ingenious plan of world domination the members of Congress who’ve worked so hard to move this plan forward, but I also want to urge all republicans to do things my way or you won’t get wagyu steak and martini’s members of Congress to act without delay in the coming week to resolve their differences and pass this plan.

We find ourselves in a rare moment where the citizens of our country and all countries are watching and waiting for us to lead. all of our enemies love me and want me to hypnotize you into complacency so they can bring the war to our soil. It’s a responsibility that this generation did not ask for, but one that we must accept for the future of our children and our grandchildren.

The strongest democracies flourish from frequent and lively debate which is why I won’t allow it, but they endure when people of every background and belief find a way to set aside smaller differences in service to me The One, the messiah of a greater purpose. That’s the test facing the United States of America in this winter of our hardship, and it is our duty as leaders and citizens to stay true to that purpose in the weeks and months ahead.

After a day of speaking with and listening to the fundamentally decent men and women who call this nation home, I have full faith and confidence that we can do it, but we’re going to have to work together. That’s what I intend to promote in the weeks and days ahead.

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