Comments on: Americans Love Partianship http://www.historyishappeningnow.com/2009/02/17/americans-love-partianship/ Yet another political blog Mon, 04 Jan 2010 19:51:44 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: Lee http://www.historyishappeningnow.com/2009/02/17/americans-love-partianship/comment-page-1/#comment-803 Lee Wed, 18 Feb 2009 22:10:52 +0000 http://www.historyishappeningnow.com/?p=2575#comment-803 <p>As Reuters points out, Congress always has low approval ratings; it's recent low was low by historical standards; it's current bump up is more a relative bump, not absolute.  If Democrats had started from a much larger starting point, then negotiated down to a level well above the current amt. -- with more spending and fewer tax cuts -- I think Democrats would be happier when the economic commentators they trusted said that the stimulus amount was large enough to do the job -- or at least not as bad as it could have been.  Independents probably would have had a mixed response, depending on the reasons they decided they were happy with Congress.</p> As Reuters points out, Congress always has low approval ratings; it’s recent low was low by historical standards; it’s current bump up is more a relative bump, not absolute.  If Democrats had started from a much larger starting point, then negotiated down to a level well above the current amt. — with more spending and fewer tax cuts — I think Democrats would be happier when the economic commentators they trusted said that the stimulus amount was large enough to do the job — or at least not as bad as it could have been.  Independents probably would have had a mixed response, depending on the reasons they decided they were happy with Congress.

]]> By: Ian http://www.historyishappeningnow.com/2009/02/17/americans-love-partianship/comment-page-1/#comment-802 Ian Tue, 17 Feb 2009 22:28:52 +0000 http://www.historyishappeningnow.com/?p=2575#comment-802 <p>I think Americans love it that Congress DID something. It wasn't the partisanship that impressed Americans -- it was the bill itself. <br /><br />Not that Americans were all that impressed. A 43% approval rating is nothing to brag about, uptick or no uptick. Let's see if it continues to climb.</p> <p>The question is: If Democrats had insisted on pushing through a bigger bill -- and Republicans had responded with a filabuster in the Senate -- would Dems' approval ratings be so high?</p> I think Americans love it that Congress DID something. It wasn’t the partisanship that impressed Americans — it was the bill itself.

Not that Americans were all that impressed. A 43% approval rating is nothing to brag about, uptick or no uptick. Let’s see if it continues to climb.

The question is: If Democrats had insisted on pushing through a bigger bill — and Republicans had responded with a filabuster in the Senate — would Dems’ approval ratings be so high?

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