Spin Control: Hession poll was pointed, not pushy

Spend any time on the mayoral campaign trail these days, and it’s hard to miss grumblings about a “push poll.”

Grumblings that go something like “the nefarious consultants working for Dennis Hession have been doing a push poll trashing Mary Verner.” The councilwoman herself complained about an alleged push poll roughly 10 days ago, and her supporters have been talking about it ever since.

Thing is, it’s not true. The Hession camp has been polling. Recent filings with the state Public Disclosure Commission show the campaign shelled out $5,000 to Moore Information of Portland earlier this month.

Hession won’t discuss the poll, other than to say it’s a “standard tracking poll to test our message.” The Verner campaign – thanks to the fact that one of the people who was called was both a supporter of the councilwoman and a former secretary who takes good notes – got a pretty workable copy of the script.

The script did ask some pointed questions about Verner’s support for things like a utility tax increase and a gambling tax decrease, and other things designed to measure what might change the potential voter’s opinion of her. It didn’t say anything positive about Verner, or negative about Hession.

But that’s not a push poll. A push poll isn’t really a poll at all, because it isn’t used to gather data; instead, it’s used to “push” a voter away from one’s opponent and into the fold of the candidate.

The script goes something like this: The “pollster” asks the standard question about whom the voter plans to support. If voter says the opponent, Candidate X, the pollster would say:

“Would you support X if you knew he was once accused of drowning kittens for a hobby?”

“Would you support X if it was proved he is really an undercover terrorist planning to blow up the Riverfront Park clocktower?”

“Would you support X even if he once was treated for a communicable disease?”

Whether the respondent says yes or no, it doesn’t matter. The message is kept short, and instead of contacting a few hundred people in proportions roughly equal to the demographics of the voting public, a push poll contacts thousands of voters, and often targets areas where the race is thought to be close.

They were once used in the final week before Election Day – the closer the better to avoid being caught and having the tactic blow up in the campaign’s face. With ballots mailed out nearly three weeks in advance of the election, true push polling might go the way of the eight-track tape deck.

Legitimate message polling has a downside to the campaign that conducts it, but not the complaints that voters or opponents might have. The real danger is that the other side will get the script, figure out what your campaign will use in the upcoming ads or debates, and be prepared for it.

Wrong V guys

An item in last Sunday’s column referred to University of Idaho grads as Vikings. In fact, as several alert readers pointed out, they are Vandals.

How could Spin Control make such a dumb mistake? It would be tempting to say it’s easy to confuse one group of marauding, pointy-helmeted rapacious northern Europeans starting with a V with another group of marauding, pointy-helmeted northern Europeans that start with a V.

But that would be a cheap copout, as well as slighting the Visigoths. It was a mistake, plain and simple.

Apologies to all Vandal fans.

Please Mr. Postman

Be kind to your local letter carrier, who may have a sore back. Some 2.7 million ballots went out in the mail around Washington state last week, including more than 235,000 in Spokane County.

Registered voters in Washington who haven’t received their ballots by late next week should call the county elections office. In Spokane, that number would be (509) 477-2320.

Catch the candidates

The debate schedule is starting to wind down, but there are still several opportunities left.

Tuesday: Downtown Kiwanis mayoral debate. Noon at CenterStage, 1017 W. 1st.

Tuesday: Chase Youth Commission forum for city candidates. 4 p.m. in City Council Chambers, Spokane City Hall.

Thursday: Manito-Cannon Hill Neighborhood mayoral and Council District 2 forum. 7 p.m. at Wilson Elementary School, 25th and Lincoln.