Culver's Approval Rating

I was looking through the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier website trying to find a story, when I found this one. Apparently, last month KCCI did a poll on Culver's approval rating after the end of the session. I had never heard of this, maybe because I don't watch KCCI, maybe because it was never reported--I'm not sure. I'm guessing the later because of the findings. I can't find anything about this on the KCCI website. The only other story I found is by Todd Dorman at the Quad-Cities Times blog, which is much better and not as much of a spin job.

Last November, Culver won by 100,000 votes. Today, only 46% of Iowans approve of the job Culver is doing. Not too good for how much some media outlets has propped him up. 32% disapproved, and 22% were not sure.

Here is another kicker---only 66% of Democrats approve of the job he is doing. While I thought it would be higher, I'm not too surprised though. Talking with a couple Democrat friends of mine who are at least somewhat involved in politics, I've been hearing that Culver was angering many in his base, particularly with the tobacco tax increase. Among independents, Culver has an approval rating of 44%, and among Republicans, only 28%

Reading through the opinion piece in the Courier, you can tell that the author in the, Charlette Eby, is trying to spin this. Such as this:

To be fair, those approval ratings could climb as more Iowans become familiar with Culver as governor and as he grows into the job.

Many of Culver's attributes remain unknowns. We haven't seen how his administration deals with a major scandal or controversy yet, other than relatively minor flaps over some of his appointments to state boards.

We do know he sticks up for teachers, isn't afraid to raise taxes and wants to make Iowa the "Silicon Valley of the Midwest" by developing the renewable energy industry.

And this:

To his credit, Culver kept a number of promises made on the campaign trail.

The former high school government teacher was able to deliver a big pay increase to public school teachers. And he nudged lawmakers from both parties into approving the $100 million Iowa Power Fund to develop renewable energy.

With those accomplishments on his list, it's fair to say the poll numbers likely came as a disappointment to Iowa's new chief executive.

I'm sure the reason why this poll hasn't been seen much is because of the dismal numbers. Dormann goes though how Culver alienated a lot of people with the tobacco tax increase, fair share, the bully bill, the stem-cell bill, and doing nothing on property tax, hog confinement issues or local smoking ordinances. Apparently, Culver also proclaims other cities in Iowa as "Capital for a Day" then is late in showing up (here and here.)

Of course, Culver campaigned on all of this. Nobody who was paying attention can say that they were surprised. Another example of why elections matter.

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