Obama job approval near 50% in new poll

Obama’s job approval rating is currently at the highest level it has been since last summer according to a new Washington Post /ABC News poll.  49% now approve of the job Obama is doing.  That’s the highest level he has achieved since March if you exclude the short-lived bump in the polls he got after killing Osama bin Laden.  Additionally, Americans trust Obama to do a better job than Republicans in Congress when it comes to Protecting the middle class (50% to 35%), Handling taxes (46% to 41%), Handling the economy (44% to 40%), and Creating jobs (44% to 41%).

The Washington Post says Obama’s “rise suggests that the White House’s new tactics in recent months — to adopt a more populist tone and to challenge Republicans aggressively over taxes and income disparities — may be shifting the national political landscape back to Obama’s favor.

And it comes with an outburst of optimism among Democrats, 72 percent of whom now say Obama will win reelection, up from 58 percent who thought so in October. Americans overall believed by a wide margin in October that a Republican would beat Obama next year, but they are evenly split in the new poll.”

Read more:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/obamas-job-approval-ratings-show-signs-of-improvement-post-abc-poll-finds/2011/12/19/gIQAdArC5O_story.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/obamas-approval-up-while-republicansin-congress-flounder/2011/12/19/gIQAqJ7c5O_graphic.html