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Rasmussen…
What They Told
Us: Reviewing Last Week’s Key Polls
Saturday, October 06, 2012
37% Say U.S. Heading in Right Direction
Generic Congressional Ballot: Republicans 45%, Democrats 41%
Senate Balance of Power: Dems 48 GOP 45 Toss-Ups 7
62% Say U.S. Currently In A Recession
Close as the presidential race has been for months, it doesn’t take
much to make a difference, and Mitt Romney’s debate win this past week
appears to have impacted the numbers in the Key Three Swing States –
Florida, Ohio and Virginia. It’s too early to say what impact Friday’s
government jobs report will have.
New Rasmussen Reports polling taken after the debate finds Romney up
two in Florida, up one in Virginia and down one in Ohio. It is
virtually impossible for Romney to win the White House without winning
at least two of these three states. They remain Toss-Ups in the
Rasmussen Reports Electoral College Projections.
Romney remains slightly ahead in Missouri and North Carolina, while
Obama has more comfortable leads in New Mexico and Washington State.
Nationally, there are signs of a Romney bounce in the Rasmussen Reports
daily Presidential Tracking Poll.
Interestingly, just 17% of voters nationwide say debates are Very
Important in terms of how they will vote. But as Scott Rasmussen
explains in his latest weekly syndicated column, while “debates rarely
have a major impact on a campaign … a small shift could be decisive in
a race as close as this one.” Still, he says, “Incumbent presidents
often struggle in the first debate and do better in the second. … Does
Obama have a comeback like that in him?”
Most voters view this year’s election as a referendum on the Obama
presidency rather than one on Romney’s plans for the
future. So the president got a rare bit of economic good
news at week’s end when the government announced that the national
unemployment rate had fallen below 8% and was back to where it was in
January 2009.
The Rasmussen Employment Index rebounded slightly in September after
falling to a 10-month low in August, correctly forecasting that the
upcoming government job reports would be stronger than the prior
month’s report. Still, the last two months have found the lowest levels
of confidence measured in the Index since October of last year. Just
20% of workers report their firms are hiring, while 23% report layoffs.
That’s the third straight month that reported layoffs have outnumbered
reported hiring. Prior to that, there had been eight straight months
with more hiring than layoffs reported.
Confidence in the U.S. job market remains near record lows for the
year. Thirty percent (30%) think the unemployment rate will be higher
in a year’s time, while 31% predict it will be lower. Nearly
one-out-of-two Americans (48%) know someone who out of frustration with
the difficult job market has given up looking for a job. That’s
unchanged from August and matches the all-time high reached in surveys
over the past two-and-a-half years.
The Rasmussen Consumer and Investor Indexes which measure daily
confidence in both groups ended the week down several points from where
they were three months ago.
One of the president’s key economic decisions – and one of his most
unpopular - was to continue the bailouts of banks and financial
institutions begun by the Bush administration following the Wall Street
meltdown. Neil Barofsky, the Treasury Department inspector general who
oversaw those bailouts, has harsh criticism of them on this weekend’s
edition of What America Thinks, Scott Rasmussen’s new nationally
syndicated TV show. Former presidential speechwriters William McGurn
and Dan Gerstein also will talk with Scott about the current state of
the 2012 presidential race and Senate races across the country. See the
list of over 60 stations carrying the program here.
Voters remain closely divided over whether the president’s health care
law will be good or bad for the country, but most still hope the law is
repealed. Eighty percent (80%) believe repeal of the law is likely if
Romney is elected and Republicans take control of Congress.
Also potentially troubling for the president is that most voters don't
rate the United States stronger today than it was four years ago when
it comes to race relations, opportunities for women and young people
and America’s relationships overseas. Forty-nine percent (49%), in
fact, think America as a nation is weaker now than it was in late 2008.
Just 29% believe the country is stronger today.
Only 23% of Americans believe today’s children will be better off than
their parents. At the same time, 37% of voters now say the country is
heading in the right direction, matching the highest level of optimism
since late June 2009, reached early last month. Fifty-five percent
(55%) continue to think the country is heading down the wrong track.
For the month of September, the president's Total Job Approval Rating
inched up a point to 49% from 48% in August. Fifty percent (50%)
disapproved. Still, Obama’s overall approval rating has been higher
this year compared to last.
The presidential race is of more interest to most voters than the
battle for control of Congress, but most Americans are also unhappy
with the status quo on Capitol Hill, Scott Rasmussen says in a new
radio update. (Catch Scott’s radio updates Monday through Friday on
stations across the country.
Republicans lead Democrats by four points on the latest Generic
Congressional Ballot, but a GOP takeover of the Senate appears
increasingly unlikely, according to the Rasmussen Reports Senate
Balance of Power rankings.
Senate surveys this past week find Democrat Tim Kaine pulling away from
GOP rival George Allen in Virginia and Democrat Martin Heinrich with a
double-digit lead over Republican Heather Wilson in New Mexico.
Democratic incumbent Maria Cantwell holds a commanding 57% to 37% lead
over Republican challenger Michael Baumgartner in Washington State. The
deadline has passed for embattled GOP Congressman Todd Akin to withdraw
from the Missouri race, and incumbent Democratic Senator Claire
McCaskill has now crossed the 50% mark for the first time.
Most Americans think this year’s political advertising on TV is more
negative than it has been in previous years, and most also say they are
less likely to vote for a candidate who runs a negative ad. But 65%
believe the media reports more on negative campaigning than on issues
raised by candidates.
Read the rest of the article with links at Rasmussen
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