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I think the value of "popular" = "good" as an indicator varies from realm to realm.
But Bush may not be a counter argument. Electing a president is a predictive popularity contest, which is a different thing from popularity of something already experienced (Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip was the most "popular" show before anybody experienced it but extremely unpopular afterwards). Currently, however, after we've experienced him as president he is not popular.
In the area of literature, however, I think broad population popularity is a very bad indicator (at least for me) of quality. In fact, the more people who have read a book (in the population at large) the more certain I am in predicting it is awful.
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