Outside Counsel

It would be interesting to see what attempts have been made in the past to measure voter satisfaction with their choices. Such a study could incorporate several axises: satisfaction over time while the candidate is in office, the type of office held, retrospective satisfaction once the candidate has left office.... It seems to me that there is seldom much buyer's remorse with candidates who are elected to legislative office-- they tend to get re-elected which is probably the most important metric. On the other hand, I don't hear many people saying aloud that Bush fils was a choice they regret, even though he was spectacularly, historically awful. Trump's negatives are pretty amazing for a guy who has only been in office two weeks. Of course, approval ratings give us one such metric:

Here’s how many days after their election it took various presidents to achieve majority disapproval in the Gallup poll:
Reagan: 727
Bush I: 1336
Clinton: 573
Bush II: 1205
Obama: 936
Trump: 8

It's also always worth keeping in mind that the majority of voters didn't like Trump in the first place. In fact, only 45 percent of Republican primary voters (the hardest nuts of all) voted for him. This makes something like the spontaneous protests that erupted over the weekend (over one of Trump's core promises) more understandable. Notwithstanding the vociferousness of his hard core, most people don't like what he represents, or what he is doing. Whether this will mean that people will turn out for the Midterms, and vote with the recognition that it is Congress which is enabling him remains to be seen-- I am pessimistic, but you don't have to be. What none of us should be is complacent.

And by the way: I find it weirdly troubling that the hard core Trump supporters on my FB feed are people I went to Catholic high school with. Were they all out on the days when we covered stuff like the Gospels?   I suppose if a substantial portion of one's formal intellectual training rejects evidence in favor of "faith" one might begin to assume that opinion is a sufficient basis for otherwise unfounded beliefs. That's a discouraging path to go down but it certainly accounts for the vehemence.