In order to find out how well a politician performs, we have to consider public opinion. In a democratic system, it’s important to find out the percentage of people approving or disapproving of the policies of the government. In America, public opinion polls are conducted quite frequently to seek people’s opinions regarding different issues. The same thing has happened with the President of Change, Mr. Barack Obama. Obama became the president of the United States while people were unhappy with many things in the country and wanted a change for the better. President Obama had to deal with big issues like economic recession, health care, and the war in Afghanistan. Now the first year of his office has passed and this is how people have rated his performance.
Although, people in general have a favorable view of President Obama, his job approval rating has declined. According to CNN/Opinion Research poll conducted on Dec. 2-3, Obama’s approval rating has fallen from 55 percent in mid-November to 48 percent and the biggest drop has come from non-college-educated white voters. As the poll director believes, this may show that unemployment has caused president’s approval rating to fall. People have also given their opinions regarding different issues like economy, the War in Afghanistan and health care. According to Marist Poll, a majority of registered voters, 51 percent, disapprove of Obama’s handling of the economy. However, 65 percent of the people believe that today’s economic situation is the inheritance of President Bush. Nonetheless, most of the polls reveal that many people are very or somewhat dissatisfied with the present state of the economy. Another important issue is the War in Afghanistan. Polls conducted up to early November showed that the majority of people were against sending more troops to Afghanistan. However, after President’s speech explaining the strategies to deploy 30,000 troops to Afghanistan, the number of people approving of his plan is growing. When it comes to health care, it is not so easy to compare the results of different polls since the questions asked differ from one poll to another. Some polls may have tried to measure people’s support or opposition to health care reform overall, while some others may have asked questions regarding different parts of the health care plan. However, there seems to be an agreement on the point that there is satisfaction among the majority of people who have health coverage and most of them believe that a change in the health care system will not improve their situation or may even make it worse. So according to Gallup, it seems that “the public does not feel a strong sense of urgency about passing health care reform.” While president Obama has been working hard to pass his health care reform plan, Americans seem to be more concerned about the problems of economy and employment.
As we can see, people are constantly being asked about their opinion regarding the overall performance of the president and the way he handles different issues. This is something we do not have in Iran. There are no polls conducted to reflect people’s opinion regarding the performance of the President and his cabinet. Now, the issue of subsidies is what many people are worried about but we see no polls measuring people’s support or position to the government plan. Although, media try to reflect public opinion, I think we need to have proper statistics of public opinion on different issues. This way, I believe, people feel that it is important for the officials to find out their opinion regarding different issues.
* taken from http://www.politicsdaily.com
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