By Eric Boehlert
Salon.com

Since his 3-percentage-point win over Sen. John Kerry, Bush has experienced a complete lack of bounce in the polls. In fact, in at least one national survey, Fox News' Opinion Dynamics poll, conducted Dec. 14-15, Bush's approval rating has fallen five points in the last month, to 48 percent. In other polls, including Washington Post-ABC, NBC/Wall Street Journal, Pew Research Center, Associated Press-Ipsos, Zogby, and Gallup, Bush's already soft approval numbers have flat-lined since the election. That phenomenon stands in sharp contrast to U.S. history, when presidents voted into office for a second term, even after close elections, routinely have received robust approval ratings…

As for what's weighing down Bush's poll numbers, it seems clear that the ongoing chaos in Iraq is a major culprit. Since Election Day alone, nearly 200 American servicemen and -women have been killed in Iraq, as violence continues to spread throughout the country, 19 months after U.S. forces first invaded. According to the latest Gallup poll, 33 percent of Americans think things are going "very badly" in Iraq, a new high-water mark for that response. Meanwhile, the embarrassment over Bernard Kerik's aborted nomination as secretary of homeland security, as well as the controversy over post-9/11 intelligence reform that some renegade Republicans tried to block, likely added to Bush's post-election woes.

It might seem natural for a president who just won a bitter and exceedingly close election to suffer from soft poll numbers, considering so many people voted against him. But Americans, up until now, have traditionally rallied around the Election Day winner, no matter how close the vote…

[C]ome Inauguration Day, George W. Bush will likely make history as the least popular president to ever take the oath of office.

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