PRESIDENT OBAMA's job approval at Real Clear Politics dropped into the 43s for the first time in late August. As I write, he's . .
Disapproval stands at 52 percent.
Some simple -- heck, simplistic -- calculations, just for fun.
Since inauguration day, Mr. Obama's approval has dropped from 65.5 percent to 42.4 percent. That's a point every 42.7 days. Keep that up until election day in 2012 and he will drop another 9.3 points, forcing him to defend his presidency from a base of 33.1 percent approval.
That's misleading, however, because Mr. Obama's approval dropped precipitously in the first year of his administration, but gently ever since. Unca D has long pushed the thesis that his numbers have been running sideways, not down -- primarily because of the bumps when he compromised with Congress last December and presided over the killing of Obama bin Laden last May. Lately, however, the direction has been unmistakeably down. More simple calculations:
Measuring Mr. Obama's decline in perhaps the most favorable way, his approval has dropped only 2 points since August 16, 2009 -- a 416-day period. If he continues on that glide path, he will drop only 1.9 points more before election day, putting him at 40.5 percent on election day.
This noodling is purely hypothetical, of course. Anything can happen, and probably will.
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Despite many theoretical objections to its methodology, I follow Real Clear Politics -- the famous poll of polls -- because it dampens the volatility of the individual polls.
Sample objections: It mixes "all adults," "registered voters," and "likely voters." The live polls at the top of the Web page cover different polling periods. And RCP includes polls by partisan polling organizations. All valid objections.
As I write, the spread among the seven live polls ranges from a high of 45 percent approval (CNN Opinion Research, all adults, closing ten days ago) to a low of 40 percent approval (Gallup, all adults, closing yesterday). The median for all seven polls is 42 percent. The average and the median for three polls of registered or likely voters is also 42 percent.
Any of the big-name pollsters may be more accurate, day-to-day, than RCP, but the RCP aggregate offers stability and reliability, of a sort. I never need get unduly excited, no matter which way the numbers turn, until the aggregate confirms the move.
I recommend RCP. By the time you look, however, the numbers cited above well may have changed.
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