Biden is a stun­ning 10 points away from reelec­tion lock

Head-to-head pres­i­den­tial pref­er­ence polls are all the rage, but ever since Dwight D. Eisenhower’s reelec­tion in 1956, the pros have looked to approval rat­ings as the key to an incumbent’s chances.
And for Pres­i­dent Joe Biden, the num­bers look bad.
While he is even or lead­ing for­mer Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump in some race­horse polls, Biden’s approval rat­ing is about 10 points under the pre­vi­ous record low of a win­ning incum­bent.
That was for­mer Pres­i­dent George W. Bush, who beat then-Sen. John Ker­ry, despite hav­ing a 48% approval rat­ing.
In a new Hill/DDHQ sur­vey, just 38.6% approve of Biden, 58.1% don’t. In the Gallup track­ing poll, Biden is at 40% approval.

Poll­sters such as Gallup have said that an approval of 50% or high­er is the key to reelec­tion. Drop below, and chances shrink to just 50–50.
Bush had the low­est approval rat­ing in decades, but a recent Gallup analy­sis not­ed that …