US-Obama Approval: 49% Approve, 47% Disapprove (ABC/Post 12/9-12)

ABC News / Washington Post
12/9-12/10; 1,001 adults, 3.5% margin of error
Mode: Live telephone interviews
Post story, results, ABC Story, Results

National

Obama Job Approval
49% Approve, 47% Disapprove (chart)
Economy: 43 / 54 (chart)

State of the Country
31% Right Direction, 67% Wrong Track (chart)

ABC:

Congressional Republicans are newly competitive on several key issues, President Obama leads on compromise and sincerity -- but that thick pall over Washington is the same as ever: economic gloom and the political disaffection that comes with it.

A month after voters chucked the Democrats out of control of the House of Representatives, a boost in political optimism is nowhere to be found. While a plurality of Americans, 41 percent, see the House switch as a good thing, that's fewer than said so the last two times it's happened, in 2006 and 1994. And 67 percent say the country's seriously off on the wrong track.

Post:

Republicans may have made major gains in the November elections, but they have yet to win the hearts and minds of the American people, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

The midterm elections - in which Republicans gained 63 seats to take control of the House and added six seats to their Senate minority - were widely seen as a rebuke to President Obama. Still, the public trusts Obama marginally more than they do congressional Republicans to deal with the country's main problems in the coming years, 43 percent to 38 percent.