I see Matt and Ian have both posted about how the most recent Brown poll shows an “approval” rating of only 39% for Governor Carcieri. The actual question/answers are as follows:

How would you rate the job Don Carcieri is doing as governor? Excellent 13.0%; Good 26.3%; Only fair 24.9%; Poor 32.8%; Don’t know/No answer 3.0%

I checked on the methodology of how Brown defines “approval” in their own polls, and they include only the “Excellent” and “Good” answers in this calculation. However, Matt takes this to mean that Governor Carcieri must have a 58% disapproval rating. Well, let’s be fair, here. I’ll concede that those answering “Only fair” don’t imply that they “approve”, but it also doesn’t follow that they disapprove, does it? A fair reading would put the Governor’s disapproval rating at around 33%.
Let’s take Matt’s formula and apply it to some other RI pols, shall we?

How would you rate the job Patrick Kennedy is doing as U.S. representative? Excellent 11.1%; Good 35.6%; Only fair 26.6%; Poor 20.2%; Don’t know/No answer 6.5%
DISAPPROVAL = 47%
How would you rate the job Elizabeth Roberts is doing as lieutenant governor? Excellent 2.5%; Good 21.5%; Only fair 29.4%; Poor 14.5%; Don’t know/No answer 32.1%
DISAPPROVAL = 44%
How would you rate the job William Murphy is doing as House speaker? Excellent 2.0%; Good 14.9%; Only fair 23.6%; Poor 18.4%; Don’t know/No answer 41.1%
DISAPPROVAL = 42%
How would you rate the job Joseph Montalbano is doing as Senate president? Excellent 1.6%; Good 11.6%; Only fair 22.2%; Poor 22.1%; Don’t know/No answer 42.5%
DISAPPROVAL = 44%
How would you rate the job David Cicilline is doing as mayor of Providence? Excellent 9.1%; Good 36.9%; Only fair 24.9%; Poor 18.2%; Don’t know/No answer 10.9%
DISAPPROVAL = 42%

Does anyone really think that nearly half of Rhode Islanders have a strong disapproval of Liz Roberts? C’mon….