WASHINGTON — The euphoria of 2008 is over: America is in a funk.
Elected last November on a wave of optimism, President Barack Obama now finds himself governing an increasingly pessimistic country.
The latest Associated Press-GfK poll shows that Americans grew slightly more dispirited on a range of matters over the past month, continuing slippage that has occurred since Obama took office.
Now, Obama’s approval rating stands at 54 percent, roughly the same as in October but very different from what it was in January just before he took office, 74 percent. And 56 percent of people say the country is heading in the wrong direction, an uptick from 51 percent last month and 49 percent in Obama’s first month as president.
The economy is by far the most important issue on the minds of Americans given a crushing recession that has erased jobs.
Unemployment hit 10.2 percent last month, helping explain why as many people said the economy got worse in the past month as said it got better — and it’s not many people who thought it got better, just 22 percent.
Most say the economy stayed the same, and most don’t approve of how Obama is handling it — just 46 percent approve compared with 50 percent last month.
Compared with October, 45 percent of people now disapprove of Obama’s handling of Iraq, up from 37 percent, while 48 percent disapprove of his handling of Afghanistan, up from 41 percent; a majority of people in the country opposes both wars. And more than half — 54 percent — now oppose sending more troops to Afghanistan, an increase from 50 percent last month.
All that puts Obama in a tough spot as he nears a decision on whether to add tens of thousands more forces to Afghanistan. His top general there is seeking 40,000 more.
On health care, about half of the country approves of how Obama is doing .
The Nov. 5-9 poll involving landline and cellphone interviews with 1,006 adults nationwide has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.
