On the September 23 broadcast of PBS' Washington Week, Los Angeles Times Washington bureau chief Doyle McManus baselessly claimed that President Bush received a “bump in the polls” following his September 15 speech addressing relief efforts for the Hurricane Katrina disaster. In fact, available polling shows that Bush's approval ratings remained stagnant or continued to drop after the speech.

An Associated Press/Ipsos poll conducted September 16-18 showed a one-point increase in Bush's job approval rating (from 39 percent to 40 percent). A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll (subscription required) conducted September 16-18 showed a six-point decrease in Bush's approval rating (from 46 percent to 40 percent). According to the weblog RealClearPolitics.com, a Rasmussen poll conducted September 17-19 showed a 44 percent approval rating -- a three-point slip from a September 10-12 poll. All three polls had margins of error of at least plus or minus three points, and the change in each poll was within its margin of error.

From the September 23 broadcast of PBS' Washington Week:

GWEN IFILL (host): That was the president this morning at the Federal Emergency Management Agency headquarters, trying to be right on top of things. Doyle, what's at stake for him?

McMANUS: A lot is at stake for him, Gwen. If you had to choose a single reason George W. Bush won re-election in 2004, it was his image as a strong leader; a strong leader principally in the war on terrorism, but generally a strong leader. That was the thing he scored highest on in polls, and that's what took a beating in the terrible first week after Hurricane Katrina. It took the president two weeks to get on top of that. He got a bump in the polls after that speech he gave last week, talking, finally, about programs to get in place for the recovery.