Presidential Approval Rating Quotes
Canes-Wrone developed Conditional Pandering Theory. The very popular Presidents do not have to engage in pandering. The unpopular presidents will not be helped much so they have little to gain by using this technique which is personally distasteful to almost all politicians. It is the middle of the road Presidents who tend to make the biggest use of policy pandering.
The President tends to keep increasing the number of Americans who are opposed to his policies, or felt he did not live up to his promises, or has been sufficiently negatively trashed by his opposition that his negatives are driven up and positives, down. The only exception to this is President William Clinton, who ironically is the only President who was impeached since Andrew Johnson, a terrible President. However, the pettiness and partisanship of the impeachment attack on Clinton caused the Senate to acquit him where the Republicans who controlled the Senate could not even muster a majority, much less the two-thirds necessary, for conviction. Meanwhile, with all the distractions of impeachment, Clinton managed the strongest economy in American history, not only balanced the budget, but created a surplus for the first time in modern history. So Clinton left office, a hero and his popularity was sustained after his presidency as George W. Bush, following a new Republican ideology, squandered the surplus, created very few jobs, and then crashed the world economy triggering the Great Recession of 2008. He left the Presidency as one of the more unpopular Presidents in history. By contrast, Clinton’s accomplishments were even more appreciated as Bush was his foil.
