W’s approval rating rises

I don’t put a lot of stock in poll numbers, but wanted to post this, considering the massive amounts of posts in the usual places when his poll numbers go down:

NEW YORK — President George W. Bush’s approval rating recovered a few points in the week’s FOX News poll, though slightly more Americans still disapprove than approve of his job performance. On the issue of pre-Iraq war intelligence, roughly equal numbers of Americans think the president shared the best information available as think he intentionally misled the country.

Today, 42 percent of Americans approve and 48 percent disapprove of the job President Bush is doing. Bush regained 6 percentage points from his standing earlier this month of 36 percent approval — the lowest approval of his presidency (November 8-9).

Much of this week’s improvement can be attributed to increases in approval among Republicans (+ 6 percentage points), men (+ 8 points) and independents (+10 points).

“Some of the improvement may also be due to President Bush’s Wednesday speech on Iraq,” comments Opinion Dynamics Chairman John Gorman. “Interviews finished before the speech show a 40 percent approval rate, while those done after the speech show 43 percent approval. If any of this is due to the speech it may very well be temporary.”