All Blog Posts from Political Hotsheet

The latest CBS News Poll, conducted in early October, found President Obama's approval rating hasn't changed much over the past few months, but it is down from the high he reached in April, as he neared the end of his first hundred days in office.

The president's overall job approval rating was 56 percent in early October, with 34 percent disapproving, and 10 percent saying they don't know. Approval dropped twelve points since April, when 68 percent approved.



Mr. Obama has lost ground with independents and Republicans. In the October CBS News Poll, just 20 percent of Republicans approved, down from 31 percent in April. Most recently 52 percent of independents approved, down 13 points from 65 percent. 91 percent Democrats approved in April; 87 percent do so now.

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President Obama is hitting the campaign trail tonight in New Jersey to stump for the state's incumbent Democratic Governor, Jon Corzine, who is locked in a tough re-election battle.

While some have characterized this race as referendum on Mr. Obama, recent polling may indicate that the New Jersey race for governor is about… well, New Jersey.

Mr. Obama, who won the Garden State by 15 points last November, remains popular here: 62 percent approve of the job he is doing as president according to the latest New York Times Poll.

As for Corzine, he receives only a 33 percent approval rating from New Jersey residents.

Independents are a key group in almost any election and most New Jersey independents (63%) approve of the job Mr. Obama is doing as president, but only 25% of this group likes the way Governor Corzine is handling his job. And while the incumbent Governor receives a 56% approval rating among Democrats, that is 49 points lower than the approval rating Democrats in New Jersey give Mr. Obama (85%).



Will Mr. Obama's popularity translate into votes? Well, at this point, two in three New Jersey voters say the President's endorsement of Mr. Corzine will make no difference in their vote.

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While the debate in Congress over including a "public option" in health care reform legislation continues, Americans' views on a government-administered health plan are clearer: more than half support it.

Recent CBS News Polls have shown that a majority of Americans consistently supports a public option – defined as a government-administered health insurance plan something like the Medicare coverage that people 65 and older receive that would compete with private health insurance plans.

And although support has dropped ten points since June, 62 percent favored it in an early October CBS News Poll, while just half as many, 31 percent, opposed it.



Recent polls conducted by other media and polling organizations also find a majority in support of a public option.

While each pollster asks the question slightly differently, levels of support are now similar. A ABC News/Washington Post poll released today found 57 percent supported the government creating "a new health insurance plan to compete with private health insurance plans." That's up from 55 percent in their previous poll last month.

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A CBS News Poll conducted in early October found just under half of Americans said they were likely to get vaccinated against the H1N1 flu, including only 28 percent who said they were very likely to do so. Other recent polls show similar results: for example, just 52 percent of respondents in an AP/GfK poll also conducted in early October said they were likely to be vaccinated.

In fact, those findings aren't much different than reaction to past flu outbreaks.

The last serious outbreak of the H1N1 virus in this country occurred in 1976. Then, the U.S. government undertook a public health campaign urging people to get the vaccine, and many millions of Americans did so. But questions arose about possible serious and potentially life-threatening side effects from the vaccine, and the vaccination program was cancelled in December.

In August 1976, 53 percent of Americans interviewed in a Gallup poll said they planned to get the swine flu inoculation shots when they became available -- slightly higher, but not much different, than today. Seventeen percent said they would not get the vaccine, and 30 percent weren't sure.

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As the United States marks eight years of military engagement in Afghanistan, a majority of Americans think that war is going badly for the U.S. and they are divided on whether the United States is doing the right thing by being involved there now.

This is a reversal from October 2001, when the U.S. began military action in Afghanistan. With the country still reeling from the September 11th attacks, support for military action in Afghanistan was high and broad. Ninety percent of Americans approved of it, including solid majorities of both Democrats and Republicans.


CBSNews.com Special Report: Afghanistan



But eight years later the country is split on U.S. involvement in Afghanistan, according to a CBS News/New York Times Poll conduced September 19-23. Forty-seven percent say the U.S. is doing the right thing by fighting there, but 42 percent think the U.S. should not be involved. And there is a partisan divide now; most Republicans say the U.S. is doing the right thing, while most Democrats disagree. Independents are divided.

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When President Obama delivered his speech on health care to a joint session of Congress in early September, he talked of the need for health care reform as a moral obligation. He quoted a letter written by the late Sen. Edward Kennedy: "What we face is above all a moral issue; at stake are not just the details of policy, but fundamental principles of social justice and the character of our country."

The latest CBS News/New York Times Poll, conducted September 19-23, finds that Americans divide on whether or not the federal government has a moral responsibility to guarantee health care for everyone: 47 percent say the government does, while 48 percent believe it does not.

CBSNews.com Special Report: Health Care

Most age groups split on this question, with the exception of those age 65 and over. While seniors are eligible for Medicare -- a health program administered by the government – 55 percent of them do not think the government has a moral responsibility to guarantee health coverage for all Americans. Seniors also give Mr. Obama his lowest ratings on health care of any age group. Just 38 percent of them approve.

In terms of gender, half of women consider providing health care to everyone to be a moral responsibility, while 53 percent of men oppose that view.

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It has been a year since the failure of Lehman Brothers and the subsequent financial and banking crisis on Wall Street that brought the U.S. economy to the brink of collapse; while for months Americans have ranked the economy as the most important problem the country faces, opinions about measures to address the economic instability resulting from last fall's events have found mixed support at best.

In polls conducted last fall, both the general principle of providing government assistance to financial institutions and the specific legislation Congress passed last fall met with lukewarm public support.

A CBS News/New York Times poll conducted September 21-24, 2008, in the immediate aftermath of the collapse of Lehman Brothers, found just 42 percent of Americans approved of the government providing money to Wall Street, and more, 46 percent, disapproved. Those sentiments transcended partisanship: just 43 percent of Republicans, 41 percent of Democrats and 4 percent of independents approved. By October, just 36 percent approved of this approach, and 52 percent disapproved.

Views have not changed much since then. In March 2009, a CBS News Poll found 41 percent approved -- and more, 50 percent, disapproved -- of the government providing money to banks and other financial institutions to try to "help fix the country's economic problems."

Why such lukewarm support for these plans, which were presented as helping the U.S. economy avoid the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression?

One answer could be the blame Americans placed on the banks themselves for the financial troubles they were experiencing. The September 2008 poll found that 46 percent of the public thought that bad management by the banks was to blame for those problems, and just 27 percent thought that a lack of government supervision was to blame. Another 17 percent thought both were at fault. By March, fully 75 percent of Americans felt that the banks' problems were caused by management decisions, and only 17 percent thought they were the result of conditions beyond the banks' control.

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As the country awaits President Barack Obama's speech on health care reform Wednesday night, it might be helpful to take a look at the impact of a similar speech then-President Bill Clinton made about health care reform in September 1993. To what extent did that speech affect -- or not affect -- the debate over health care?

Sixteen years ago, views of the U.S. health care system were very negative -- much as they are now. Nine in ten Americans felt the U.S. health care system needed fundamental changes or to be completely rebuilt. At the time, many thought the system was headed for a financial crisis.

But there was confusion: in September of 1993, most Americans didn't have a clear view of how President Clinton's health care reform plans would affect them. A CBS News/New York Times Poll conducted just before President Clinton's speech found that only 13 percent of Americans had a good understanding of what the Clinton health care plan would mean to them, and 84 percent felt it was too early to tell.

Forty percent felt that the reforms the president was proposing were fair to people like themselves, but almost as many, 36 percent, felt they were not fair. In addition, the public was divided, 41 percent to 41 percent, as to whether the Clinton plan would bring about the changes the health care system needed. And Mr. Clinton's job approval rating was 43 percent, with nearly as many, 42 percent, disapproving.

Late in September, the president gave a speech on health care reform.

A CBS News Poll conducted in early October showed the speech as having a limited impact. The percentage who felt they had a clear understanding of what the Clinton health care reform plan would mean rose just a bit, from 13 percent to 23 percent. And while there was a modest increase in the percentage of Americans who thought Mr. Clinton's reforms were fair to them -- from 40 percent before the speech to 45 percent -- the percentage that thought the plan would make health care better dropped slightly, from 46 percent to 43 percent.

By mid-October, Americans were reacting to the health care plan just as they did before Mr. Clinton's September 22 address to the nation. Much of the improvement in perception that occurred after the speech had disappeared; Americans were evenly divided on whether the plan would be fair to them, and were also divided on Mr. Clinton's handling of health care reform. By mid-October, only 18 percent said they had a good understanding of the plan.

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Sen. Edward Kennedy, the youngest brother of President John F. Kennedy and the third longest-serving Senator in U.S. history, had been a polarizing figure in American politics.

In a CBS News/New York Times poll conducted in August 2008, Americans voters were divided in their opinion of him: 34 percent held a favorable opinion, while 33 percent viewed him unfavorably. Not surprisingly, the Massachusetts Senator was more popular with Democrats than Republicans.

The poll was taken just before the 2008 Democratic convention where Sen. Kennedy delivered a speech supporting Barack Obama and talked of his signature issue, health care:

CBSNews.com Special Report: Ted Kennedy

"And this is the cause of my life -- new hope that we will break the old gridlock and guarantee that every American -- north, south, east, west, young, old -- will have decent, quality health care as a fundamental right and not a privilege."

CBS NEWS/NYT POLL - AUGUST 2008 (registered voters)
Opinions of Sen. Kennedy were more positive in 2008 compared to 1995. Back in 1984, views of him were divided much as they are now. More voters viewed him negatively than positively back in September 1980, shortly after his unsuccessful run for the presidency.

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As the people of Afghanistan head to the polls today, Americans remain pessimistic about how things are going for the U.S. in that country.

According to a recent CBS News/New York Times Poll (July 24-28, 2009), only a third of Americans think the war in Afghanistan is going well for the U.S. Most – 57 percent - say the war is going badly. Six U.S. troops were killed in Afghanistan on Wednesday and last month was the deadliest for U.S. forces in Afghanistan since the war began.

Assessments of the war in Afghanistan are markedly more negative now than at the early stages of the conflict. In October 2001, when the war began, 83 percent of Americans said things were going well for the U.S. there, reaching a high of 93 percent in December of that year.

It was a different story seven years later. Only 27 percent said U.S. efforts in Afghanistan were going well in December 2008 –- an all-time low. Since the start of this year, the percentage who says the war is going well has hovered in the 30s.

Majorities of both Republicans (56 percent) and Democrats (58 percent) think the war in Afghanistan is going badly for the United States.

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