CBS News Admits They Ran a Bogus Bush Poll
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.
Jim Kouri, CPP is currently fifth vice-president of the National
Association of Chiefs of Police and he's a staff writer for the New Media
Alliance (thenma.org). He's former chief at a New York City housing
project in Washington Heights nicknamed "Crack City" by reporters covering
the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public
safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for several
major organizations. He's also served on the National Drug Task Force and
trained police and security officers throughout the country. Kouri
writes for many police and security magazines including Chief of Police,
Police Times, The Narc Officer and others. He's a news writer for
TheConservativeVoice.Com. He's also a columnist for AmericanDaily.Com,
MensNewsDaily.Com, MichNews.Com, and he's syndicated by AXcessNews.Com.
He's appeared as on-air commentator for over 100 TV and radio news and
talk shows including Oprah, McLaughlin Report, CNN Headline News, MTV, Fox
News, etc. His book Assume The Position is available at Amazon.Com.
Kouri's own website is located at
http://jimkouri.us