Griper Blade: A Vanishing Opportunity to Turn the Tables on the GOP

Politico called last week a "political gift" for Republicans. The convergence of three controversies had a fading political party drooling. Of course, Benghazi was an entirely made up conspiracy theory, the IRS story may or may not be scandalous but doesn't involve the White House, and seizing phone records from the AP is the sort of thing Republicans can actually get behind in their never-ending War on Terror.

Still, the press went a little nuts with the stories on an otherwise slow news week and Republicans began to believe the hype. Wall-to-wall coverage of these three stories merged into one rat king of story and the nation was transfixed. Completely and utterly transfixed.

Or were we?

CNN: President Barack Obama comes out of what was arguably the worst week of his presidency with his approval rating holding steady, according to a new national poll.

But a CNN/ORC International survey released Sunday morning also indicates that congressional Republicans are not overplaying their hand when it comes to their reaction to the three controversies that have consumed the nation's capital over the past week and a half. And the poll finds that a majority of Americans take all three issues seriously.

According to the survey, which was conducted Friday and Saturday, 53% of Americans say they approve of the job the president is doing, with 45% saying they disapprove. The president's approval rating was at 51% in CNN's last poll, which was conducted in early April.

So Americans take these issues seriously, but not seriously enough to change their opinion of the president. "The CNN poll is in-line with Gallup, which also indicated a very slight rise in Obama's approval rating over the same time period," the report continues. "And Gallup's daily tracking poll also indicated a slight upward movement of Obama's approval rating over the past week. But as with the CNN poll, it was within that survey's sampling error"...[CLICK TO READ FULL POST]