WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s critics may revel in the fact his approval numbers have dropped in several polls this summer, something you can blame on health care reform and ballooning budget deficits. But here in the nation’s capital, he’s still touted with the same fervor with which this city touts the Lincoln Memorial, the National Air and Space Museum and tours of the U.S. Capitol — maybe more so.

One need not go far in any direction before one is reminded of the excitement — let’s call it idolatry — that accompanied Obama’s ascension to the White House in January. Even stately museums stock Obama T-shirts, videos, paper dolls and ceremonial, limited-edition inaugural coins, right next to stuffed squids, coffee cups emblazoned with the American flag and plastic woolly mammoths.

During my visit in 2006, President George W. Bush was nowhere near as marketable. But then he never made any bid to be hip.

While dining at the District Chop House and Brewery one evening, I learned it had whipped up a celebratory batch of “Barack Bock” on occasion of Obama’s inauguration and the record crowds that pushed their way into this city. And the Good Stuff Eatery touts an Obama Burger, topped with blue cheese, bacon, onion marmalade and horseradish mayo.

A District Chop House manager told me that, yes, the excitement had waned some since January, but Obama was still good for business, something I quickly gathered walking down Independence Avenue. Street vendors there and elsewhere hawked a variety of Obama T-shirts, including one of the first lady in a somewhat suggestive pose, complete with slinky gown and plunging neckline.

And, no, I don’t believe she posed for it.

Only Michael Jackson, newly ordained to pop sainthood, rivals Obama among street vendors. But even in such unexpected venues as the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, Obama holds his own alongside dinosaur models, stuffed pandas and captivating gems.

The Washington Post reflects this town fervor. It published an engaging article about Obama’s forays around the city, patronizing eateries such as Ben’s Chili Bowl.

And the 43rd president?

Scant evidence of Bush’s eight years can be found here, even in an exhibit on the presidency at the newly reopened National Museum of American History. In the gift shop I found small $20 busts of Bush, but that was it. And back at the Marriott in Wardman Park, you can buy pens with thumb-sized busts of Bush.

Even so, the former president’s recently unveiled portrait in the National Portrait Gallery begs our attention. It’s the only presidential portrait in the place I saw in which the commander in chief is not wearing a jacket with cravat or tie. Instead, he’s sitting on a couch, button-down shirt open at the collar.

“I suspected there would be a good-sized crowd once word got out about my hanging,” Bush wittily remarked during its unveiling earlier this year.

During Bush’s own heyday, one sensed Washington and he were an uneasy mix. Locals say Bush’s aloofness — at least when it involved D.C. high society — plus his lack of “cool” simply precluded his becoming part of what I think even Obama fans would acknowledge is a sometimes tacky D.C. souvenir scene.

As folks in McLennan County know, the 43rd president really favored his ranch above all White House trappings. Friends say Bush has spent part of this summer at his rugged, 1,600-acre spread west of Crawford, presumably working on his memoirs, occasionally venturing into town for a more traditional hamburger.

One suspects he’s happy to be out of the limelight.

As for Obama, he’s still hip, still cool and still everywhere you turn. I’m told by a Washington colleague that life-size Obama cardboard cutouts are especially popular here, so that our president seems to be peering from every third apartment window you pass in the nation’s capital.

And a year from now? Who knows? Some may be ready to show his facsimile the door, if not the real thing.