The big news in the GOP Presidential race right now is anti-Romney, anti-Mormon push polls being conducted in New Hampshire and Iowa. While the calls make favorable references to John McCain, he has denounced the calls, and the identity of their sponsor is unclear.
However, the calls are being made by Utah-based Western Wats. This company has some ties to the Romney camp, and as such seems to be an odd choice to make these calls. This has led to some speculation (more here) that Romney proponents might be behind the calls, in an effort to gain sympathy for their candidate.
This seems like it would be a bad idea for any other campaign to do this, since they would have to realize that a media uproar would occur, which, in fact, it did. This fact would tend to add credence to the aforementioned speculation. And McCain sure wouldn’t put his own name in the calls, if he were behind them. If it were Romney fans doing this, McCain would be the candidate they’d be most likely to try to blame, at least in New Hampshire. He’s in third place there in recent polls, behind Romney and Giuliani, and it’s been said that Romney would like to end up in a two-man race against the more liberal Giuliani, and thus would like to eliminate other conservative competition.
It should be noted that people don’t seem to think that Romney himself, or his top aides, or behind this.
Craig
Funny how the supposed poll took place right before he arrives in Mormon Utah for more money. “Give me more money, they keep saying bad things about us Mormons”.
My conspiracy theory: There is a Utah connection (someone who has used WW in some previous campaign). The push poll slimes Romney and McCain. Who does that leave? Look at Guiliani’s Utah operatives.
Rep U,
I tend to agree that McCain is likely not involved. The fall out from a push poll is well known – and only amplified by the highly sensitive issue of religion. To believe that McCain is behind the push poll is to beleive that his campaign can’t think two steps ahead strategically to the backlash from a push poll.