Obama's Approval, Gallup Tracking Clues

I just downloaded the full Gallup tracking poll data for Obama's approval rating. I made averages for each month since the data set begins, April 2009, of Obama's approval, disapproval, net approval, and (except for the first month) change in net approval since the previous month. Here's the data:

April 09: +35.6%
May 09: +36.2%, +0.6% change
June 09: +28.6%, -7.6% change
July 09: +21.8%, -6.8% change
August 09: +13.5%, -8.3% change
September 09: +11.8%, -1.7% change
October 09: +12.7%, +0.9% change
November 09: +9.1%, -3.6% change
December 09: +7.3%, -1.8% change
January 10: +5.5%, -1.9% change
February 10: +7.8%, +2.3% change
March 10: +4.4%, -3.4%
April 10: +3.5%, -1.0% change
May 10: +4.1%, +0.6% change
June 10: +1.1%, -3.0% change
July 10: -0.8%, -1.9% change
August 10: -4.4%, -3.6% change
September 10: -2.0%, +2.3% change
October 10: -2.7%, -0.7% change
November 10: -2.1%, +0.6% change
December 10: +0.1%, +2.2% change
January 11: +4.3%, +4.1% change

(Change numbers not always what the subtraction looks like, due to rounding.)

So, a few notes:

So far, January 2011 is the best month in terms of absolute standing for Obama since March 2010. It is also, of course, the best month in terms of improvement over the previous month for Obama... ever. And it comes on the heels of two previous months of improvement; the previous record for consecutive months of improvement was, well, one. The current run of improving months has amounted to a swing of +6.9%; adding the two previous months, which were a net improvement, and Obama's up 8.7% from his low in August 2010.

The summer is a bad time for Obama. Between June, July, and August of 2009 and 2010, Obama lost a total of 31.1 net points of approval. He started with 35.6 net points of approval. Taking away the damage from the summer, that leaves him with 4.5 net points of approval, which is about where he's at right now. So he's taken essentially 100% of his total net damage during the summer months.

May is the only month in which Obama has so far made gains both times it's rolled around. Yeah, May!

January is so far the month which is best on average for Obama, with +2.2% total between '10 and '11. August is the worst, with a total of -11.8%. January, however, is entirely propped up by Obama's massive performance so far this month; in 2010 he lost 1.9% in January.

What's with the improvement? Obama's been on the mend almost continually since August, gaining a total of 8.7% over those five months. I think that probably has something to do with the improvement in the economy's becoming a little more palpable and/or a little more genuine. No idea if it'll continue, and polling is in general a random walk, but there's some reason to think the economy might continue approving and if it does so, I imagine he is likely to improve considerably. And when/if that happens, watch out Republicans: he's still the most popular politician in the room.

EDIT: With only a few more days to go in January, Obama's up to +5.9 on the month. That makes a further gain of a point and a half since when I wrote this originally, and he's up almost ten net points from his low.