This is a bad polling report, but we must deal with realities and facts lest we just turn into a liberal version of Republicans.
A new Gallup poll finds President Trump’s rating for handling the economy, 56%, is the highest of his presidency and the highest of his approval ratings on any of 14 domestic and foreign issues tested. At the same time, his overall 43% job approval rating is essentially unchanged from a month ago but appears to be stabilizing at a higher level than it had been in late 2018 and early 2019. If Trump wasn’t Trump, but a standard Democratic or Republican President like Obama or Bush or Clinton, his approval rating would be in the 60’s. So I guess that is a silver lining.
This is why I do not view the defeat of Trump in 2020 as a slam dunk or a forgone conclusion as some of my colleagues on another site have stated. The strong economy is keeping Trump competitive, no matter how horrible the economy is for wages and income inequality. Which is why a new Axios report should strike fear into the heart of the President: “The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow model is known for predicting GDP readings that start out exceedingly high and eventually recoil back to trend. But Monday’s reading shows expectations for just 0.3% growth in the first quarter of 2019. It followed a weak U.S. construction spending report that badly missed expectations.” What that means is that it is quite possible that we will have negative growth in the GDP in the first quarter of 2019.
A new University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll finds a slight majority of Texas voters would choose someone other than Donald Trump in a presidential race held right now.
“While 45% said they would ‘definitely vote for someone else,’ 39% said they would ‘definitely vote to re-elect Donald Trump.’ But the president got 10% who said they would ‘probably vote to re-elect Donald Trump,’ and only 6% said they would ‘probably vote for someone else.’”
“If you count the leaners on both sides, that would be a virtual tie between Trump and an unnamed opponent.”
As long as the economy stays strong Trump is by default in good shape for reelection, as noted if he was a “standard” Republicans his ratings would be much higher. At some point there will be a recession and the game as a whole changes.
While the timing may not be precise, the economy IS slowing. The rate of grwoth has declined in each of the past three reported quartlers (2Q18/4/2%, 3Q18/3.5%, 4Q18/2.6%). Housing starts were down 10% in December, suggesting the slowing pattern is reinforcing.
The longer an expansion lasts, the more fragile it becomes. This recovery was rocked by a stupid trade war with long standing allies and trading partners. Will this be enough for the economy to slip into a mild recession? That is uncertain. However, it is clear it is unlikley that better days are ahead without a positive intervention. (No, stopping a strupid trade war is not a positive intervention)
And, while corrolation is not causation, the economy does quite well with higher tax rates.
New Q Poll (summary from Greg Sargent on Twitter):
Trump approval: 38-55
Committed crimes before becoming president: 64-24
Committed crimes while president: 45-43
Believe Cohen over Trump: 50-35
Congress should investigate Cohen claims: 58-35
Trump should release tax returns: 64-29
If he doesn’t, Congress should pursue them: 57-38
Mueller running fair investigation: 54-27
Hush money payments unethical: 73-20
But public is not ready for impeachment, 59-35
This looks like a clear green light for Dems to investigate.