More importantly why do we care. Approval ratings are a waste of our time, they don't tell the general public anything important. Looking at past ratings only proves that they tell you one thing only- they don't matter. Whether the public approves of the president is no indicator of whether he is doing a good job or not. Since most people have no idea why or how the world works-economics, foreign policy, etc. it is only an indicator of who is doing a better pr job at the moment- the fors or the againsts.