President Obama has seen his Gallup poll numbers jump into favorability for the first time since July.

The rise in popularity arrives after a bruising defeat for Republicans over extending the payroll tax cut, a fight Democrats had hoped to use to their advantage.

For the first time since July, more people view President Obama favorably than unfavorably, according to Gallup’s tracking poll of the president’s job approval rating.

Obama’s approval numbers spiked five percentage points the week before Christmas, Gallup found, with 47 percent approving and 45 percent disapproving between Dec. 21 and 23.

The president’s numbers were under water in the first weeks of December. Fifty percent of those polled by Gallup disapproved of Obama’s job performance at mid-month, but his approval rating his climbed since then.

Obama had a rough summer, struggling to win congressional approval of legislation to raise the nation’s debt ceiling.

After ordering the killing of Osama bin laden, Obama saw his poll numbers soar in May. But the bin Laden bounce ended up being short-lived, as just a few weeks after the al Qaeda leader’s death the president’s approval ratings slipped into the negative again.

It’s unclear whether the latest bounce will last longer, but it does seem clear that Republicans have injured themselves politically in the tax fight. The numbers can’t help but lift the mood at the White House and in Chicago, where Obama’s campaign team is awaiting a Republican challenger.

Since August, Obama has set himself up as an advocate for the middle class and a foil for a dysfunctional Congress.

Only 12.7 percent of voters approve of Congress’s performance, according to the Real Clear Politics average of polls, compared to 84 percent who disapprove.

The payroll fight ended up playing into that storyline. House and Senate Republicans agreed that the two percentage point cut to the payroll tax should be extended for a year, even though many conservatives questioned the economic wisdom of the cuts, which some noted would take funding away from Social Security. They also agreed to tie in a yearlong extension of federal unemployment benefits.

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