It appears that every other day there's a new poll released on President George Bush's job approval rating. The majority of these polls or surveys are conducted by news organizations or polling companies contracted by news organizations. Many American's believe these poll results are accurate and still trust the news organizations to conduct them fairly.

However, the blogosphere and talk radio uncovered a bit of hanky-panky going on at CBS once again. No, they didn't use forged documents again -- and those responsible for the use of fraudulent memos used to damage the Bush presidency are gone from CBS News, including Mary Mapes and Dandy Dan Rather.

This time we're talking about a CBS poll that showed President Bush's approval rating at an all time low of 34%. For the last few months, American's were fed a steady diet of bad news regarding Bush or members of his administration. From torture to spying to an accidental shooting to the Dubai ports controversy, there's never a shortage of news stories that show the President of the United States in a less than favorable light.

And so most people will accept without question the results of this latest poll even if it does come from the obvious Bush-haters at CBS News.

So, in an effort to turn the findings of bloggers and talk hosts, who caught CBS monkeying with the poll numbers, into a non-story, they decided to "out" themselves on their website, albeit in the guise of explaining how polls are conducted.

CBS News explained to readers what most pollsters do when they conduct their telephone surveys, and then they dropped this little bomb in the midst of their explanation:
Bush's favorability poll was weighted in favor of Democrats.

Bush's 34% approval rating is a result of polling 37% Democrats, 28% Republicans and 35% other or independents. One can only imagine the affiliations of that 35%. Are they Libertarians? Socialists? Communists? Are some extreme right-wing militia-types, who hate Bush as much as the left?

But just the divide between Democrats and Republicans is noticeably suspect. Nine percent fewer people who identified themselves as Republicans were polled. That is far from insignificant when one realizes "the other or independent" respondents are 7% higher than the Republican respondents, as well.

Also, the poll fails to differentiate between registered voters, likely voters or people who don't even know they can vote. Does CBS or their pollsters screen these respondents in the Independent category? How many are registered with the Green Party, Libertarian Party, Socialist Party, Reform Party, Liberal Party or Conservative Party, and how many are truly independents?

Granted, there are no perfect polls, but a poll released by CBS News is always deserving of further scrutiny.

At least Bush's ratings are higher than SeeBS'...  *Snort*

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