Gallup has a 45 percent plurality of voters backing the American Jobs Act, making it the first popular non-Navy Seal-related Obama initiative since… well, since the early days of the stimulus plan.
How much bearing does this have on Congress? Almost none. No Democrats have balked at the bill, but to pass, Republicans need to get behind it in the House, and 7 Republicans need to swallow it in the Senate. Right a fairly unpopular president is asking them to back a bill with payfors that they don’t quite buy; the biggest political beneficiary, if it passes, will be Barack Obama. Republicans aren’t taking shots at the bill, but they’re diligently working to define their agenda, once again, as the jobs agenda – that’s even how they’re framing the Balanced Budget Amendment.
