Poll Watch: Obama enjoys slight uptick in approval rating

President Obama enjoyed a slight uptick in Gallup’s tracking poll of his popularity as the high political season winds down and lawmakers adjourn to recess.

56 percent of voters said they approved of the way the president was handling his job, up from an administration-low of 52 percent last week.

The slight edge up comes after a week in which Obama has made very forceful and public defenses of his administration’s economic management, especially when it comes to the $787 stimulus bill he signed into law earlier this year, and his bid to reform healthcare.

The upward tick also reflects public opinion in the wake of the infamous “beer summit,” in which the president sought to cool tensions from a racially-tinged arrest in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Still, Gallup cautioned: “The longer-term significance of the current uptick in Obama’s ratings will not be known until it can be looked at in historical perspective.”

The poll, conducted July 31-Aug. 2, has a three percent margin of error.