Minnesota Poll: Strong support for Obama as state's mood improves

Nearly 100 days into his presidency, Barack Obama has the approval of a strong majority of Minnesotans, amid an improving but fragile mood about the general direction of the nation.

A new Star Tribune Minnesota Poll finds that 62 percent of adults in the state approve of the job Obama is doing as president, even as slightly more than half -- 51 percent -- say the country is off on the "wrong track."

While U.S. presidents typically have strong approval ratings after their first few months, the Minnesota Poll found a striking jump in the number of respondents who feel good about the general direction of the country.

Overall, 39 percent said the nation is going in the "right direction" rather than being on the "wrong track." While still low, that's up from 14 percent in two separate Minnesota polls conducted last year, one in May and another at the end of September during a sharp downward spiral in financial markets.

The telephone poll of 1,042 Minnesota adults, conducted last Monday through Thursday, found broad support for Obama on the economy, one of the overarching issues of the November election. Nearly three-quarters of Minnesotans (72 percent) expressed a lot or some confidence that he is doing the right things to fix the ailing economy.

"At least he's doing something different," said poll respondent Joan Anderson, a retired Northwest Airlines reservation agent from Apple Valley. "We definitely needed a change. Now it's just wait and see."

While Anderson said she is not sure whether all of Obama's policies will work, she said she has been glad to see him forging a new path on the economy and in foreign affairs. On the economy, she said, "people were so dishonest and greedy, there have to be new rules to hold them in check."

But even as Obama rode into the White House on the hope of easing the nation's partisan divide, Minnesotans split largely along party lines in their assessments of his presidency: 88 percent of Democrats approve of the job he is doing, while only 21 percent of Republicans do.

The random telephone survey produced a sample consisting of 20 percent Republicans, 36 percent Democrats and 37 percent independents, with 6 percent offering no self-identification. The poll has a margin of sampling error of 4 percentage points, plus or minus.

Obama won the approval of 59 percent of Minnesotans who consider themselves independents, a sign that the nation's first black president is still holding onto the political center that helped him carry the state comfortably in November.

Mixed feelings

Among the Obama skeptics is Chuck Frick, a small-business owner from Plymouth. "I like the man. I think he's an honest person," said Frick, an independent. "But his policies and his approach to government involvement in capitalism [are] scary for me. I'm almost afraid of the consequences."

Obama's approval rating largely seems to transcend age and income brackets, with solid majorities across the board expressing approval. He polled somewhat better among women than men, 65 percent to 58 percent.

Among Obama's strongest supporters are those who see him putting country above politics in the tone he brings to Washington. "He's doing what he can to reach across the aisle," said Linda Gmitter, a teacher in the Anoka County corrections system. "I just get the feeling the across-the-aisle folks just don't give a darn."

Some of the president's critics, meanwhile, see something foreign in both his style and substance. "The founders of this country would not recognize where Barack Obama and his group are trying to drag us," said Kevin O'Brien, a Minneapolis health-care executive who objects to Obama's foreign and domestic policies.

"I'm bothered by some of his gestures and actions," said O'Brien, citing Obama's apparent bow to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. "I don't believe we are guiltless in all of the things that have gone on around the globe, but I don't accept that we are the world's problem."

Overall, 58 percent of respondents said they approve of Obama's handling of foreign policy, while 26 percent disapprove.

Crisis rally

The past three U.S. presidents have shown similarly high approval ratings after their opening months, but no corresponding increases in "right track" numbers.

"That's an amazing jump," said political scientist Kay Wolsborn of the College of St. Benedict in St. Joseph, Minn.

The last time a Minnesota poll found a 25-point jump in the general feeling about the direction of the country was right after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. To Wolsborn, that suggests a similar sense of rallying around crisis.

"The crises are quite different -- the economic crisis and 9/11," she said. "But President Bush's ratings went very high after that, because he was understood to be doing something about a threat and moving forward."

"He got stuck with a horrible situation," said Gmitter, whose husband works in a steel plant that's seen its share of layoffs. "He's doing what he needs to do, and hopefully it will be the right thing."