But job approval, Mr. Zogby points out, is quite different from popularity. But on any number of personal questions, this is not a popular president. People would not hire Bill Clinton as CEO, they would not want him dating their daughter, they do not see him as a role model for their kids. The latest Zogby poll, however, gives the president an overwhelming 61 percent job approval rating-9 to 15 points lower than some other polls, but impressive nonetheless. Mr. Zogby, who is himself a Democrat, hurries to add that this doesn't mean as much as the White House might like the Senate to believe.
Job performance is a passive reading.
Indeed, Mr. Newport of the Gallup poll acknowledges that since the time of Franklin Roosevelt, job approval ratings have usually mirrored the health of the economy rather than any specific actions on the part of the chief executive. Despite the booming economy, just 40 percent of respondents in the latest Zogby poll said they were proud to have Mr. Clinton as president, compared to 42 percent who said they were ashamed. For conservatives bewildered by the seeming popularity of a thoroughly discredited president, such numbers may prove reassuring. That in many ways allows Bill Clinton to survive. As closing arguments concluded on Saturday, Jan. 23, they had to realize fully that they were facing not just the president and the polls, but the Senate's own vaunted sense of prestige and prerogative.