As we watch the horrendous violence in and near Gaza (the highly lethal Israeli airstrikes and the heavy but not very competent rocket attacks from Hamas), along comes research from Gallup that in this country, Muslims and Jews have one important thing in common: they both disproportionately approve of President Obama’s job performance.
Actually, non-Christians agree across all sorts of lines (including the one that separates belief from unbelief) on this subject as measured in 2014 tracking poll averages, with Obama’s approval/disapproval ratio standing at 72/20 among Muslims, 55/41 among Jews, 59/34 among “other non-Christians,” and 54/38 among “No religion/Atheist.” Obama’s approval ratings are underwater among all the major Christian groupings (though Gallup doesn’t help our understanding by lumping all Protestants together a time when mainliners and conservative evangelicals are miles apart), and are worst among LDS folk (18/78). All the positive numbers are lower for Obama than in earlier stages of his presidency, but are largely consistent with past patterns.
Maybe it is time for a presidential Middle East mission….
