Bush's approval is up. Fortunately, it still isn't very good, but you would have to be in denial at this point to not notice the upward trend. Just
take a quick look at Charles Franklin's Bush approval graph, and this is pretty much undisputable. Of course, as I also said,
Bush's approval still isn't very good:
With the latest addition, my trend estimate of approval is now at 40.6%, the first time the approval trend has topped 40% in some long while. The last reading over 40% was 2/16/06.
I'll take 40.6%. Remember, it was only 13 months ago that Bush's approval had never dropped below 40% in any poll, so in many ways our perspective on his approval has been skewed by just how terrible it has been over the past seven months. I have a number in my head, 43.0%, that serves as the dividing line between a potential wave election for Democrats and an election where our best hope is for narrow control. (Don't ask me how I came to that number, I just have.) In the generic ballot, I'll stay reasonably confident as long as our five-poll average lead stays over 8.0%. Right now,
it is at 11.6%. Again, don't ask where I am pulling those numbers from.
What I really wanted to address in this post, however, are the ridiculous rationales members of the established media have given to the rise in Bush's approval prices. Much like the children who think that rain is caused because God is peeing, political journalists seem to be convinced of an equally ridiculous cause supposedly being behind the rise in Bush's approval rating. Namely, journalists have a strong tendency to tie it to the media cycle and campaign events. Hogwash, I say.
How many people watch the news? How many people are familiar with the twists and turns of the news cycle, or with the contents of recent speeches, even if those speeches are given by Bush? Not many. The real cause of the rise in Bush's approval rating can be found in the simplest explanation: gad prices are down. Not only can a lot more people tell you the price of gas than what Bush recently said, but
Professor Pollkatz has consistently provided strong, statistical evidence to support this conclusion. The explanations offered by journalists tend to be purely conjecture. Hopefully Professor Pollkatz will forgive me for reproducing his graph here, but take a look at the relationship between Bush's approval and the price of gas over the past twelve months:
(click on the pic for a larger version). Bush's approval is not up because of his speeches on terrorism, or some other baseless, purely conjectural reason. Bush's approval is up because gas prices are down. This is probably related to releasing part of the strategic reserves this spring, just as in 2004 around election time it was related to making a deal with the Saudis to increase oil production. It didn't stop raining because God stopped peeing. Bush's approval is not up because he is using better talking points in his speeches.
That gas prices are dropping around election time is no surprise at all. In fact,
I predicted it would happen five weeks ago. When a power-mad administration is this marinated in the oil industry, and when it isn't exactly a state secret (except, apparently, for journalists) that Presidential approval has long been tied to the price of gas, of course the Bush administration was going to do something to lower the prices of gas around election time. That is just one reason why I tried to tell people to be prepared for Republicans to close the gap, and why I was happy in August that we had such a large lead. If we had a ridiculous lead, as we had in mid-August, then even when Republicans catch up, our numbers should still look good. And, as I said, despite the trend, our numbers still look good. If they improve another three or four points for Republicans, then I will start to get worried. For now, however, I just want to remind everyone what is really causing Bush's approval to rise, and it ain't because he put Pop Rocks in a can of Jolt.
