[the_third_wave]

Approval poll numbers seem to indicate a plurality of US voters agree with much of what the current government is implementing and for the first time in a very long period the majority of US voters seems to think the country is on the right track. You may not like what Trump and his crew are doing but most people did not like what your preferred candidates were doing and planning to do. Given these numbers I'd say "your democracy" (which is a constitutional republic but I'll just borrow some of the oft-heard rhetoric from the "democratic" party) seems to be functioning quite well and certainly a lot better than under the previous regime when approval numbers were abysmal.

[justinrubek]

Nice try, but the comment you're replying to didn't use the word democracy at all. Maybe it would help to read it again.

Just because a group of people approve of things happening doesn't make it a good year. My estranged family does and they don't have a grasp on the notion of cause and effect nor do they have an acceptable level of reading comprehension- I do not value their opinion in the slightest l.

[buckhx]

What are you talking about? The admins current net approval rating is -6.9% https://www.natesilver.net/p/trump-approval-ratings-nate-sil... Biden was at a +5% net rating at this point in his term

[wqaatwt]

> -6.9%

Still extremely high by global standards considering everything.

e.g. Hollande in France was at less than -80% not that many years ago.

[mensetmanusman]

Approval ratings are just measures of partisanship. Ideally it drops to zero. The fact that it was nearly 40% for a leader experiencing dementia-like symptoms confirmed this with political theoreticians.

[mindslight]

Biden had a team around him to work with, plus the general separation of responsibilities of independent agencies. So nominal "Biden" was doing just fine regardless of the one man. This time we're getting the full dementia experience from a manic mad king who has already driven away anyone that might tell him no.

[mensetmanusman]

So these polls are about the idea of Biden and not the person? That also supports the idea that polls don’t matter.

[mindslight]

Yes, polls are obviously about the administration's actions. And people's opinions of administrations are obviously important - even more so with politicians' tendency to promise everything while campaigning, then focus on different things when actually in office. And this effect is even more pronounced with Trump's signature blend of contradictory word salad and shameless direct lying.

[mensetmanusman]

So it doesn’t matter if Trump lies then? because the idea of Trump is to lower taxes, protect rural jobs via manufacturing tariffs, prevent millions from cutting in line?