Congress more popular than Kardashians, Lohan, gonorrhea
Americans still have a higher opinion of head lice, colonoscopies, cockroaches, Nickelback, the NFL replacement refs, and Donald Trump
By Olivier Knox, Yahoo! News | The Ticket
Good news, Congress! You’re more popular than telemarketers, the deadly ebola virus, gonorrhea, the Kardashians, Lindsay Lohan, communism, disgraced Democratic former Sen. John Edwards, playground bullies and meth labs.
Bad news, Congress! Americans still have a higher opinion of head lice, colonoscopies, cockroaches, Nickelback, the NFL replacement refs, and Donald Trump.
Those are the findings of the latest they-have-way-too-much-fun-over-there survey by Public Policy Polling, which found that the legislative branch’s approval rating is mired at 9 percent. A whopping 85 percent of respondents said they disapproved. The margin of error was plus or minus 3.4 percentage points.
Public Policy Polling pitted Congress against a series of unpleasant things or unpopular people, and the results were not flattering for lawmakers. This will come as no surprise to some of the legislative branch’s critics, including Republican Sen. John McCain, who has said that only blood relatives and paid staffers think Congress is doing a good job.
So: Higher opinion of root canals or Congress? Congress gets drilled, 56 to 32 percent. NFL replacement refs? Easy call: Congress loses 56 to 29 percent. Head lice? Congress loses 67 to 19 percent (head-scratcher: The 15 percent who said they weren’t sure). Nickelback? Congress gets rocked 39 to 32 percent. Colonoscopies? Up yours, Congress, 58 to 31 percent. Inside-the-Beltway pundits? The Sabbath gasbags and their ilk eke it out 37 to 34 percent. Donald Trump? You’re (barely) fired, Congress, 44 to 42 percent. And cockroaches scurry away with a 45 to 43 percent win.
It’s not all bad news for Congress. Americans rate lawmakers higher than telemarketers (45 to 35 percent), Edwards (45 to 29 percent), the Kardashian clan (49 to 36 percent, with 16 percent not sure), lobbyists (48 to 30 percent), North Korea (61 to 26 percent), ebola (53 to 25 percent with 21 percent apparently not sure whether they prefer their elected representatives over death after bleeding from various bodily orifices), Lindsay Lohan (though the 45 to 41 percent ratio falls well within the margin of error), Fidel Castro (54 to 32 percent), communism (57 to 23 percent) and gonorrhea (53 to 28 percent).
Of course, even though the survey was conducted Jan. 3-6, those ratings most likely reflect views about the 112th Congress, which ended last week. Onward, 113th Congress!
