Bush Approval Rating in Upper Midwest Lingers in the Basement

Despite relatively positive news coming out of Iraq and a new campaign season that has focused the lens of the news media off the sitting president to the new contenders, George W. Bush cannot shake the horrendous job approval rating that he has faced in the Upper Midwest for nearly two and a half years.

New polling from SurveyUSA finds Bush's approval rating to be nearly identical across the Upper Midwest:

Iowa: 32 percent approve, 65 percent disapprove
Minnesota: 32 percent approve, 64 percent disapprove
Wisconsin: 31 percent approve, 67 percent disapprove

With all three of these states prime battleground targets in the 2008 race, the uniformly critical view of Bush's performance in Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin seems to be the biggest potential albatross for Republican nominee John McCain, who is polling quite competitively in these states.

Independents, long McCain's strong suit, have not been friendly to the Bush administration in these states for quite some time, with less than one-third currently approving of Bush's job performance in each state:

Iowa: 26 percent approve
Minnesota: 29 percent approve
Wisconsin: 30 percent approve

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Curse of the '4'?

May 22, 2013

Big-name Republicans are not coming out of the woodwork yet to challenge Al Franken in Minnesota's 2014 U.S. Senate race, and there is not much chatter of the GOP picking off one of the five DFL-held U.S. House seats either. Over the last century, Minnesota Republican U.S. House candidates have not fared all that well in cycles ending in '4' - losing seats in five of these cycles (1914, 1924, 1944, 1954, 1974), holding serve in four others (1964, 1984, 1994, 2004), and gaining seats just one time (1934, after redistricting had been delayed one cycle with all nine seats voted at-large in 1932). Perhaps the Republican Party's best chance for a pick up in the Gopher State in 2014 is if 12-term Democrat Collin Peterson retires after nearly a quarter century on Capitol Hill. The 7th CD has the second largest GOP lean in the state.

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May 2, 2013

Of the 15 men and women that have served in the U.S. Senate from Wisconsin since popular vote elections were introduced a century ago, Ron Johnson and Tammy Baldwin rank among the oldest upon first entering the chamber. Johnson began his tenure at the age of 55 years, 8 months, and 26 days in January 2011, which is the oldest of any elected Wisconsin Senator during this popular vote era. The next oldest, Alexander Wiley, was more than one year younger when he took his seat in 1939 (54 years, 7 months, 8 days). Tammy Baldwin comes in at #6 being 50 years, 10 months, and 23 days when she took office in January of this year. The youngest elected Senator from the Badger State was Robert La Follette, Jr. at 30 years, 7 months, and 24 days (1925) when he took the seat of his legendary deceased father.

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Bush Approval Rating in Upper Midwest Lingers in the Basement

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