Hey, whoever is pushing those push polls out there, I’ve got three words: knock it off! Have you heard what’s going on? I’d explain it but instead, here’s The Associated Press below: 

Residents in New Hampshire and Iowa have received phone calls raising questions about Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, his Mormon faith and the Vietnam War-era military deferments he received while serving as a missionary in France.

Western Wats, a Utah-based company, placed the calls that initially sound like a poll but then pose questions that cast Romney in a harsh light, according to those who received the calls. In politics, this type of phone surveying is called "push polling" — contacting potential voters and asking questions intended to plant a message in voters' minds, usually negative, rather than gauging peoples' attitudes.

A spokesman for the company would not comment on whether it made the calls. "Western Wats has never, currently does not, nor will it ever engage in push polling," its client services director, Robert Maccabee, said in a statement released Thursday night.

Among the questions was whether a resident knew that Romney was a Mormon, that he received military deferments when he served as a Mormon missionary in France, that his five sons did not serve in the military, that Romney's faith did not accept blacks as bishops into the 1970s and that Mormons believe the Book of Mormon is superior to the Bible.

Read more here. The Romney campaign has issued a statement. Here it is from Communications Director Matt Rhoades:

The push polls were making favorable statements about John McCain but McCain has come out right away to say he had nothing to do with it. Here’s his statement:

“I call on all other candidates and their supporters to repudiate these attacks and join me in pledging not to engage in such despicable tactics throughout the balance of this campaign. I am outraged by the cowardly telephone calls that hide behind my name in an effort to disparage one candidate and advance the candidacy of another. I was a target of these same tactics in South Carolina in 2000 and believe the American people deserve better from those who seek the high office of the presidency."

You want to know my take. Click here.

That picture pretty much sums up my feelings. I mean, c’mon folks can we keep it clean. You want to disagree with Romney on his past positions fine. If you can’t vote for Romney because he’s a Mormon, that decision is ultimately left up to you. But to blatantly go after him anonymously because of his religion, I’m sorry. Count me out. That’s not presidential politics. That’s cowardly and sophomoric. Who was behind it? I need an extra strength Excedrin. Make that two.

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