NEWSWEEK WEB EXCLUSIVE

April 14 — Sixty-nine percent of Americans approve of the way President George W. Bush handled the recent incident involving the American spy plane and China, according to a new NEWSWEEK poll. But the crisis had virtually no impact on the country’s overall assessment of his performance.

BUSH’S APPROVAL RATING stands at 57 percent, statistically similar to the 55 percent recorded one month ago. A significant majority of Americans (69%) want to continue surveillance flights off the Chinese coast; just 10 percent say they should end.

But American public opinion toward China is not particularly negative. Just 22 percent say the spy-plane incident will result in long-term damage to U.S.-China relations. Fifty-four percent support China’s membership in the World Trade Organization. And just 35 percent of Americans oppose China’s bid to host the 2008 Olympic games. Public sentiment runs against proposals to sell military equipment to Taiwan; 50 percent say such a sale should not be approved vs. 35 percent who are in favor. Bush’s handling of foreign policy issues in general gets a solid approval rating of 55 percent. His ratings on other issues range from a low of 41 percent for energy policy to a high of 68 percent for moral values. Americans continue to be divided about Bush’s tax-cut plan. About half (48 percent) approve of the way Bush is handling the issue of taxes, vs. 40 percent who say they disapprove. And the public as a whole favors the smaller Senate tax plan by a margin of 48 percent to 35 percent. Bush’s budget, announced last week, also gets a mixed reaction.

Forty-three percent say they generally agree with the president’s spending priorities; 37 percent say they disagree.

The NEWSWEEK poll was conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates on April 12 -13. One thousand adults were interviewed by telephone. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus three percentage points.

-- Ain't Gonna's (Wine@Mer.chant), April 15, 2001

Answers

BIG FUCKING DEAL.

The guy is still an asshole and always will be an asshole.

-- (poll.that@you.dipshit), April 15, 2001.

And liberals will still push towards socialism.

-- libs are idiots (moreinterpretation@ugly.com), April 15, 2001.

And libs are idiots will still be drinking from the republigoon toilet.

-- dumbya (not@my.president), April 15, 2001.

Well ya know dubya, it *does* taste better than the shit the libs in Congress have been shov'lin' down our throats for three decades. That's one thing I've been so grateful that Clinton did for us... get the libs out of congress.

-- Maria (anon@ymous.com), April 16, 2001.