Low Polling Numbers Plague Trump, Congress

Being Republican means walking on egg shells these days as an atmosphere permeates the party that pointing out the obvious is frowned upon. But when national polling numbers continue to show the GOP and its president’s approval ratings in the cellar, there has to be concern and questions about the direction the party is going.

Quinnipiac’s latest poll released Wednesday, compiled before the firing of FBI Director James Comey, continues the bad approval ratings that have been rolling out of D.C. The president’s approval rating is 35 percent, down five points from April 19, with a whopping 58 percent disapproval.

Perhaps one of the starkest revelations was the sharp drop of support with Independents who gave the president a 29 percent approval rating, down 10 points since April 19. That means 63 percent of Independent voters disapprove of this president.

Washington Examiner: The weak candidacies of Clinton, Trump

By Lynn R. Mitchell

The Washington Examiner, my old stomping grounds when they had a blogging team, took on the upcoming 2016 presidential election in their editorial on Friday (see Clinton is weak, and Trump is weaker). In looking at two presidential candidates, they noted a recent Quinnipiac University poll that did not bode well for Hillary Clinton:

Quinnipiac University this week released polls of three swing states that were critical in both of Obama’s electoral victories, Colorado, Iowa, and Virginia. In all three, Hillary Clinton trails Republicans Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush and Scott Walker. Take your pick, she loses. For that matter, so do her other Democratic rivals, Vice President Joe Biden and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders.

What’s more, Clinton, the prohibitive favorite for the Democratic nomination at this point, already enjoys near-universal name recognition in all those states. In contrast to her competitors, voters have made their mind up about her, and her numbers don’t look good — 21 points net-negative favorability in Colorado, 23 net-negative in Iowa, and 9 in Virginia. Majorities have a negative perception of the former first lady.