More broadly, 68 percent of Americans approve of Obama's job performance to date, not atypical for an incoming president (it precisely matches Ronald Reagan's first-month rating, and trails George H.W. Bush's) but a striking counterpoint to George W. Bush's departing 33 percent approval last month. Bush hadn't seen a 68 in five and a half years. Partisanship, though, seems inescapable: Obama's approval rating, 90 percent among Democrats, dives to 37 percent among Republicans – a rating equally as partisan (in the other direction) as Bush's initial approval after the disputed election of 2000. Support for Obama's stimulus plan, similarly, is 64 percent overall, but half that, 32 percent, among Republicans. Reasons include their sharply lower confidence that the plan will work, their sharply higher concern about the federal budget deficit – and broad concerns about adequate oversight of all that federal spending. If Obama's hopes for a post-partisan presidency are falling short, he does get credit for trying – another area in which he far outpoints the opposition. Seventy-three percent of Americans say he's been trying to compromise with Republican leaders in Congress on important issues. Fewer than half as many, 34 percent, say the Republicans are trying to compromise with him. In a related rating, 68 percent say Obama is "bringing needed change to Washington," the campaign promise he rode to Washington through the primaries and the general election alike. Again, though, Republicans are less than half as likely as Democrats to say so.

One MAJOR thing is did was--prevent McCain from taking office!!!!