By CHRISTOPHER DREW The New York Times November 6, 2006
An automated voice at the other end of the telephone line asks whether you believe that judges who "push homosexual marriage and create new rights like abortion and sodomy" should be controlled. If your reply is "yes," the voice lets you know that the Democratic candidate in the Senate race in Montana, Jon Tester, is not your man.
In Maryland, a similar question-and-answer sequence suggests that only the Republican Senate candidate would keep the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. In Tennessee, another paints the Democrat as wanting to give foreign terrorists "the same legal rights and privileges" as Americans.
Using a telemarketing tactic that is best known for steering consumers to buy products, the organizers of the political telephone calls say they have reached hundreds of thousands of homes in five states over the last several weeks in a push to win votes for Republicans. Democrats say the calls present a distorted picture.
The Ohio-based conservatives behind the new campaign, who include current and former Procter & Gamble managers, say the automated system can reach vast numbers of people at a fraction of the cost of traditional volunteer phone banks and is the most ambitious political use of the telemarketing technology ever undertaken.
But critics say the automated calls are a twist on push polls -- a campaign tactic that is often criticized as deceptive because it involves calling potential voters under the guise of measuring public opinion, while the real intent is to change opinions with questions that push people in one direction or the other.
The calls have set off a furor in the closing days of a campaign in which control of Congress hinges on a handful of races.