Image 01 Image 03

Disapproving of Obama

Disapproving of Obama

Those polls are interesting, but are they important?

We keep seeing reports about how Obama’s approval ratings are “hovering near his all-time lows,” but at this point in his presidency, do low numbers really mean that much?

The latest polls show that only 43% now consider him a strong leader. Only? That 43% figure apparently represents the number of Americans who don’t read the news, don’t care, and/or are so firmly planted in the Democratic camp that nothing could dislodge them. It is not an encouraging statistic, because it should be in single digits, but overall it’s not terribly significant from a governing standpoint.

Why would Obama care about his rating? He will never run for office again (if the 22nd Amendment holds up,) and although he doesn’t enjoy disapproval—he’d much prefer the wild adulation he’s accustomed to—he can take it, because both his narcissism and his staff (and the perks of his office, like vacations and golf) shield him from it. The only reason he would care about this level of disapproval is if it makes it harder for him to do what he wants to do in his next two and a half years of office.

Disapproval would make it harder for Obama to do things, if in fact he was making any attempt to cater to the wishes of the American people, or at least to cajole and fool them into thinking he is. But for Obama, bucking the majority opinion on a number of fronts, both foreign and domestic, is nothing new. It’s actually a hallmark of his presidency, Obamacare being one of the earliest and most prominent examples. The bill was never popular, but that never mattered to him or his Democratic leaders in Congress: it was going to be happen anyway, by hook or by crook. Same with amnesty, same with whatever else he might have in mind.

The dilemma for Obama is how to present it to the American people in such a way that they don’t elect a Congress in 2014 that is so overwhelmingly Republican that it would block his agenda. Even if that were to happen, though, Obama figures he can get around such a Congress through executive action. You can bet he has a team of lawyers working hard to figure out the best way to do that without running afoul of the Supreme Court.

As a check on Obama, there’s always the power of Congress to impeach and convict (impeachment is nothing without conviction), which would depend on how many votes there would be for conviction in the Senate. And that’s another reason Obama might be paying at least a tiny bit of lip service to soothing the American people prior to that 2014 election. Even then, for conviction in the Senate a two-thirds (67) vote would be necessary.

It is certainly theoretically possible for there to be enough votes in the Senate as a result of the 2014 election to convict Obama, although it is highly unlikely. Currently there are 45 Republicans in the Senate, with 53 Democrats and 2 Independents who caucus with the Democrats, making a grand total of 55 for the Democrats.

However, 21 Democratic Senate seats are up for grabs in 2014, as opposed to 15 Republican ones. If the impossible were to happen and Republicans won all of the contested Democratic seats and lost none of their own, Republicans would still have only 66 Senate seats, and would need one Democrat to cross over and join them in order to convict.

But of course, there is almost no chance of such a sweep happening in the first place. Any effort to impeach and convict Obama, even if Republicans gain a majority that’s electorally realistic, would require significantly more Democratic crossover votes than one. It is hard to imagine a scenario where enough Democrats would be willing to do that.

The last direct power the American people had over Obama was the 2012 election, and they blew it. Now they are stuck, and Obama knows it, which gives him freedom as defined in the song “Me and Bobby McGee”: nothin’ left to lose.

[Neo-neocon is a writer with degrees in law and family therapy, who blogs at neo-neocon.]

DONATE

Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.

Tags:

Comments

“Social permission” is a powerful thing. Bad polling can constitute such permission.

We may not have found the Barracula polling floor yet.

I don’t think that obama cares one way or the other what the American people think. He has lived in his own world since he took office and appears not to be about to change now. He is the center of the world so why would the little satellites matter?

Doug Wright Old Grouchy | September 11, 2014 at 6:39 pm

Yep, Obama quite frankly, doesn’t give a damn about public opinion as such. He might if it were to impact his perks and benefits but that’s a low probability, IMHO!

Yep, Obama doesn’t care about the job of being president, the benes are wonderful, however.

Lastly, he doesn’t truly understand why he’s not adored now yet doesn’t give a rip either. He’s accomplishing his goals of radically transforming this country and that’s his only desire, well, except to also make out of there alive.

Mostly O/T – Given he practically lives on the golf course, we understandably see it all over the news whenever he goes. How come nobody in media ever posts his scores or his handicap? State secret? Naw.. he must be so bad at it the lib media is hiding his scores.

It really and truly scares me how blindly faithful the Democrats are to Obama.

There was an article run just this week about how the unemployment rate under Obama matches the unemployment rate under Reagan at this stage in his recovery.

Yes, that’s right, they’re actually claiming that Obama’s ‘recovery’ is on the same track as Reagans.

I spent nearly an hour arguing with two Democrats, pointing out the myriad data points of GDP, labor force participation, worker income, etc, and they just kept insisting that I was just spouting ‘right wing talking points’ and hated Obama.

Obama’s approval will never drop below high 30%. The Democrats simply will never, EVER believe he has done anything wrong.

The inability of otherwise smart people to just take an objective look at how poor a leader Obama is truly frightens me.

JackRussellTerrierist | September 12, 2014 at 2:14 am

The 43% is most likely comprised of the vast majority of blacks, libtards and the hopelessly clueless.

43% !!

Hey, it’s down from 47%

Why hasn’t Obama done something about Ray Rice … he is the “smartest man in the room” and surely knew from the beginning and yet he did nothing.

In many polls, Obama has an 80% approval rating from blacks. This is an astounding number when you consider how blacks, under the Obama administration, have fared worse than every other group in America.
>
So what could they have based their 80% approval rating on? During the last 6 years, Obama has been found to be a pathological liar. Everything that was initially stated about Benghazi, the IRS scandal, and many other scandals proved to be lies. He has lied repeatedly about Obamacare as well as many other issues facing America. To receive an approval rating of 80%, people must either not see his statements as lies or else think they must think that lying is not important.
>
Obama’s policies have also resulted in the slowest recovery since WWII, has caused the southern border to be porous such that hundreds of thousands stream across the border, and so forth. Obama’s policies have left America weaker and far more vulnerable than ever before, but evidently these are not important issues to those that give Obama an 80% approval rating.
>
The only reason why the black community gives Obama an 80%approval rating is that they either have a completely different value system than any other American or that they base their approval on the fact that Obama is black. All evidence points to he latter and, if this is indeed correct, then it is a clear demonstration of racism.