I was one of the recipients of the phone poll. It was a very long poll that tried out a variety of messages, some of which were highly, highly negative.

But what really stood out for me is that one of the messages sought to re-litigate the entire "recall Sam" mess.

The caller read a message that characterized Smith as violent, a loose canon (and other things), and then said "We've already had one mayor that was an embarrassment to the city."

I flat out told the caller to tell his bosses that if ANY campaign by ANY candidate decides to turn this election into an anti-Sam rant, that candidate automatically loses my vote.

Other odd things about the call:

The caller was clearly unfamiliar with Portland. Perhaps he was from out-of-state (unlisted number). He mispronounced "Vera" and when he got around to mentioning "Sam Adams" he chuckled and said "You know, like the beer." Seriously. If he was from here, he'd know we were over that joke more than a decade ago, at least until the beer threatened to sue the then-candidate over a domain name! I asked him if he was from Oregon and he instead answered that he was polling "for Oregon".