Molly Potter is 65 years old and has multiple sclerosis, which confines her to a chair. Normally she doesn’t mess with phone calls from people she doesn’t know. But every evening her husband goes for a walk. And the week before last, while he was on his walk, the phone rang. The caller said he was conducting research for the upcoming election. So Potter answered his questions — and rather quickly a disturbing trend emerged from his line of questioning that suggests there’s some push polling being aimed at State Rep. Tony Goolsby.
Whom did she plan to vote for in the presidential election? And, tellingly, almost right after that question, whom did she plan to vote for in the race for the District 102 seat in the Texas House?
So happens that Potter went to school with Tony Goolsby’s wife, Toppy. She goes to the same church as the Goolsbys, Lovers Lane United Methodist. Potter told the caller that Goolsby had her vote.
At which point, Potter was asked a series of follow-up questions. She can’t recall the exact questions, but they were along the lines of: “How likely would you be to vote for Goolsby if you knew of such and such corruption charges?” She said she was asked about 10 questions that painted Goolsby in a negative light. When her husband got home, Potter told him, “If I didn’t know Tony, I’d think he was a terrible person.”
Goolsby’s camp says his office has gotten a dozen or so calls from constituents in District 102 saying they’ve received similar calls.
Is someone out there playing dirty?
