The Latest from CBS & USAToday/Gallup

Both USAToday/Gallup and CBS News are out with new polls this week that provide slightly conflicting views of the impact of the death last week of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi on the fortunes of President Bush.  CBS News (article, results) shows Bush’s job approval rating a statistically insignificant two percentage points lower than their reading four weeks ago (down from 35% to 33%)).   USAToday/Gallup (article, results, Gallup free-for-today-only analysis) shows the Bush rating moving two points in the other direction (up from 36% to 38%) in the last week, but up seven percentage points (from 31%) since early May.   

Prof. Charles “Political Arithmetik” Franklin graphs it all, as usual.  His most recent plot (shown below) compares the recent sharp increase shown on the Gallup surveys (the red line) to the overall trend line based on his regression model.  The overall blue trend line trend, which takes into account all available public polls, now shows a slight upturn in the Bush approval rating for the first time since late December.  Thus, Franklin concludes that while the upturn is real, the “seven point gain” on the Gallup Poll “is almost certainly an overstatement of the ‘real’ gains made by the President since his May 15 address on immigration, which marked a turning point for his recent approval ratings.”

Both surveys devote questions to the issue of perceptions of the War and the death of al-Zarqawi.  Both find evidence of slightly more optimism, although readers should consult the analyses for more details. 

One trend that Franklin spotted receives relatively less attention. Both the Gallup and CBS polls have registered sharp increases in Bush’s ratings on immigration since his immigration speech, although the CBS poll would indicate some slippage over the last four weeks.