Schiavo pandering takes a toll

I wrote here and here that the Republicans shot themselves in the foot with a Schiavo media show. Well, Basie reports on the latest AP poll that indicates I may have been right. We had already seen that a majority of those polled were opposed to the congressional/presidential involvement in the case.

More than two-thirds of people who describe themselves as evangelicals and conservatives disapprove of the intervention by Congress and President Bush in the case of the Terri Schiavo, the brain-damaged woman at the center of a national debate.

A CBS News poll found that four of five people polled opposed federal intervention, with levels of disapproval among key groups supporting the GOP almost that high.

So even the group that was the target of the pandering was opposed. And there is plenty of bad news for Bush and the congress.

• Bush's overall approval was at 43 percent, down from 49 percent last month.


• Congress' approval rating has dropped seven points in one month, from 41% to 34%. Congress has not been this unpopular since 1997 in the wake of GOP investigations into Democratic fundraising.

This will make it harder for the Senate to go "nuclear" on judicial nominations and impact all of the Bush agenda if the slide continues.