Obama rides high in US poll, despite scandals

President Barack Obama was riding high in a new opinion poll released today showing that 53 per cent of Americans approve of the way he's doing his job, despite a flurry of recent scandals.
The survey of 923 adults by CNN and the ORC International polling organisation found that 45 per cent of respondents disapprove of Obama's job performance.
In early April, the same poll gave the president a 51 per cent approval rating, showing that Obama is holding steady despite a brutal week in which the White House attempted to control damage from three simultaneous scandals which threatened to derail his agenda.

The White House last week was forced to respond to controversy over the administration's response to last year's fatal attack on a US mission in Benghazi, Libya; government subpoenas of phone records belonging to the Associated Press news agency; and revelations that federal tax authorities had singled out conservative groups for special scrutiny.
Republicans have used the affairs to accuse the Obama administration of being guilty of a massive abuse of power, which the White House denies.
The polls showed that most Americans believe the scandals are either "somewhat important" or "very important," but for the time being were giving Obama the benefit of the doubt.

The survey was conducted Friday and yesterday and had a sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.