US President George W. Bush's job approval rating continues to decline, with a new Gallup poll released on Friday showing his job approval rating at 40 percent and his disapproval rating at 56 percent.

Bush's average approval rating for the last three Gallup polls -- all conducted in August -- was 43 percent.

The previous low point in approval for the president was 44 percent in a similar survey conducted in late July this year, and his previous high point in disapproval was 53 percent in late June.

Polls by Gallup this year found a steady decline in the president's average approval rating. In the first three months this year, his approval ratings were in the 50-52 percent range, and in the subsequent months, the ratings began declining slowly.

Bush's current average 43 percent job approval rating was the lowest of all the seven US presidents re-elected to a second term since World War II with the exception of Richard Nixon, who was beset by the Watergate scandal by the summer of 1973.

The poll found that the drop in Bush's job approval rating was accompanied by a continuing drop in the American public's overall satisfaction with the way things were going in the country. 

In the latest survey, only 34 percent of Americans were satisfied with the way things were going in the country, the lowest satisfaction level of the entire Bush administration to date, while 62 percent were dissatisfied.

The survey was conducted Aug. 22-25 among 1,007 adults, and has a sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points.

(Xinhua News Agency August 27, 2005)