For what it’s worth, I feel the same way about normal settings for FP1 in that it’s pretty easy. Switching to extreme though, it felt as though I needed to play perfectly to finish a scenario. To me, I think it comes down to most of the difficulty being frontloaded. A solid start sets you up for the rest of the game, while a rough start can ruin a run as the game continues to kick you down with every temp drop, event, etc.
I’m not sure why they’re so concerned about their approval ratings. Seems to me that at least 100% of the population would be satisfied with them. Have they conducted a poll?