Topic: Why W is in trouble
Bush is in trouble for many reasons, and I will get to all of them in due time. I will try to keep this consolidated, but it will still be long because I have a lot of points to hit.
1. Low and declining approval ratings
First and foremost, America is not happy with the job Bush is doing as President. FOX News, a notoriously right-wing news outlet, has his approval at a startlingly low 44%. When your own boys have you polling low, you know you're in trouble.
2. Low re-elect numbers
Gallup has his latest numbers for "does he deserve to be re-elected" , before the Democratic National Convention, at 45% yes and 51% no, with the rest unsure.
3. "The Nader Factor" is gone
Nader of course doesn't hurt Bush, but he isn't helping either. Nader is struggling to get on the ballot in most states, so much so he is relying almost completely on help from the conservative Reform Party that ran Ros Perot for President in 1992 and 1996.
Nader will not get above 2% of the vote nationwide. The liberal base has abandoned him, Democrats are suing to keep him off the ballot, the Green Party rejected him and he is polling low from his 2000 highs.
Ralph Nader is now officially a non-issue, if only for the time being.
4. Undecided voters
The undecided voters usually break with the challenger the closer it gets to the election. In most polls, they are about 8% or so of the electorate. In some they are made to "lean", and right now in most polls they unsurprisingly lean towards Kerry after his convention.
In the demographics polls that Gallup has, independents still prefer Kerry by a margin of 7, 50% to 43%. Moderates favor Kerry by an astounding 18%, 57% to 39%.
Kerry is also running ahead in many battleground states right now, although that will likely go down after the Republican convention at the end of the month.
5. Favorability
For all the negative campaign ads against John Kerry, Bush is still viewed less positively than Kerry by a good margin.
Kerry's net image is 18%, Bush's is 2%. Edwards is at 23% and Dicky's is at -6%.
Nobody likes Dick. Too bad.
According to FOX News:
Favorable Unfavorable
John Kerry 52% 34%
John Edwards 51% 28%
George W. Bush 47% 45%
Dick Cheney 40% 46%
The main reason Bush is in trouble is probably that the economy is turning around, although not quite as drasatically for his father in 1992. Jobs are starting to slow in terms of their growth.
They aren't beating Wall Street's expectations and they aren't hitting above the 150,000 a month needed to combat population growth. Bush is still fighting back a 1.8 million net job loss.
Iraq is starting to look bad again too with combat breaking out.
Save a terrorist attack or finding bin Laden at the last minute, I'm starting to think Kerry is slightly more likely to win the election than Bush.
Worth pointing out is that the job growth has declined drastically over the last few months, and the recovery might be losing steam:
