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Obama’s approval rating: not perfect, but close

Dante Chinni

Posted: 04.13.2009 / 7:50 AM PDT

There may be no such thing as a perfect approval rating, but the latest set of numbers for President Obama look awfully good.

The deluge of polls in recent days shows Mr. Obama in the 60-plus percent approval area. While those surveys show Republicans and Democrats are divided on Obama’s performance, he is buoyed by wide support among independents and moderates.

A look at the latest Pew Center for the People and Press survey broken down by Patchwork Nation community type shows just how broad Obama’s support is at this early stage of his presidency. Obama is above 50 percent in every one of our 11 community types, even the most conservative, and he is above 60 percent in most.

Considering the large-scale moves the Obama administration has made since its arrival in Washington – from the auto bailout to the disbursement of the second half of the federal Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) money – those high numbers could be read a few ways. They could be seen as big support for Obama’s agenda or appreciation for an administration that has embraced bold action in a time of crisis – even if some question those actions. They might also be a positive response to what some see as an economic situation that is slowly improving.

But whatever the meaning, the numbers show the Obama team has wide public support as it enters a period where it hopes to take up a host of tough issues, ranging from immigration to health are.

The differences

Of course, the numbers for Obama are not uniform across Patchwork Nation.

As one might expect, his support is strongest in our big-city “Industrial Metropolis” communities, where he has an approval rating of 81 percent among registered voters. He won those overwhelmingly liberal places by a wide margin in November.

But more important to Obama may be the high levels of support he is seeing in the wealthy, educated “Monied ’Burbs,” where his approval rating is at 70 percent. Those communities are the most populous in Patchwork Nation and they hold high numbers of swing voters.

The president also has high approval numbers in other key swing community types: the growing, diversifying “Boom Towns” and the small-town “Service Worker Centers.” In those places he has approval numbers of 63 percent and 64 percent, respectively.

If Obama keeps his approval numbers up in those communities, he will be able to push hard on his agenda.

Perhaps most surprising for Obama are the high numbers from communities that are traditionally more conservative.

Obama is at 56 percent approval in our socially conservative “Evangelical Epicenters,” and he is at 60 percent in our agricultural “Tractor Country” counties. Obama lost the vote in those community types by large margins in November.

A European bounce

Again, considering the kinds of contentious issues Obama has taken on, these figures are high and at the very least suggest a broad desire to see the new president succeed. But remember polls are snapshots of public opinion at a particular time.

This particular survey was conducted March 31 to April 6 as Obama was out of the country on his first overseas trip and winning the hearts of foreign crowds and media. Much of the press coverage during his time was devoted to how wildly popular Obama was overseas and how he has improved the United States’ image abroad.

That coverage probably played some role in how people viewed Obama in those few days.

And it helps to remember that Obama’s numbers, which are without question quite high, look positively stratospheric compared with the extremely low numbers former President George W. Bush had as he left office.

Pew’s final poll had Bush at 24 percent approval overall. And a different poll showed that all of Patchwork Nation’s 11 community types, even the most conservative, believed Bush’s presidency would be remembered as a failure.

Still, even with the suggestion in recent weeks that Obama has become a divisive figure, it seems that the divide he has created does not go down the center. These numbers suggest the White House has moved that divide over and carved into the right side of political spectrum.

That’s not shocking. The decline in self-identified Republicans is well-noted.

But beyond that, these numbers suggest that, at the moment anyway, the anti-Obama sentiment across the country is not only focused in conservative communities, but among the most conservative in those conservative communities. It is a distinctly minority view.