AP Poll: Bush, Congress remain unpopular

Thu Jan 10, 4:22 PM ET

WASHINGTON - President Bush and Congress retained their dismal levels of popularity and huge majorities are unhappy with how things are going in the country, according to a poll released Thursday.
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Thirty-four percent said they approved of the job Bush is doing, about where his ratings have been for more than a year, according to the poll by The Associated Press and Ipsos. Twenty-six percent said they were happy with Congress' performance, little different than where it has been for months.

With signs of economic stress abounding, Bush's approval for handling the economy was 33 percent, compared with 36 percent last month.

About three quarters of Republicans, a tenth of Democrats and a quarter of independents were happy with Bush's overall job performance. Congress got good marks from about a fourth in each group.

Just 27 percent said the country was headed in the right direction, including fewer than half of Republicans. That was a slight dip from last month.

The survey was conducted from Jan. 7-9 and involved telephone interviews with 1,027 adults. It had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

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