imo both bush and congress are to blame for our problems.

Do we REALLY have to go through this again?
Nobody votes for ‘congress’. Congress is usually seen as synonymous with ‘Politics’, ‘Politicians’ and ‘Government’. Any time that the people are unhappy with anything that they feel that the government could be helping with, they’re going to get really ticked at ‘Congress’.
And gee, wonder what sorts of things they could be unhappy with? The economy, gas prices, the war, etc….
However, this doesn’t always translate to being upset with a party, and it rarely translates to being unhappy with the ones they DO vote for, namely their own, individual Senators and Representatives.
I do notice that you ignored some of the other parts of this article. Not suriticprising, such as.. (Quotes from YOUR article..)
“Despite these negative attitudes towards Congress, Democrats continue to enjoy a double digit lead on the Generic Congressional Ballot.”
Oh, and their upset has to do with believing politicians care more about themselves than the constituents, and ‘not passing legislation that will help people’. NOT with the level of taxes they are paying, or the prospect of paying more taxes.
And I HOPE they point out that the oil drilling will only take ‘seven years, not ten’, in their ads. *grin*
Most voters aren’t aware that its going to take ANY time at all. (Can’t take a sampling of people posting here as representative of the general voter. Most of them are far less informed about current events.) Or only a few months. With no idea that its not ‘remove the restrictions and BAM, there’s tons more oil available. Prices should be down before THIS Christmas.’
So, go ahead. Let them know in your ads that woo, it will be SEVEN years, not TEN, when most of them aren’t aware its even going to take ONE.

So, far from ‘owning those numbers’, the ‘Generic Congressional Ballot’ notes that voters are thirteen percent more likely to vote for a Democratic candidate over a Republican one. And that’s from yesterday.
Its a 28 percent lead when it comes to economic issues, which was seen as being of primary importance to 81 percent of the voters.
Something that might worry you, Democrats even have a 5 percent lead among men. As well as the less surprising 20 percent lead among women.
As I stated, ‘Congress’ in polls, seems to have a sort of generic ‘politics’ meaning. Not translating always to opinions about parties, or their own representatives.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/mood_of_america/congressional_ballot/generic_congressional_ballot

What we need in the country is a sort of national recall, where the voters in the country can throw out any member of congress no matter what the people in his district think of him.

What we need in the country is a sort of national recall, where the voters in the country can throw out any member of congress no matter what the people in his district think of him.
Because, of course, people in one state know who should be in charge in a different one. Really.
Don’t you realize the chaos something like that would cause? If anyone anywhere could recall anyone in government, we’d be bogged down with recall attempts on all sides. It would also completely violate the idea of representative government and of people being able to vote for the candidates they feel can best serve their interests.
It’s a horrible idea all the way around, no matter which side of the political spectrum you’re on.

Speaking of alternatives, in the last eight years I have more than once wished we did have the British parliamentary option of “a vote of no confidence.” We could have avoided most of Bush’s second term that way.

This entire post is based on a LIE.
Again, THIS ENTIRE POST IS BASED ON A LIE.
The poll didn’t ask people approval ratings. They asked , do you think Congress is doing a
a- excellent
b- good
c-fair
d-poor job.
Only 2% said excellent, 7% said good, and 36% said fair. ‘Fair’ could be interpreted two ways. But the GOP immediately spun this poll to say what it’s not saying. Approval was not the question, nor could it have been the answer.
Once again, spin is all you hear, and the facts are not even given a chance. Why does this not surprise me?
The bearing of false witness is no longer a sin. It’s a job description.

RG, you’re absolutely correct. here’s an politico story that rebukes the mistakes pushed by the right-wing media:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20080709/pl_politico/11617
which makes the point from a poll last month:

In last month’s NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, 52 percent of the respondents said they would like to see Congress controlled by the Democrats next year, while just 33 percent said they wanted to see the Republicans back in charge.

michele, obviously cheering for the loosing team, is promoting that republicans get back to the smear and propaganda that they’re so good at: editing soundbytes to 30 misleading seconds; finding a few oil execs who will say anything to get their greedy hands on more free federal lands; and accusing democrats of lies when it comes to middle-class taxes.
“Obama’s saying that those under $250,000 won’t have their taxes raised and that’s a lie and he knows it. Rangel has said that Congress will not be renewing any of Bush’s tax cuts and there were many tax cuts in there for people making under $250,000.”
michele, i made less than $250K and i got nothing from bush’s tax cuts. also, you have no evidence or proof that obama is lying. rangel saying that congress won’t make bush’s tax cuts permanent has nothing to do with potential future tax cuts and to think otherwise is pure simplemindedness.
“They should also make sure that the general public knows that it’s the Democrats who are in charge of Congress and aren’t getting anything done.”
that’s friggin hilarious! considering that congressional democrats are pushing legislation that the majority of us want and that republicans are blocking it, or bush is vetoing it, you really must be hoping for a stupid electorate. yes, i think that the numbers should be put to the general public if only to harden their opposition to republicans.

“If the Republicans were smart (a huge stretch, I know) they would run ads touting the fact that the Democrats are the ones who refuse to drill for oil (which is becoming pretty popular now). And when they do they should address the issue of how long drilling would take (some are saying seven years, not ten) and the impact to the futures market that the news would have. And how far off alternative energy is and how much it would cost each of us to switch to the new energy source (I would assume that we would all have to buy a new car, wouldn’t we? Or is the answer to this problem more trains? Bicycles? Skates?).”
Projections show that ANWR will yield between 5.7 and 16 billion barrels of oil in its lifetime.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/analysis_publications/arctic_national_wildlife_refuge/html/analysisdiscussion.html
According to this government analysis there is a 95% chance that there is at least 5.7 billion barrels in the reserve.
We consume 20 million barrels a day.
tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/mttupus2a.htm
Do the math, Michele. ANWR has a 95% chance of supplying enough oil to keep our country going for…about three years?
Production rates from ANWR would peak at 1.5 million barrels per day under the most likely scenario.
Now, how much would this additional oil affect the market price? Well, in December of 2007 Brazil announced a huge oil discovery.
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7086264.stm
This has estimated reserves around 8 billion barrels, increasing their reserves by well over 50%.
Did you notice any price change because of this announcement last December? No? Well neither did I.
So please…don’t try to blow smoke by telling us that drilling in ANWR will lower our prices, or that it will amount to a hill of beans difference in the day-to-day supply. It won’t, even if all the oil is mandated to stay in the US for production (a provision that would NEVER fly in our Congress, no matter which party controls the place).

This entire post is based on a LIE.
Again, THIS ENTIRE POST IS BASED ON A LIE.
The poll didn’t ask people approval ratings. They asked , do you think Congress is doing a
a- excellent
b- good
c-fair
d-poor job.
Only 2% said excellent, 7% said good, and 36% said fair. ‘Fair’ could be interpreted two ways. But the GOP immediately spun this poll to say what it’s not saying. Approval was not the question, nor could it have been the answer.
Once again, spin is all you hear, and the facts are not even given a chance. Why does this not surprise me?
The bearing of false witness is no longer a sin. It’s a job description.
Posted by: RG | July 9, 2008 4:13 PM
____________________________________________________________
Boo hoo, RG is upset that RASMUSSEN reported its own TRACKING as “APPROVAL RATINGs FALLING”.
RG’s protest is that the word “FAIR” can be interpreted many ways however “RG” would like it to be interpreted so that it doesn’t mean the DUMMYCRAT Congress is miserable and viewed less favorable than at any time.
You see the problem RG? It isn’t YOUR report, it’s RASMUSSEN’S and guess who gets to determine HOW they used the word “fair” which, by the way, they determined it was used as a less than favorable rating? DUH DUH, I’ll give you a hint, it starts with an “R”. Ding dong is anyone home?
Next please!
Rasmussen

Dummycrat? Wow, that’s such a mature insult, Guy.
Actually, the article, as I cited, specifically noted that the view of Congress was not specifically aimed at Democrats, who are actually polling more than 10 points higher than Republicans.
And, as noted once again, this doesn’t seem to extend to specific Congressmen and women.
Since nobody actually votes for ‘Congress’ on any ballot, in other words, this says nothing about what will happen in the next election. Indeed, the other poll, also by, who was that, ‘Rasmussen’?
Yeah, them, stated that Americans, by a good ten points, preferred to elect Democrats over Republicans.
But I guess that means you are going to have to view a majority of your fellow citizens as ‘Dummies’.

Grade- school- Guy strikes again.
Boy, how can I argue with such piercing intellect? Especially when he has not one single fact to argue with.
Tell you what, grade -school Guy. Read what the Rasmussen poll said, If you can read.
I’m telling the truth. The GOP is lying. I wish that were a surprise.

Psst, hate to inform everyone but Congress approvals ratings are statistically irrelevant. Why? Because these polls access state/district elected officials by NATIONAL polling. The ONLY relevant stat would be to find the average of all the individual approval ratings of each senator and representative. I can promise you THAT number would be MUCH higher than the incompetent and disliked Bush. Political polls only have meaning when potential voters are polled about THEIR potential candidates. I don’t believe that voters in New York can vote for senators/reps from Missouri, etc unless the US Constitution was changed while I wasn’t paying attention.
Please show a tinge of competence the next time and do the PROPER polling, not some nonsense poll that has NOTHING to do with “Congressional approval.” Absolutely nothing…garbage in –> garbage out!