"Compromise" Has Damaged Obama's Popularity

There was a perception that President Obama had angered a lot of his supporters last week when he capitulated to the Republicans and agreed to a massive tax cut for the richest 2% of Americans -- something he promised not to do while on the campaign trail in 2008.   He also agreed to a huge cut in the estate tax for those same rich people.   A poll just released by McClatchy/Marist shows that the president has indeed lost some support.

The poll showed President Obama is now at his lowest level of support since assuming the presidency.   His approval rating now stands at 42%, while his disapproval rating has risen to 50%.   And the new lower approval rating is not among independents or Republicans -- their approval rating for Obama remained about the same.   The loss of support has come from Democrats and liberals.  

Among Democrats his approval rating dropped about 9 points -- from 83% to 74%.   There was also a 9 point drop among liberals, where the approval rating went from 78% to 69%.   Even worse for the president, the poll shows he could lose to at least one Republican candidate (Romney) if the election were held today.   This marks the first time since he took office that any Republican finished ahead of him in a poll (although it was within the 3.5% margin of error).   Here are the numbers:

Romney...............46%
Obama...............44%

Obama...............47%
Huckabee...............43%

Obama...............52%
Palin...............40%

Of course, it's still a long time until the next presidential and the numbers will probably go up and down a lot before we get there.   But the poll does show the president hurt himself with his own base -- the people who must go to the polls and vote if the Democrats are going to do well in 2012.

It was bad enough that the president capitulated to the Republicans over tax cuts for the rich, but he then compounded that mistake by chewing out his liberal supporters who were unhappy about it.   I am one of those liberal supporters.   I supported Obama is the primaries when he ran against Clinton and in the general election, but I have to admit that right now I am very disillusioned.   Obama is obviously not the fighter I and many others thought we were voting for.

He brought ex-president Bill Clinton up to Capitol Hill recently to help win support for his capitulation.   It could work with the congressional Democrats -- I expect it will since most of them don't have much more spine than he does.   But that's not going to help with the real liberals and progressives (who have never been impressed with Clinton's liberal credentials, which are almost nonexistent).

If President Obama continues to walk the path of capitulation (which is very possible with Republicans assuming the majority in the House), he may be shocked at how bad the election in 2012 turns out.   He's still got time, but he needs to show his base that he's got some fight in him -- something we haven't seen so far.