Don’t Get Too Excited About the Obama Poll Bounce

Gallup’s daily tracking poll gives Barack Obama a positive approval rating – 47/45 – for the first time since June. What does it mean? Not too much, actually. In laters December, as voters turn a little less attention to politics (as they should, Washington is laying totally fallow), presidents often bounce a little bit. In 2010, after his party had just suffered an historic election defeat, Obama got a sort of Christmas bounce.
Compare this to the trend of December 2011. Obama started higher in 2010, and ended a couple of points higher. He started at 40 percent in December 2011, which makes the bounce look much more impressive. At the risk of making the punditry-negating statement that ruins all polling analysis, these holiday trends matter less than whether or not voters feel like unemployment is falling in November 2012.