WHAT AMERICANS THINK – AT 9:28 A.M. ET:  Andrew Malcolm, at the L.A. Times's excellent Top of the Ticket blog, presents some recent findings on how Americans see things.  Some of the results seem to reflect what we've been seeing, but others are bit surprising:

Gallup finds terrorism remains the top concern. But it has now been joined by -- Hello, big Democratic spenders Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid -- the exploding enormity of the federal deficits. And here's the midterm election year political problem for both of these Democrats: Republicans are viewed as better at handling both of those concerns.

ABC News finds voter frustration at the boiling point. The number of Americans approving of ...

... their local House member has dropped below 50% for the first time since Bill Clinton's first midterm elections in 1994.

Anybody remember which party named Republican seized control of both houses of Congress that year for the first time in four decades? Voter approval of Congress is now at 26%, down 18 points since the same Democrats took majority control of both houses in 2007.

The even better news for Republicans is that the GOP has increased its lead on the so-called generic congressional ballot this month. That is, which party's candidate are you most likely to vote for on Nov. 2? Republicans now lead Democrats by nine points, 44-35, Rasmussen Reports reports.

And...

The Harris Poll has an interesting new survey out on how 2,503 Americans rate 16 elements of life in their country. Large majorities give positive ratings to America's science and technology (75%), its Constitution (70%), quality of life (66%) and even its overpriced colleges and universities (65%).

The more education you have, the higher you rate these categories.

I'm a little surprised at how high colleges and universities rank, as I believe they will be the targets of some pretty intense scrutiny in coming years as people start asking what their kids are getting for $45,000 a year.  Maybe overburdened parents were underrepresented in the Harris survey.

However, the health care system (33%), public schools (32%) and the economic system (28%) don't get rated very well.

I suspect the health care figure reflects a lot of negative talk related to the Obamacare debate, rather than reality.  There are problems with health care, some serious, but the system actually functions quite well for the great majority of Americans. 

Incumbent Alert: You'll never guess which sector gets the worst rating from Americans: Political (23%).

I guess we didn't get the change we can believe in.

June 10, 2010