Americans approve of Obama's performance

Good news from McClatchy:

Nearly seven in ten Americans approve of the way President Barack Obama is doing his job, giving him enormous political capital as he pushes Congress to give him unprecedented tools to fight economic crisis, according to a new McClatchy-Ipsos poll.

Obama outpolls Congress by more than 30 points, and he also can point to an uptick in the number of people who think the country's headed in the right direction even as a majority thinks the worst is yet to come in the economy.

The survey found that 69 percent of Americans approve of Obama's performance — with a robust 38 percent "strongly" approving.