A spate of new polls shows no one is immune from this season's rising tide of voter disgust - not President Obama, not Mayor Bloomberg, not City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, not anyone.
"Welcome to the new public game show - it's called 'Hate the Incumbents,'" cracked political consultant Hank Sheinkopf.
"The good news for most of them is they don't have to face reelection anytime soon," Sheinkopf added. "But those who do may not be in control of their own destinies."
The bad news starts at the top, where President Obama would be booted from the Oval Office if he faced reelection today. Just 44% of Americans would vote for him, compared with 52% who would prefer someone else, a CNN/ORC survey found this week.
The President's biggest problem is the economy, which helped put him in office when it tanked under President George W. Bush but now has become an anchor around his administration's neck, surveys suggest.
Obama did his best yesterday to put a new gloss on his $787 billion stimulus bill, which was signed into law a year ago.
"Our work is far from over, but we have rescued this economy from the worst of this crisis," Obama said.
The news is better, but still not great, for Bloomberg.
Hizzoner's approval rating has fallen to 61% - a healthy majority but still his lowest point in 41/2 years, a new Quinnipiac University poll found yesterday.
That's down from 67% in September and 75% in October 2008. The last time Bloomberg dipped so low was July 2005, when he had a 60% approval rating heading into his first reelection bid.
"For Mayor Mike, 60 is the new 70," Quinnipiac's Mickey Carroll said. "The man who cruised through his second term with 70% approval ratings should be happy if he can stay above 60% in his third term."
Other city leaders fare worse.
Quinn has a 44% approval rating after four years of running the Council. New Controller John Liu also is at 44%, and new Public Advocate Bill de Blasio has a rating of 37%.
Controversial Schools Chancellor Joel Klein is more loathed than loved: 39% of voters approve of the job he's doing, and 40% disapprove.
Obama can take heart in one number - if this whole White House thing doesn't work out, he might want to consider running for mayor of New York in 2013.
The President's approval rating in deep blue New York remains at 72% - an enviable number for other pols. Still, his disapproval rating shot up to 25%.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said it was understandable that people's outlook is not rosy, given the depth of the recession inherited by the White House.
"It's understandable the frustration that the American people feel about the direction of their economy, based on what we've gone through since December 2007," Gibbs said, adding that the recovery act created about 2 million jobs to "fill in a hole that was 8.4 million jobs deep."
NYdaily News
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