NBC and The Wall Street Journal have conducted a survey about the state of our government, a survey in which the sampling size was a thousand adults. The survey was run by Hart Research Associates and Public Opinion Strategies from July 30, 2014 through August 3, 2014 and had a margin of ± 3.1 percentage points. The survey found that only 40 percent of respondents approved of President Barack Obama’s job performance. This was a new low in the ongoing poll. President Obama isn’t the only Government entity that received poor ratings from the respondents. When asked about Congress’ job performance 31% of respondents said that they had a somewhat or very positive impression of Democrats in Congress, while only 19% had a positive impression of Republicans in Congress.

Contradictory to the above results, 44% of respondents said they preferred a Republican-controlled Congress, while only 43% said they preferred a Democrat-controlled Congress. However, one-third of Americans wanted to vote out incumbents in Congress so that there are fresh faces in government. Additionally, A Washington News and ABC news poll showed that 51% of respondents said that they disapprove of the way their own congressman handled their job. The survey also showed that 57% of Americans were upset enough to hold up a sign in protest for an entire day.

Despite all of these respondents disapproving of our government’s job performance, the reasons for which they disapprove vary. Some disapproved of the way our border crisis was being handled, as well as the congressional gridlock. Others cited the handling of the Israeli- Palestinian conflict or the handling of the situation in Ukraine. Some respondents still have the events of financial collapse of 2008 and the Great Recession fresh in their minds. Additionally, almost half of those that were polled said that the U.S. was still in an economic recession. Two-thirds said that they are still in a situation where they are negatively affected by the recession.

FSA Connection Questions

1. In the article, the author conveys what information?
2. What is the connotation of the word disapproved in the story?
3. The author seems to offer what main idea?
4. Select the best two sentences from the story that supports the idea of how Americans are disillusioned with their government?
5. Select one sentence that best summarizes the work.