President Bush Poll Numbers Plummet: 31% in Gallup Poll

President George W. Bush's approval rating has plummeted to 31% in a new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll, the lowest of his presidency in that particular poll. 

Can Bush stop the slide?

The reason seems simple - he's losing the support of his conservative base.

The report that accompanies the poll says exactly that and gives the analysis that Bush's fall is being fueled by erosion among support from conservatives and Republicans. In the poll, 52% of conservatives and 68% of Republicans approved of the job he is doing. Both are record lows among those groups.

Moderates gave him an approval rating of 28%, liberals of 7%.

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"You hear people say he has a hard core that will never desert him, and that has been the case for most of the administration," says Charles Franklin, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin who studies presidential approval ratings.

"But for the last few months, we started to see that hard core seriously erode in support."

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That's an easy call. 

Conservatives tolerated the over the top spending and his poor performance on communication on the war in Iraq.

They believed they had to support him as Commander in Chief as America is at war.

But it appears his lack of understanding the importance of getting a handle on illegal immigration to conservatives has driven the number to historic lows.  The price at gas at the pump for motorists is also pushing that number down, as Bush has failed to capitilize on that opportunuty as well.

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It may be tough to pull out of this before the mid-term elections - without a drastic change in the fundamental way the Administration deals with the problem of illegal immigration.

Only four presidents have scored lower approval ratings since the Gallup Poll began regularly measuring it in the mid-1940s, reports USA Today.  Harry Truman, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter and the first George Bush all sunk this low and when Nixon, Carter and the elder Bush sank below 35%, they never again registered above 40%.

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President Bush must begin to set the agenda as a conservative on illegal immigration and use his fading bully pulpit to call for domestic oil exploration and new refineries. 

If not - he may fade into the twenties.

--CK Rairden