Its the first of the month and we will start getting glimpses into how the
public thinks of our President. The first look is not so good for him.
CBS has released their latest poll that
goes into the leak investigation and the approval of the President. His approval
has dropped even more and more people now view the leak as serious.
HOW IMPORTANT TO THE NATION IS THE CIA LEAK MATTER?
- Great Importance: 51%
- Some Importance: 35%
- Little/No Importance 12%
CBS also compared this to the views of other scandals that have surrounded
the White House in recent history. Here is a table comparing the results.
| Great Importance | Some Importance | Little/No Importance | |
| Leak Investigation | 51% | 35% | 12% |
| Monica Lewinsky | 41% | 21% | 37% |
| Whitewater | 20% | 29% | 45% |
| Iran-Contra | 48% | 33% | 19% |
| Watergate | 53% | 25% | 22% |
From that table we quickly see that the current scandal in the White House is
viewed as the second most important one in recent history. Even more troubling
to Republicans should be the view of importance on the scandals surrounding Bill
Clinton. By public opinion, they look more like witch hunts than true scandals.
Another important question deals with the pre war intelligence. When the poll
asked respondents how they felt the administration was presenting information
regarding WMD before the war the following results came out:
| NOW | 1/2005 | 2/2004 | |
| Telling All/Most of what they know | 32% | 37% | 40% |
| Hiding Important Elements | 38% | 36% | 39% |
| Mostly Lying About Weapons | 26% | 23% | 13% |
The most significant is the last response. The number of people feeling
the administration was lying about the WMD has now doubled. This also puts more
merit on the actions taken yesterday by Democrats in Senate when they shut down
Senate to address the pre-war intelligence reports.
Now the slammer – the approval rating. This seems to be the most important
number in any poll and the one that gains the most attention. Bush has fallen
again with an approval rating of 35% and a disapproval rating of 57%. He is now
just 8 points above Richard Nixon when he left office. That should send a
chilling feel through the White House.
Bush has lost some support amongst Democrats (3%) and Republicans (2%),
but the group which showed the greatest loss of support was the conservative
base where his approval dropped by 8%, bringing it down to 54%.
CBS has more information on the poll, including an in depth analysis of
Bush’s declining approval rating. To view the poll click
here and to view their analysis click
here.