Dog Days

The dog days are here.
The ugliness of the political discourse this month--as Republicans took to calling the opposition "Defeatocrats"--foreshadows a brutal fall campaign season.
While Newsweek published a poll finding that approval of Bush's handling of terrorism climbed from 44 percent to 55 percent, no polls have found a significant overall boost for Bush or the Republicans.
John Zogby's latest poll, which has Bush's approval at 34 percent, finds bad news for him in an unlikely location:

Even among weekly WalMart shoppers – a demographic group identified by Pollster John Zogby as a critical support group for Bush – just 45% now give him positive job marks, though his numbers among those shoppers have improved 10 points since early June.
More than three out of four – 76% – of weekly WalMart shoppers voted for Bush over Democrat John Kerry in the 2004 presidential election, earlier Zogby polling showed.

The next several weeks will not be kind to Bush as we commemorate the first anniversary of Hurrican Katrina and the fifth anniversary of 9/11. In the past, reminders of the dangers from terrorists have worked for Bush, but I think those days are over. Even so, I would expect to continue to hear Republicans attack Democrats on terrorism, like this television ad with Hillary Clinton's face next to Osama bin Laden's. (The ad also mispells "fascists" as "facists.")
My best advice is to take a few days, grab a beer or some lemonade and try to relax.