What's Behind Those Bad Poll Numbers - INCOMPETENCE! (WaPo)

[kpete]

What's Behind Those Bad Poll Numbers

By Alan Abramowitz
Sunday, March 5, 2006; Page B03

Judging by the numbers, it wasn't a good week for George Bush. Of course, news that the administration had approved a deal to turn over the operation of six U.S. ports to a company owned by the United Arab Emirates did nothing to buoy his sagging approval ratings. But the truly damaging revelation, from a public relations perspective, was the admission by White House press secretary Scott McClellan that the president didn't even know about the deal until after it had appeared on the front pages of newspapers around the country. That shocked even many Republican loyalists.

The problem for President Bush is a growing perception that he simply isn't competent. That's the story behind the polling numbers that have declined -- bad week by bad week -- since February 2005 when the president's approval rating stood at a respectable 52 percent.

The predecessor whom Bush has begun to resemble isn't, as many liberal Democrats seem to believe, Richard Nixon. It's Jimmy Carter. Carter's political demise began when the American people, including many Democrats, started to perceive him as in over his head in the Oval Office. That's what may be happening now to Bush.

.................

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/03/AR2006030302044.html

[HockeyMom]

1. Bush ran 3 companies into the ground

And now he is running an entire COUNTRY into the ground. On second thought, make that TWO countries (including Iraq), into the ground.

Is he trying to tie his recored with a THIRD now (Iran)?

[peacebird]

5. 3 companies and 3 countries - Afghanistan not looking so good either

[HockeyMom]

12. Forget about Afgansitan, like so many other people

Thank you for reminding me.

Make that FOUR countries, then.

[Warpy]

2. What the hell took them so long?

Anybody who watched Texas go from a budget surplus to a deep debt when he was governor knows the man is incompetent. Anybody who listened to any of his speeches when he tried to extemporize knows he's incompetent. Anybody who has read his quotes about hands-off management, not reading newspapers or watching newscasts and relying on a cherrypicked staff of sycophants to tell him the news knows he's incompetent.

If it took the people now saying they disapprove 5 long years to recognize this, then the country is doomed.

[indie_voter]

3. "growing perception" ? No WP

The problem for President Bush is a growing perception that he simply isn't competent.

it's a growing realization he is incompetent.

[daleanime]

4. Bush?Competent?

I can't even type that with a straight face.:banghead:

[Disturbed]

7. Trust

Most Americans are not very political. They don't pay attention to details. The RW Corp. Media is propping up the Bush Regime. The tally of events, the numerous scandals, Iraq and Afghanistan bleeding and the Katina failures are taking their tolls. Even the apolitical and apathetic are starting to lose trust in the shrub and his Neo Fascist criminals.

[Kierkegaard]

10. The competence of Commander Codpiece on display here:

http://www.ebaumsworld.com/gwbushdrunk.html

[Ecumenist]

6. no kidding.....

He's a waste of skin and bones and I don't understand why Carter is perceived as a failure. Although I wasn't old enough to vote at the time, I am VERY aware of the tricks that the Reagan campaign used to try to make it seem as if he was in control before he was even "elected". If I remember correctly, Didn't the Iran Contra grow out of their gameplaying with the hostages in Tehran?
The only thing that bush is a success in is being a world class failure. The "media" is just now admitting what we've been saying from jump street.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

8. the only reason Carter is called a failure is

because the cabal run by Bush INc which stirred up the mullahs in Iran, and then illegally went around the US foreign policy by giving them arms for hostages and delaying their release by five months did what they did.

other than that, he was not a failure.

if he had done what he should have done, arrested the scum who were subverting the US policy and trying them for treason, it would be a different world now.

but, he followed the rules against people who had no rules.

[Ecumenist]

9. Amen, WannaJumpMyScooter...

:think:

[indie_voter]

11. YES!

I will NEVER forget the sleazy deal that freed the hostages the moment Reagan (fixed spelling) was inaugurated. It was sickening.

I really thought we hit a low point during that time, little did I know.

I hope history vindicates Carter.

[MissWaverly]

13. I now think that it's totally odd that a bunch of Iranian

students would want to take US hostages, maybe PLO members or Hamas but not students, but
back then our knowledge of covert operations was a little naive. Also the happy release just as Reagan and his v.p. George H. Bush take power, again another odd occurrence.

[indie_voter]

14. I know, in retrospect it is very strange

The release right when Reagan took power stunk from day one. In retrospect, I think that was beginning of the end of the media being an independent body.

[MissWaverly]

16. not only the media

I think that there are powerful people who starting shaping things for their own ends,
like after Nixon announced the end of the cold war, war hawks keep beating the drum
to keep the money flowing even though there was no need, just think if all that money
had been used on social programs. (and the repugs are still portraying liberals as
spendthrifts); we have spent far more on defense, nuclear weapons and the war machine than
we ever did on social programs.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

15. History will, I believe.

and it was a low point.

[Disturbed]

17. The MIC must be fed.

War is good for those that profit from it.

[JerseygirlCT]

18. Comparing Bush to Carter is just

Sick.

Wow. Can't get in a word about the final awakening of the American people to what we've all known for years and years without taking a dig at Clinton or Carter, can they?

Jimmy Carter may not have been the most effective president. It's arguable, I suppose.

But he is heads and shoulders and entire bodies above that poor excuse for a human being occupying the White House now. Morals? Intelligence? Charity? Work-ethic?

[Skittles]

19. I absolutely resent the comparison to Jimmy Carter

he was elected and he truly cared about the American people