Incumbent Obama Polling Troubles … Get Ready for the Race Card, CNN Poll White Voters Disapprove of Obama 61%–36%, Non-Whites Approve 67%–32%

President Barack Obama continues to struggle in the polls, especially when compared against recent incumbents. According to the most recent CNN poll, Obama has more troubling data ahead of the 2012 elections. Some of the most damning data is Obama’s polling with Independents, where by a 54%-42% margin, indies disapprove of how the president’s handling his duties.

In comparison to recent incumbents running for re-election, Obama’s 46% approval ranks above only Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford – who both lost their re-election bids – in November of the year before an election. Most incumbents who were re-elected had an approval rating above 50% a year before the election. But George W. Bush, at 50%, and Richard Nixon, at 49%, also won re-election, and Bush’s father George H.W. Bush had a 56% approval rating yet lost to Bill Clinton the following year.

Overall, Obama’s numbers still troubling when he polls better for foreign policy as compared to handling the economy.

A CNN/ORC International Poll released Tuesday indicates that 52% of all Americans approve of how the president is handling the situation in Iraq, an indication that Americans tend to favor Obama’s decision to withdraw all U.S. troops from that country by year’s end. Forty-eight percent of those questioned approve of how he is handling the war in Afghanistan. By contrast, only 35% have a positive view of his economic track record, and just 38% approve of how he is handling health care policy.

Women are divided on how Obama’s performing, but men disapprove by a 55%–43% margin. White Americans give Obama a thumbs down by a 61%–36% margin, with non-white Americans give the president a thumbs up by a more than 2–1 margin.

As Weasel Zippers opines, when you have a failure of a President, get ready for the race card to be used early and often in the reelection efforts of Barack Obama.