Friday, May 12, 2006

america surveyed

"If only 23 percent of those polled approve of the way Congress is doing its job, how is it that 96 percent of incumbents in the House are re-elected?"
-Letter to the editor, NYTimes

I read this to my boy this morning and he said, and rightly, "Duh! It's all those other guys who are bad!" I might paraphrase slightly, as he doesn't generally employ the term "duh."


But in all seriousness, folks, can I just say that this most recent poll of America's approval ratings of Bush and his administration is really quite astounding? Much as the circa 30% approval rating of Bush as a whole is both mind-boggling and vindicating, what struck me most is that 13% of us continue to approve of his "handling of oil prices" and I began to wonder how many people are employed by the oil industry. But to keep it in perspective, I also read somewhere earlier this week, in reference to this amazing 13%, that 12% of Americans also believe that we or someone we know has had an interaction of some kind with a UFO. I use the term "we" loosely here, as I am not amongst this 12%, though numbers like these can't help but make me proud to be an American. I use the term "proud" loosely here as well.

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