33% (Pew Research Center)

The Chimp in Winter

Cue Culture Club's "I'll Tumble 4 Ya" as you take a gander at these numbers... The Pew Research Center has President Bush's approval ratings at 33%--a fall of 7 points from his 40% rating back in February. Here's some data mining:

The new Pew survey underscores the public's alarm over the prospect that an Arab-owned company could have operated U.S. ports. Fully 41% say they paid very close attention to news about the debate, which is unusually high interest for a Washington story and is only slightly lower than the number tracking Iraq war news very closely (43%). There was broad opposition to the proposed deal from across the political spectrum, including two-to-one disapproval among conservative Republicans (56%-27%).

Bush's overall approval measure stands at 33%, the lowest rating of his presidency. Bush's job performance mark is now about the same as the ratings for Democratic and Republican congressional leaders (34% and 32%, respectively), which showed no improvement in spite of public approval of the congressional response to the ports deal.

[...]

The survey finds that the falloff in the president's support since the start of his second term includes a significant decline in support among Republicans. [...] In January 2005, Bush earned a lofty 89% approval from members of his own party, but that has declined to 73% in the current survey. Among independents, the number approving of Bush's job performance has fallen from 47% in January 2005 to 26% today; and Bush's support among Democrats, already quite low, has fallen by about half since the start of his second term (from 17% to 9%).

I didn't think this was possible, but approval ratings in the high 20s is not that far-fetched.

[UPDATE] Thank heavens BushCo sees absolutely nothing wrong in any of this (via Reuters):

President George W. Bush's spokesman on Wednesday dismissed calls for a White House shake-up as "inside-Washington pontificating" after a series of controversies that have pushed his approval ratings to new lows.

"The president has a smart, capable and experienced team that is fully committed to helping him advance his agenda and get things done for the American people," said White House spokesman Scott McClellan.

Stick to your guns, President Chimpy!

[UPDATE 2.0] Atrios points us to this passage from the Pew results that I passed over in my haste to get a freelance assignment done earlier this afternoon when this was first posted:

Currently, 48% use a negative word to describe Bush compared with just 28% who use a positive term, and 10% who use neutral language.

The changing impressions of the president can best be viewed by tracking over time how often words come up in these top-of-the-mind associations. Until now, the most frequently offered word to describe the president was "honest," but this comes up far less often today than in the past. Other positive traits such as "integrity" are also cited less, and virtually no respondent used superlatives such as "excellent" or "great" ­ terms that came up fairly often in previous surveys.

The single word most frequently associated with George W. Bush today is "incompetent,"and close behind are two other increasingly mentioned descriptors: "idiot" and "liar." All three are mentioned far more often today than a year ago.

Also interesting is that "Christian" has made it into the Top 5. Finally, CNN is reporting that FOB's (Friends of BushCo's) want fresh blood in the White House (emphasis mine):

According to sources involved in the discussions, some veteran Republicans have been quietly trying to convince White House chief of staff Andy Card to bring in at least one "adult," like a former senator or another "experienced hand," to help him reach out to congressional leaders, troubleshoot and, in the words of one source, "just be in the loop and give advice."