Independent News and Politics

The federal government isn’t a very popular institution these days, and despite a boost under the Obama brand, the public attitude toward D.C. is once again slipping toward some combination of disgust and apathy.  Disgust because of the things they do and the ways they waste our money, and apathy for the fact that we know we’re essentially powerless to stop them.

While Obama support is still running neck-and-neck with opposition, Congress and the healthcare plan have not fared so well.

Currently, about 20% or 1 in 5 Americans is confident in the job being done by Congress – 75% or 3 in 4 Americans think Congress is doing a poor job.  Obviously, this can’t be explained away by partisanship.  Its clear instead that Democrats as well as Republicans are becoming frustrated with the priorities and “solutions” being offered by federal legislation.

On healthcare, Americans have been turning against the proposal since the public option was gutted.  For every further compromise that has been made, they’ve lost even more supporters – and now just less than 40% of Americans still want the plan to go through.  It was over 50% in June, but they were discussing a much different bill at that time.  (Coincidentally, the more popular version would have been less generous to the established insurance cartel, so Congress had to fix that!)

And finally, for the direction of the country and where we are headed:  About 1 in 3 Americans are happy with the path they see, but 2 in 3 are worried about the future because of the choices we’re making today.

Will the politicians realize that they don’t have the legitimate support of popular opinion behind their acts?  Well, they probably do realize already – but they also know that doesn’t stop them from spending insane amounts of money to build up strategic alliances and personal wealth..

Despite a promise of hope and change, Americans are increasingly disillusioned with the performance of the federal government, and they’re becoming increasingly pessimistic about the direction our country is currently headed in.

For the majority of Obama’s first year in office, his approval ratings had hovered above the 60% mark – leaving a much smaller 40% to complain about his actions or lack of actions (as the case may be.)  In the last few weeks, however, this number has quickly slid down to a much closer 50-50%.  For every Obama fan, there is someone who thinks he should be doing a whole lot less or a whole lot more.

And this highlights another problem the government currently faces in its attempt to legislate from the center – the voices of complaint are splintered, and thusly do not point to a more popular course of action.

Congressional job approval is now at about 27% nationwide, so just about one in four Americans is happy with the work being done by our highest paid representatives.  Unfortunately, this offers little danger to incumbents, because as unpopular as the entire body is, people tend to appreciate their own corrupt bastard.

So all in all, about a third of the nation is happy with the direction we’re headed in, and there’s not a whole lot of evidence that this direction is likely to change any time soon.  In fact, the momentum of the machine is intent on self-preservation and resistance from true change – but that won’t stop us from hoping for some kind of real future change.