The Popularity of Our Governors
SurveyUSA.Com rates the nation’s governors by their approve-disapprove numbers. Indiana’s Governor Mitch Daniels has seen his approval rating slip to just 42%, with 49% disapproving–and this after a productive legislative session. Not being in Indiana at the moment, I can only guess–was it the school funding thing?
Also interesting: Haley Barbour, former RNC chairman and now governor of Mississippi (see, in the GOP, you get promoted from national chairman to governor) is at 37-55 approve/disapprove. Given that National Journal and other DC publications have been touting Barbour as possible presidential material in ‘08, I think that these numbers might cool that speculation somewhat. New York’s Republican George Pataki is in trouble, too, with only 36-56. By contrast, New Mexico’s Bill Richardson, often talked about on the Dem side for the next White House cycle, pulls in a nice 54-39. And longshot Iowa gov Tom Vilsack is at 50-39.
In the can’t-run-but-want-to category (alternatively, the can’t-run-and-unfairly-barred category), foreign-born governors Schwarzennegger of California and Granholm of Michigan are pretty well dead in the water, with 40-56 and 36-57 respectively.
8 Responses to “The Popularity of Our Governors”
Mitch has been criticized on school funding, breaking up the state unions, facing reality with the budget, wearing plaid shirts to the office, taking over the stadium from the CIB, being a toughguy, wanting to live in Carmel instead of on Meridian St. Other than that last one, it makes me wonder if people were paying attention during the campaign.
He said there’d be change, Hoosiers voted for change, and now that there’s change, people are shocked and all of a sudden don’t like him???
I’m surprised to see Granholm’s numbers that low — does anyone know whether that’s apropos of any particular scandals or anything, or more an expression of general Michigander malaise?
Petronius, I think there’s something to what you say, in particular with regard to his ‘facing reality with the budget’. But the last part of your comment seemed a little weird, at least in how it was phrased. Suppose he had come into office and suddenly declared the nationalization (er, statalization?) of all Indiana companies. That would have been a change, surely, but I think we’d all agree that it would be very legitimate for his number to plummet under such circumstances! (It would also be legitimate to ask him to undergo a significant neurological exam, but that’s beside the point.) It’s not a matter of “I promised change, and look, here’s some-change-or-other”, but rather “I promised some _specific_ changes, and look, here they are”.
I could be absolutely wrong about this, but I’d guess Mitch is taking a big hit over the Daylight Saving Time question. I think there are probably a fair number of Republicans, especially in the rural, western parts of the state who either don’t want DST at all or who want it only on the condition that they be on Central Time.
I think it’s sort of a purely emotional issue and one where changing the status quo won’t win you too many votes, but it might lose you a fair number of votes. I just don’t see people voting for the pro-DST candidate on that issue alone, but I tend to think that people might vote against the DST candidate on that issue alone.
philosopher – A fair criticism of the structure of my comments. What I meant was that Mitch promised many specific changes, and carried himself a certain way, and he is now taking heat for (shockingly!!!) implementing those changes and continuing to carry himself in the same way as he did in the campaign.
I think Mitch’s low ratings may be due to the kinds of things the assembly produced: diffuse benefits and concentrated costs.
All Hoosiers will benefit to some degree from the new IG, a reformed FSSA, a balancing budget, etc., yet the ‘good government’ crowd is not a sizeable or salient interest group. Even some markedly regional programs, like the economic development of NW Indiana or the Colts stadium, don’t have specific constituencies (also, the IEDC’s activities received relatively little press). On the other hand, there are some well-touted ‘losers’: education, , Medicaid recipients, minorities, western Hoosier and anti-DST cranks (like me), Mayor Peterson, the old guard civil servants Mitch (rudely) threw out, and hardline fiscal conservatives.
In short, Mitch had relatively few photo-op celebrations of key achievements. After all, how does one have a ribbon-cutting ceremony for increasing the speed limit on rural interstates?
“how does one have a ribbon-cutting ceremony for increasing the speed limit on rural interstates?”
I would start by renting the General Lee from Dukes of Hazzard…
I see that our governor of Missouri, Matt Blunt is more popular than he deserves to be but I am pleasantly surprised that his approval rating is below 40%. He and the Republican dominated legislature cut over 90,000 people off of Medicaid and Missouri’s system wasn’t nearly as large as Tennessee’s. Blunt’s spokesperson said that some people would be better off because losing those benefits would encourage them to go get a job. She did not address how this applied to the many people being cut who were physically unable to work. One of his allies in the legislature dismissed the consequences of their actions by the simple expedient of declaring that God would take care of them.
Two other presidential Governors are doing well, though: Bill Owens (R-CO) 54-38, and Mark Sanford (R-SC) 53-35.