WINNING: OBAMA'S APPROVAL RATING PLUMMETS!!

AP poll: Obama at 37% approval

Readers have to get halfway into the Associated Press report on its new AP-GFK poll to find this out, but Barack Obama's job approval numbers have cratered in the shutdown.  His overall job approval is now 37/53, and a majority want Obama to start cooperating more with Republicans, as 63% want Republicans to meet Obama part-way, too:

Americans are holding Republicans primarily responsible for the partial government shutdown as public esteem sinks for all players in the impasse, President Barack Obama among them, according to a new poll. It’s a struggle with no heroes. …

Most Americans disapprove of the way Obama is handling his job, the poll suggests, with 53 percent unhappy with his performance and 37 percent approving of it. Congress is scraping rock bottom, with a ghastly approval rating of 5 percent.

Indeed, anyone making headlines in the dispute has earned poor marks for his or her trouble, whether it’s Democrat Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, or Republican John Boehner, the House speaker, both with a favorability rating of 18 percent.

Only 30% approve of raising the debt ceiling, clean or otherwise.  And despite the best (that is to say, most malicious) efforts of the National Parks Service, more than 80% have had no impact from the government shutdown.  That's not exactly the kind of momentum Obama and the Democrats hoped to generate for pressure on Republicans, and their "no negotiations" stand is practically designed to backfire...