Pollster.com

SurveyUSA generally puts out some pretty sketchy numbers, but this takes the cake. Obama is less popular in VA than KS? These kind of results would put John Zogby to shame. The only numbers that seem accurate are KS, KY, and maybe AL.

Sketchy indeed, and check out some of the internals, especially the approval numbers for blacks. In the 60s in Virginia? In the 70s in Alabama? Gallup shows Obama with national approval from blacks in the low 90s. These numbers are not credible. And approval numbers for Democrats are also well below those in recent national polls.

Awwww, look. Libs don't like the numbers so hte poll is bunk....geeee, never would have predicted that response.

I don't think either of those posters are liberal Stillow. In fact I've seen them rarely post.

Some of these numbers make no sense and aren't consistent. WA numbers for Cantwell and Murray particularly.

Looking at the numbers, one has to assume Oregon has less than one percent Blacks. LOL

There is no way to tell if the numbers are bunk, with any certainty. What we can say with absolute certainty is that the samples are not representative of the populations as a whole, and thus, the results are invalid.

I'm living in Oregon right now. Its pretty not-black :p

Perhaps our friend Stillow would respond to the specific criticisms of these results instead of resorting to liberal-bashing. It makes no sense to evaluate poll data based on one's partisan or ideological biases. There are problems with some of these results that should raise questions about their validity whether you are liberal, moderate, or conservative.

"It makes no sense to evaluate poll data based on one's partisan or ideological biases."

You mean like, Rasmussen is a rep pollster that skews their results. Give me a break.

Oregon has a very small black population. The number that looks strange there to me in the Oregon results is Obama's approval among the youngest age group, which is no higher than his overall apprval. That doesn't match up with results of many national and state polls that show Obama maintaining relatively high approval among young people.

You should evaluate Rasmussen based on whether his results, particularly his internals, make sense and whether his methods are sound. Unfortunately, Rasmussen hasn't provided enough information to evaluate his methods, especially his method of identifying likely voters many months or even years before an election and in some cases his results appear out of line with the vast majority of other polls, such as on the generic ballot question. That's not because he's a Republican or conservative pollster. There are very good conservative and Republican pollsters.

@Stillow: Really? From your comments that I've read (and I've read many, long-time lurker, first-time poster), you seem to have this bias against the facts. I'm not complaining about the results because Obama is doing badly (as a matter of fact, the only results that I think are potentially accurate are KY, KS, and AL, which skew strongly to the right), I'm complaining about them because they're pretty inconsistent with ... well ... all the other info about these states. I mean, why would Kansas' opinion on Obama remain virtually the same since election day, but Virginia, New York, California, and Missouri have wild 20+ point swings. I mean, they're pretty different states, politically. That plus SurveyUSA's inconsistent history equals bad polls.

Oh, and I'm not a "Lib".

Not even going to bother wading into the Rasmussen issue as it's been beaten absolutely to death. All I can say there is why the ripping of Scott's firm for being "out of line" with other pollsters while ABC/WaPo's insane outliers on basically every subject this year have been ignored. Whatever.

SurveyUSA only polled 600 adults in each state here, so the MoE for the toplines were already +/- 4 points. Then you get into the breakdowns by race and it becomes much, much trickier. I'm fairly confident that if you surveyed 600 African-Americans in VA you'd end up with a more favorable opinion of the President as opposed to this 10-12% sample of 600 adults which can easily give you outliers. But the other states look sound to me; NY, CA, AL, all showing what you'd expect to see in those states.

As for the youth approval, I have to take issue here Mr. Abramowitz. Obama's approval with the youth is indeed higher, if you classify the youth as college and graduate student age. SurveyUSA breaks the youngest demographic down to 18-34 and there is a huge disparity between an 18 year old kid and a 34 year old who is likely married with a few kids of his own. With a smaller sample size it makes sense to break the age demographics down the way the polling firm did here, but it won't show the big, big presidential approval differences that exist between 18-25 and 26-34.

Agreed CU. A 34 year old is more likely to be able to tell right from wrong, an 18 year old is not. Hence Obama's higher numbers among the youngest.

20 points swings in NY, CA and MO? What? Obama lost Missouri, however narrowly, and approval ratings for him in that state have dropped harshly since his inauguration. Looking at the approve/disapprove for Bond, Nixon and McClaskill, it's obvious that the poll is pretty well in line with what we've seen elsewhere.

While Obama won NY and CA handily, he surely didn't win them 70-30. Support is softening there, but more people seem to be heading into the "no opinion" or "neutral" camp since the disapproves are along the lines of what McCain earned in those states last year. These aren't wild swings, they are consistent with Obama's steady fall that has been well documented in many, many national surveys.

That's your opinion Field Marshal and I have my own. But the fact remains that 18-25 is quite different than 26-34 when it comes to political leanings... and inclination to vote.

As for the difference between Kansas and Virginia (Kansas not changing and Virginia changing radically), maybe it's because good mid-west common sense had it right on election day, and it took a few months for Virginians to see the light. As for sampling, I've noticed an overweight of Democrats in many polls. Can anyone possibly understand CBS's poll that has Obama far higher than the other major polls?

I think its important to remember that approval rating is starkly different than the number of comparing how many voted Obama in. Its not entirely useful to compare approval rating to that number.

@CU: They're dropped massively since his inauguration, yes, but I'm comparing this to election day. Comparing his numbers in VA now to his numbers on 11-04-08, it's a 15-point drop (alright, not 20, my mistake). The thing is, his national numbers have only gone down by roughly 3-4 percent since election day, and his negatives average around 45-46%. In the states listed, his drops are much larger, and the rise in his DISapproval ratings is even more abnormal. 60% in VA, compared to only 58 in Kentucky? That just doesn't add up right, especially factoring in Mark Warner's approval rating of 52%. Lemme tell you, Warner is a heck of a lot more popular than that. Webb's numbers seem more in check with reality (not really unpopular by any means, but definitely struggling).
Then there's New York. Gillibrand's low approval makes sense to me, few New Yorkers know much-if anything-about her. That's been a well-recognized problem, and I'm surprise Giuliani hasn't decided to run against her, since he'd have pretty decent odds for a Republican in a state as blue as NY.
The national poll drop is also less pronounced IMO. The first 6 months were inevitable, the only reason he got such high ratings is that many moderate conservatives decided to give him a chance, but then backed away because of his spending, and generally left-wing positions. Since then, the only major drop was during the town-hall phase of the HC debacle, and that was no means a drop as much as a massive, sharp, plunge.
Plus, a national approval rating of 49% would mean that for every close state like MO and VA that banked sharply right, there's be another close state (like Indiana or NC) that's giving him roughly 60% approval ratings. That's just not happening.

This poll is nonsense. There is no way Obama's approval would even be at 50 percent if his approval in Washington and Oregon were below that. Kansas and Kentucky I believe and maybe Indiana, because they don't have alot of minority groups, but with Obama even at 40 percent among white voters this poll is a stretch. Virginia was way off. Missouri was too. I would like to advise people that Ohio is a state where all politicians right now have negative approval ratings, so if Obama is at 45 percent there, that is actually quite good.

In Kentucky Obama is still more popular than Jim Bunning. Mitch Mcconnell isn't that popular in his home state either.

The difference between KS and VA is that they just had state wide elections in VA. And what goes hand in hand with elections? Campaigning.

I read this as I have several other polls. A lot of anti-incumbent sentiment out there, with a few exceptions like Schumer and Brownback.

Farleftandproud:

"This poll is nonsense. There is no way Obama's approval would even be at 50 percent if his approval in Washington and Oregon were below that."

Wake up lefty. His approval is not at 50%. Reference the pretty little charts on this web site.

Mea Culpa. I never realized just how white Oregon is.

Again I would like to mention that this poll has a bias to it that tends to be less favorable to Democratics, nevertheless, it doesn't sound like any politician is really that popular right now.

I don't get the "almost" anti-incumbent numbers. It would make sense if the Dems were looking good in the deepest blue states and the Reps were in good shape in the reddest of red states. But there are Dems polling poorly in lib states and Reps doing just as badly in conservative states.

I understand BO's slipping. Health care. You notice no one denies it when you say that passing one of the health care bills that are moving thru congress is just the first step. Once it passes the libs will want to move some dollar signs around until it becomes single payer. Still chasing that Nanny state. And people are starting to realize the truth. This guy is a far left whacko.

'Cos people really hate single payer... just ask any senior citizen on single payer Medicare how much they hate it and would rather try to shop around for private insurance with their pre-existing conditions...

America's practically the only country in the world that doesn't take care of its citizen's medical needs. The only thing stopping it are conservatives who know in their heart that if people managed to get affordable health care, they'd be happy citizens, and conservatives cannot have that!

I don't find the Oregon numbers credible. Portland is far more liberal than the rest of the state and voted for Obama maybe 2 to 1. So to have the portland numbers the same as the rest of the state makes no sense. If Obama's approval in OR is really less than 50%, then it should be in the low 40s nationally.

Reading the comments from people like Bigmike is kind of funny. I admit I chuckled. Is it possible to have an intelligent conversation about basic numbers without personal bias being thrown in?

Did anyone else find it odd that the topline numbers in AL, KS, KY, MO AND VA are identical?

What are the odds of that?

"Did anyone else find it odd that the topline numbers in AL, KS, KY, MO AND VA are identical"

Yes, I was just about to say that's the main reason this poll is suspect. There is no way the numbers are identical in AL and VA. Also the numbers are unlikely to be identical in NY and CA. And ties in both OR and WA? Among *adults*? Numbers like that might be plausible for likely voters, but among adults that is just off. As someone noted above, if Obama is below 50 in WA and OR, his national number should be in the low 40's at best.

Quentin Menzel:

"Reading the comments from people like Bigmike is kind of funny. I admit I chuckled. Is it possible to have an intelligent conversation about basic numbers without personal bias being thrown in?"

My comments are my take on the numbers. My opinion is that BO is paying the price for his agenda, which is much more liberal than most Americans. You don't have to agree. If you have a different take on BO's dropping numbers it's OK. It does not change the fact that they are dropping. The chart today has him below 48%. So we both get a chuckle.