WASHINGTON - Despite many disagreements, people in the United States and Japan have the same general view of how their governments are handling Iraq: More than half in each country disapprove.

An Associated Press-Kyodo poll found that 55 percent in the U.S. disapprove of their government's handling of Iraq and 55 percent in Japan dislike their government's handling of Iraq.

Just the latest in a seemingly endless string of polls conducted by the news industry that seem to suggest, generally, that the public is a) not satisfied with the President and b) not satisfied with the war in Iraq. If one were to dig back through the news archives you'd probably find that, according to these polls and the reporting surrounding them, the public has been growing disenchanted with America's current leadership since the build-up toward the invasion of Iraq.

Which makes one wonder how the President and most of the rest of the politicians who supported the invasion of Iraq are still in office. After all, if the public is so dissatisfied with these people why aren't they being voted out of office?

My take on these polls is that they aren't nearly as representative of the sentiments of the average citizen as big media would like you to believe. Which is probably the point. After all, publishing poll after negative poll about the Bush administration and the war in Iraq is itself going to have a wearying effect on the opinions of Americans.