Share
Commentary

Under Trump Americans Are Most Satisfied with Country Since 2005, Double Obama's Number

Share

I don’t know if you watch the Democrat debates.

I do, because I’m paid to.

It’s the same way you’re paid to write TPS reports, though.

Is it something you’d do on your own? Probably not, unless you really love your job.

Take me, for example.

Trending:
John Mellencamp Leaves Stage During Concert After Heckler Says 'Just Play Some Music'; Audience Left Wondering if Show Will Continue

I’m addicted to politics, and the Democratic debates are beginning to feel like the TPS reports of the 2020 cycle for me.

However, despite the three hours of sleep hypnosis last week, there was something important I learned: The Democrats are ready to take on Donald Trump on the economy.

Now, I didn’t quite see how they were planning to take him on, just that they were ready to take him on.

“With regard to the economy, I can hardly wait to have that debate with him. Where I come from, the neighborhoods I come from, they’re in real trouble — working-class people, middle-class people,” former Vice President Joe Biden said.

Do you think Donald Trump will win the 2020 election?

“I’d love that debate because the American public is getting clobbered. The wealthy are the only ones doing well — period.”

“Whoever is going to beat Mr. Trump is going to have to beat him on the economy, and I have the experience and the expertise to show he’s a fake there and a fraud,” billionaire tartan-tie enthusiast Tom Steyer said.

Former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, meanwhile, said, “I am ready to take on this president on the economy, because I am from the exact kind of industrial Midwestern community that he pretends to speak to and has proven to turn his back on — and guided that community through a historic transformation.”

Have fun with that, gents, since the results of a new Gallup poll found that under the current president, more Americans are “satisfied with the way things are going in the U.S.” since 2005.

Perhaps most problematic for the Democrats, that’s more than twice the number of Americans who responded the same way at this point in the first term of Barack Obama, the president Joe Biden served under.

Related:
Biden Backs Speaker Mike Johnson's Ukraine Aid Plan, Which Puts Americans Last Once Again

“Satisfaction ‘with the way things are going’ in the United States has reached a 15-year high, about four times better than the low points registered under President Barack Obama,” the Washington Examiner reported

First, the numbers: According to the Examiner, “Gallup said that 41% are satisfied with the direction of the nation. The last time it hit that level was in 2005, during the administration of President George W. Bush.

“Under Obama, it hit about 10% in his first and third year, but it rose to the mid-30s in his last year,” the outlet added.

Under Trump, it’s currently 41 percent. For comparison’s sake, in January 2012 (the last full January of Obama’s first term), just 18 percent of respondents told Gallup they were “satisfied with the way things are going.”

The reason for the great numbers under Trump, unsurprisingly, is the good economic data.

“The higher level of satisfaction measured in the Jan. 2-15 Gallup poll comes at a time when Americans’ evaluations of the U.S. economy are the best they have been in nearly two decades, perhaps because of continued low unemployment and record stock values,” Gallup’s analysis said.

Satisfaction reached its lowest level in 2008 — 7 percent — and has risen steadily ever since.

Fifty-eight percent were still dissatisfied in the most recent survey, but this is actually quite low. During most of the Obama administration, the numbers for that statistic were in the 70s and 80s.

The numbers are divided, of course, with 72 percent of Republicans satisfied vs. 14 percent of Democrats. Nevertheless, that’s still some pretty impressive stuff. (Gallup conducted telephone interviews with a random sample of 1,014 adults. The margin of error was plus- or minus-4 percentage points.)

Then you have the low unemployment rate, a high stock market, wage growth, tight labor markets — all of these are very good things, and none of them sound like the bleak economic picture that the Democrats painted during their debate earlier this month.

So which is it?

Well, for the Democrats, the answer is clear: The economy is horrible under Trump, even if the fundamentals look good.

And yet, so many Americans are satisfied with the direction the country is going.

And the reason why is simple: Deregulation, a defanged Environmental Protection Agency, a federal government that finally remembers that the business of America is business, conservative judges, great unemployment figures — including for minorities and women — and lower taxes.

Democrats want us to believe that the days when these were good things are long since gone.

As it turns out, not so much.

Do Democrats really want to run on opposing the great things that our country currently has going for it?

It certainly seems like this is their strategy.

If it is, I can guarantee you Donald Trump is going to be a very happy man.

Truth and Accuracy

Submit a Correction →



We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.

Tags:
, , , , , , , , ,
Share
C. Douglas Golden is a writer who splits his time between the United States and Southeast Asia. Specializing in political commentary and world affairs, he's written for Conservative Tribune and The Western Journal since 2014.
C. Douglas Golden is a writer who splits his time between the United States and Southeast Asia. Specializing in political commentary and world affairs, he's written for Conservative Tribune and The Western Journal since 2014. Aside from politics, he enjoys spending time with his wife, literature (especially British comic novels and modern Japanese lit), indie rock, coffee, Formula One and football (of both American and world varieties).
Birthplace
Morristown, New Jersey
Education
Catholic University of America
Languages Spoken
English, Spanish
Topics of Expertise
American Politics, World Politics, Culture




Conversation