Sinking Like A Stone

This is not what the Democrats had in mind: after five months in control of Congress, they have driven the institution’s approval rating down to the lowest point ever measured by Gallup: only 14% of respondents expressed “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in Congress.
In the current survey, Congress ranks last among the institutions measured, just below HMOs. At the top, as usual, is the military, at 69%. Harry Reid might want to be careful about whom he’s calling incompetent.
It’s a mistake to put too much weight on a single poll of this sort, of course, but it’s obvious that the Democrats have made a poor impression on the public so far. The conventional wisdom is that the Republicans have little chance of re-taking either the House or the Senate in 2008. That may well be right. But if the Democrats don’t do something positive between now and then, the Republicans won’t have to be any luckier in the close races than the Democrats were in ’06 to recapture one or both houses.
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