Wisconsin's 2 cents

Here is the job approval rating that Wisconsinites have for our President.

http://huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/23/jobapproval-presobama_n_725956.html?xml=http://pollster.com/flashcharts/content/xml/WIObamaJobPres.xml&choices=Disapprove,Approve&phone=&ivr=&internet=&mail=&smoothing=&from_date=&to_date=&min_pct=&max_pct=&grid=&points=&trends=&lines=

How does this bode for republicans here, political science would tell us not well.The switch in favor happened between February and March of this year.The trend is continuing to decline with respect to Obama's favor, so nothing different is expected to change among the overall feeling for Democrats by mid-term time. I think the five point spread; Approve: 44.9% Disprove: 50.9 %, where it is now, is significant for Wisconsin Republicans on the ballot.

Does this matter?

Well now, this might mean something. Wright Track/Wrong Track
Wrong track is on top
Wright track is on bottom

In June of '09 the ballots meet at 45.8 believing the Country was on the Wright track, as well as the same percentage thinking the Country was on the Wrong track. Now, 63.5 disagree with the Country's direction while a huge 30.8 disagree. That accounts for a -32.7 spread. It's easy to interpret what this means for the mid-term elections. However, in attempting to interpret the trend, people seem to have been increasingly optimistic after the Presidential Election and throughout the stimulus taking place, until the economy/unemployment rate became stagnant, when the majority became increasing dissatisfied. Very interestingly, from late March to mid May, there was an actual a decrease in dissatisfaction, by three points! This is a time span immediately fallowing the Health-Care Reform Bill being signed into law. I could guess that post-midterm trends would follow this graph until the economic growth pulls out of recession. But, I like this graph.

!@$%?

I was curious to see what kind of influence specific party's would have when going to the poles this November. These are the margins that I found.

http://huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/30/party-id_n_725948.html?xml=http://pollster.com/flashcharts/content/xml/USPartyID.xml&choices=independent,Democrat,Republican&phone=&ivr=&internet=&mail=&smoothing=&from_date=&to_date=&min_pct=&max_pct=&grid=&points=&trends=&lines=

This not surprisingly, surprised me, and I did not appreciate how crucial the Independent Vote was, or at least how important it appears to be by this chart from pollster.com. It will also be interesting to witness the next shift in majority.

Close your eyes people.

http://sas-origin.onstreammedia.com/origin/gallupinc/GallupSpaces/Production/Cms/POLL/dmaocdd1se2puc8cb-ekta.gif

Well, nobody said that it was going to be easy, and apparently, nobody thinks that it is. The reason I think this is important is because it affect the idea of the 'American Dream'. From this I gather that even employed people are less happy with there job; this whether due to lower wage, longer hours, less job security,  need of a better job to supplement lost household income, a combination of these things, or some left unsaid, showing that the recession has had a profound impact on all Americans way of life. Maybe this is digging too deep, but if recovery means going back to where we were as a nation before the recession, things may not be back to normal even longer after nationwide employment grows.