Gallup finds that since January, a 17-percentage-point advantage for Democrats in party affiliation or leanings has narrowed to a 5-percentage-point margin.
Many pollsters are finding the Republicans leading the generic congressional ballot. President Obama’s approval rating has sunk from the 70s to the low 50s. In New Jersey and Virginia, polls that show the Democrat ahead are few and far between.
By almost every measuring stick, Democrats and President Obama began the year on top of the world, and have steadily lost that public confidence and trust over the past eight months.
What happened? Well, the utopia of hope and change did not take hold immediately, and hopes for a moderate course have been dashed. But also worth noting is how dramatically the political landscape has changed since George W. Bush rode off into the sunset. Perhaps while he was front and center, and the dominant voice of the GOP, many Americans tired of Iraq, tired of his Texas twang, tired of everything they had seen and heard for the past eight years; they would hear nothing else from the GOP, and could overlook a multitude of flaws in the Democratic-party option.
The world looks different without that familiar – and at times deserving – scapegoat.