Democrats numbers up? Beware

An AP/Ipsos poll released today provided some encouraging news to Democrats nationwide. Americans prefer a Democratic Congress to a Republican Congress by a 49 percent to 36 percent margin. Also, W found out that his campaign-style public relations strategy on Iraq did not work after all. After seeing his poll numbers bump up into the mid-40's for a few weeks now, his approval rating is now at 40 percent. Further, only 34 percent of Americans approve of the job this Republican-controlled Congress is doing, while 63 percent disapprove.

Unfortunately, it is easy to jump to conclusions when stumbling upon this data. While many might believe that voters are itching to get to the voting booth now to unseat the ineffective Republicans, the problem is that it's very easy to spread the blame so that the voter never feels it's their congressperson to blame, but the 434 others. If you combine that with the power of incumbency, it's still a tall mountain to scale. Democrats need to start construction on a positive, substantive message.

Things are looking good, but we're nowhere near finished yet.