From the disastrous rollout of Obamacare to struggles with Syria, NSA leaks and congressional probing into Benghazi, President Obama's problems have culminated in a 42 percent approval rating in the latest NBC/WSJ poll, Chuck Todd reported Wednesday on Nightly News.
"It all adds up to a public that is increasingly losing confidence in his leadership," Todd said.
That number is five points down from the same poll earlier this month, and his 51-percent disapproval matches an all-time high in the poll.
The poll showed just 22 percent thought the country was headed in the right direction, and it also revealed just 41 percent viewing Obama as personally favorable:
The NBC/WSJ pollsters argue that no single reason explains Obama’s lower poll standing. Rather, they attribute it to the accumulation of setbacks since the summer -- allegations of spying by the National Security Agency, the debate over Syria’s chemical weapons, the government shutdown and now intense scrutiny over the problems associated with the health care law’s federal website and its overall implementation.
Those events have combined to erase some of the advantage the president gained with polls showing most Americans blame congressional Republicans for the shutdown.
And for the first time in the survey, even Obama’s personal ratings are upside-down, with 41 percent viewing him a favorable light and 45 percent viewing him negatively.