Gallup: Obama not losing liberals or Dems (also another poll on primary matchups)

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Tue Aug-02-11 06:01 PM
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Gallup: Obama not losing liberals or Dems (also another poll on primary matchups)

Gallup: Obama not losing liberals or Dems

By Greg Sargent

If there ever were a time when you�d think Obama would lose support from his base, it would be now, with high profile lefty activists and pundits hammering the President daily over the emerging debt deal.

But Gallup took a poll from July 25th through July 31st and found him holding steady with both liberals and Dems:

The website Politico carried a story on Monday morning headlined: �Debt deal complicates liberals� support.�

Yet the data show that Obama�s support from his liberal base remains as high relative to his overall average as it has throughout his term. Specifically, liberals� approval of Obama last week was 72%, 30 points higher than his overall approval rating of 42%. By comparison, liberals� approval has averaged about 28 points higher than his overall average so far in the Obama administration.

Obama�s job approval last week was 77% among Democrats, 37% among independents, and 12% among Republicans. This overall pattern of partisan difference is not substantially changed from the average such differences over the last 2 � years. Democrats have on average given Obama an approval rating 33 points higher than his overall rating, and last week their approval rating was 35 points higher.

The problem with this kind of polling is that it doesn�t gauge the base�s enthusiasm, as opposed to generic approval, and enthusiasm is a key metric for determining whether base voters will turn out, volunteer, give money, and so on. And as Digby notes, CNN�s new poll finds a majority of liberals thinks Dems gave up too much in the debt deal, and media figures are beinning to entertain the idea that depressed base enthusiasm could end up being a real problem for Obama�s reelection campaign.

more

Yeah, enthusiasm is key, and there are a lot of forces working overtime to depress Democratic voters.

Now that primary data: Sanders approval rating bests Leahy

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Sens. Patrick Leahy and Bernard Sanders each boast approval ratings in excess of 60 percent, according Public Policy Polling, a decade-old polling-for-hire outfit that does contract work for politicians, businesses and organizations.

The Raleigh, N.C.-based polling firm won't unveil the full results of its Vermont poll until tomorrow. But the firm has teased the release by posting some interesting highlights via Twitter.

Sanders' in-state approval ratings make him the third most popular senator in the nation � behind only Daniel Inouye of Hawaii and John Barrasso of Wyoming � according to the poll.

Despite his popularity though, Sanders trails Barack Obama by 19 points in a hypothetical presidential primary � among Green Mountain voters, no less. Former Gov. Howard Dean, meanwhile, lags 37 points behind Obama among Vermont voters in a hypothetical primary.

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