CBS Slants Bush Poll in Favor of Democrats. The Rathergate network is busted -- again. You've probably been hearing about the CBS poll that puts the president's approval rating at 34%. But the Media Research Center points out that the poll was skewed to favor Democrats. Here is the website:

http://newsbusters.org/node/4211

It says:

On the bottom of the PDF version of the poll (page 18) it says how many Democrats versus Republicans were contacted.

"Total Republicans" contacted: 272 unweighted and 289 weighted.
"Total Democrats" contacted: 409 unweighted and 381 weighted.
"Total Independents" contacted: 337 unweighted and 348 weighted.

Brent Baker also noted how CBS failed to highlight a key portion of its poll on the Feb. 27 "CBS Evening News." 66 percent of respondents thought the media devoted "too much time" to Cheney's hunting accident.

UPDATE 12:31. The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press has a helpful table in this report (page 13) on what percentage of Americans consider themselves to be Republican or Democrat. It shows that in both 2004 and 2005, 30% said they were Republican compared to 33% who said they were Democrats. The new CBS poll (even after being weighted) had a population of only 28% Republicans to 37% Democrats.

This bias does not surprise me, of course. By contrast, Rasmussen Reports shows Bush job approval at 43%. This may not be a number to brag about, especially considering that it was 49% only ten days ago, but it is a big difference from the CBS number. Rasmussen polls have generally been reliable in the past, when it came to predicting election results.