I recall reading last week that some Republicans were quite upset that Bush addressed the nation about Iraq in prime time. After all the careful choreography that went into building up General Petraeus as a credible mouthpiece for the surge, here was an unpopular president going on TV to defend an unpopular war and many feared it would be to the detriment of the 2008 candidates who are trying to balance support for the war with criticism of the way Bush has managed it; here Bush reminded the country Bush = the war, you support one, you support the other.

Despite the concerns, Bush of course went on the air anyway, perhaps emboldened by the slight uptick in approval he experienced in August and early September (AP showed him as high as 35%, CNN at 36% and Fox at 37%.) As you can see from Pollster's trend estimate chart, his job approval rating has been on an upward trajectory, with a current trend estimate at 33.3%.

With this in mind, take a look at the three job approval ratings that were registered in polls taken during and since September 13, the date of his prime time address (h/t Polling Report):

CBS (9/14-16)
29%

Zogby/Reuters (9/13-9/16)
29%

Pew (9/12-9/16)  
31%

It's been a while since Bush has hit a new low in a poll so you'll be pleased to know that this trend is over as well. Zogby's 29% is the lowest approval rating Bush has ever gotten in that poll (his previous worst was 30% in March.)

In fairness, the Pew and CBS polls have registered low numbers for Bush pretty consistently so the real test of whether Bush has experienced a statistically significant drop post-speech is if his approval ratings in the next CNN and Fox polls drop from their meteoric mid-to-upper 30s heights. But at the very least, we can expect to see Pollster's upward trend estimate arrow level off and the 33.3% drop once these more recent polls are factored in.