The
Chicago Tribune has a
new poll (subscription required) out with some bad numbers for the Illinois Governor:
Winds of change may have put Rod Blagojevich in the governor's office, but a steady buffeting of allegations over mismanagement and "pay to play" politics have soured a growing number of Illinois voters on the first-term Democrat, a new Tribune/WGN-TV poll shows.
...
Perhaps even more troubling for Blagojevich, only one-third of voters say they want to see him re-elected next year while 45 percent say they don't, according to the poll.
Among the 1,200 likely voters surveyed, 35 percent said they approved of the job Blagojevich is doing as the state's chief executive, while 44 percent said they disapproved. Another 21 percent said they had no opinion.
(more)
Blagojevich's numbers have steadily eroded (he was at 52-28 approval just last fall) as he has mismanaged everything from his workings with the Democratic-dominated state legislature to the questions of ethics and corruption now plaguing his administration.
For many of us in the party, he is fulfilling all of our worst fears about his governorship... petty politics, uninformed actions and alleged corruption that may, ultimately, end up making George Ryan, the now-indicted former Republican governor, look like a piker by comparison.
The real tragedy for the party is that Democrats had a lock on this state, and Blagojevich's ignorant and selfish actions threaten to tank our advantage at a time when we have our foot on the throat of the statewide Republican apparatus.
And to show just how clueless the guy is, he has been telling confidantes that he wants to run for president.
Fool.
My prediction: If he manages to eke out a second term (always a possibility given A. his enormous war chest, and B. the general disarray of the state Republican Party), he and his associates will be taken down in a swirl of charges that will seriously damage the Democrats statewide.
We need every blue state and blue voter we can get, both as a state and as a country. To see an idiot squander that advantage is infuriating.