When Bush won the 2004 election by a couple of percentage points, it was considered a "mandate". But when Bush is beaten
two-to-one consistently in a CNN poll
http://www.cnn.com/...
and does not lead in a single indicator against his predecessor, well, then they say that Bush was simply, merely "outperformed."
The closest Bush got to Clinton was on the handling of national security (42 to 46 percent, respectively) and who they thought was more honest (Clinton 46, Bush 41).
But otherwise, Clinton crushed him: on the economy; handling the problems of "ordinary Americans"; foreign affairs; natural disasters.
Another way that CNN might have put it -- equally accurately -- is that our current president is considered to be massively underperforming and is considered more of a liar than a man who was impeached.
But, then, that would be a "biased" reading of the poll, no?