Polls are easy to understand.

40% of the people are on one side and 40% are on the other. The 20% in the middle can't make up their minds and bounce from one side to the other. If a president is over 50% he is doing great, over 60% and he is eating the other guys lunch. The job of the loyal opposition is to try to keep the numbers as near to 50% as possible. When they are near 60% the loyal opposition has little to lose so they try anything to see what sticks. The only real variable for any president is that 20% in the middle. To really see how an issue or any political leader is doing just take the poll number and subtract 40 and multiply the remainder by 5. That will give you a real number. For example: Say a president has a poll rating of 57%. Subtract 40 and you get 17. Multiply by 5 and you get 85%. That means that in this example the president has 85% of all the votes that are gettable. That's why the republicans in the senate did not remove Clinton after he was impeached. His poll numbers were 60% or so and they knew if they removed him they would be themselves removed come election day. But you already knew that didn't you?