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Hill supporters accused of manipulating poll

May 3, 2012

Adam Hill

In an apparent attempt to keep Adam Hill seated as 3rd District San Luis Obispo County Supervisor, several supporters allegedly used unethical methods to vote multiple times in a New Times poll. [NewTimes]

The weekly poll question asked, “Which of these candidates for SLO County Supervisor has your vote?” Answers included 3rd District candidates Adam Hill and Ed Waage and 5th District candidates Debbie Arnold and Jim Patterson.

On  April 28, Waage took a small lead over Hill with about 150 votes in. The Democratic Central Committee responded by sending an email to members explaining how to manipulate the vote by cleaning cookies and voting repeatedly.

Shortly afterwards, it appeared someone was using an automatic program. From about 8:30 p.m. until midnight, approximately three votes a minute were made in favor of Hill.

Waage supporter Kevin Rice, also a recipient of the committee email, checked to see if turning cookies off allowed a second vote, and then called several media outlets including the New Times and CalCoastNews to report the apparent crooked voting.

“It was very clear someone was using an automatic program because the votes were coming in consistently and then it just stopped,” Rice said “It looks like team Adam Hill shares the same ethics as their candidate.”

In the end, 86 percent of those votes, roughly 5,396, went to Hill with the other three candidates receiving between 4 percent to 5 percent of the vote.

In today’s New Times, the Shredder wrote that its “IT guy” discovered that 5,349 votes were made from just three IP addresses.


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Kevin P. Rice is doing voice-overs for radio advertisements in support of the Ed Waage political campaign. And he simultaneously denies being involved in the campaign “in any way.” (See his statement below.)


So, what does that say about Mr Rice?


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By the way, Mr. Rice. Has Ed Waage asked you to try to distance yourself from the campaign, or are you doing in on your own accord?


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I’ve never had anything to do with Waage’s campaign.


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So, Mr. Rice, are you denying that is YOUR voice on those political attacks ads that have run on KVEC radio?


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WiseGuy: I already gave you the answer for which you appear too lazy to do any research. You can call me or email and I will be happy to lay it all out for you. I have no need to be interrogated anonymously.


(805) 602-2616 or email through my web site.


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Just tell it to us straight, Mr. Rice. Is that or is that not YOUR voice on political attack ads (attacking Mr. Hill) that have been broadcast on KVEC radio?


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By the way SLOrider, I am NOT “anonymous”. I am WiseGuy and based on my long track record posting to this site, I am rather well known. Perhaps YOU might say “infamous”. My reputation speaks for itself.


Why, Mr. Rice, do you desperately seek to know more personal facts about myself and my family?


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>> I am NOT “anonymous”


That’s rich! I’ll go have a laugh outside now.


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*busting up laughing* riiiiiiight. Wiseguy, you are not famous, infamous, or otherwise. You are not a “force to be reckoned with on this blog. Please. You are not even that enjoyable to debate with because you accuse ask for proof then do not rebut the evidence that has been brought up. Basically, I believe you are a “troll” as your post suggest.


BTW, you are very obsessed with Prankster Hill, so much s so that I wonder, ARE YOU ADAM HILL Wiseguy? Seriously, let it drop .


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WiseGuy,


You have made yourself into a liar (and a coward). I am neither employed nor involved with Dr. Waage and his campaign in any way. You have ranted continuously about “having a shred of evidence” and “lynch mobs”. Now you are a hypocrite yourself.


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So, Mr. Rice, NOW you are trying to distance yourself from Ed Waage? Forgive me if I got something wrong, but YOU ARE doing voice-overs for radio commercials promoting the candidacy of Ed Waage. So, are you donating your time in lieu of payment for your advertising/propaganda/computer work?


Please clarify. Let’s set the record absolutely straight. If I got something wrong about your employment status with Mr. Waage, I apologize and welcome you to make your relationship with his campaign perfectly clear to the electorate. No hypocrisy there. I’m sure you can agree that it is easy to mistake the difference between a paid employee and a volunteer. If you didn’t get paid for our work, I am sorry I suggested otherwise.


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Every political ad includes disclosure about who paid for the ad. I suggest you research and know what you are talking about before making ignorant “lynch mob” accusations.


I have ZERO to do with Dr. Waage’s campaign. ZERO.


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Mr. Rice, when you try to denigrate me by publicly calling me out as a “coward”, are you again speaking as a representative of the Ed Waage campaign?


And, by the way, just curious as to what it is about me that you find cowardly?


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cowardice: lack of courage or resolution


Publishing lies under cover of anonymity indicates you won’t put your name or reputation behind your false statements.


And, no, I am not a representative for Dr. Waage. Didn’t I make that clear already or are you being dense or obtuse for some reason?


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Mr Rice, are you supporting the campaign of Ed Waage or not?


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With more than a week having passed and STILL absolutely no evidence presented to back up allegations against the “Adam Hill team”, Kevin P. Rice and his employer Ed Waage, owe Adam Hill and everyone of his supporters a HUGE apology. In fact, they owe apologies to the entire electorate for having tried to manipulate the electorate with misleading political propaganda.


CalCoastNews might consider an apology also, for having been suckered into promoting the Kevin Rice/Ed Waage political propaganda in an entirely unbalanced story in which it uses words like “unethical’ in a completely irresponsible and unfounded manner.


Facts: There is no rule against multiple voting on the New Times weekly poll; the News Times website is set up to make it relatively easy to make multiple votes from a single IP address, suggesting that to some extent the New Times encourages multiple votes; multiple votes on an internet poll like that are common and to be expected when the website system is not set up to prevent it; and Adam Hill’s opponents have presented absolutely no evidence to prove who orchestrated or carried out the multiple voting.


Conclusion: Kevin P. Rice, Ed Waage, and several people who comment on this forum owe Adam Hill and his supporters a huge apology, and the New Times should publish a clarification to balance the ill-conceived article that tends to mislead its readers and promote the personal agenda of Kevin Rice and Ed Waage.


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Facts: The New Times poll denies multiple votes by setting a cookie on the user’s browser. One must purposefully delete that cookie to vote twice, SUGGESTING THAT TO EVERY EXTENT THE NEW TIMES PROHIBITS MULTIPLE VOTES.


Conclusion: Read the comments left here by many and note all the thumbs down on your posts (rants).


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I disagree with your conclusion, Mr. Rice. It seems absolutely clear that the New Times DOES NOT prohibit multiple votes. By having no stated rule against it and making it so easy–simply remove a cookie with a single click–it’s my opinion that they are encouraging multiple votes, perhaps as a way of boosting action on their website. You being something of a celebrated computer hacker yourself, you KNOW that the website could be set up to more effectively prevent multiple votes if that was the intention.


Also, its ironic that you would suggest that the “like” and “dislike” poll on this thread should be interpreted to discourage my posting of relevant facts to this discussion. Tell me something, Mr. Rice, with your computer hacking skills, do you have the skills to post multiple “dislikes” from a single IP address on this CalCoastNews site?


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>> It seems absolutely clear that the New Times DOES NOT prohibit multiple votes.


Quote from Shredder: “A mass e-mail circulated by the SLO County Democratic Party urged everyone to vote for Hill and offered some clever advice for bypassing the one-vote-per-computer rule. Which is actually really sleazy.”


Seems pretty clear to me that New Times considers it a RULE.


>> Do you have the skills to post multiple “dislikes” from a single IP address on this CalCoastNews site?


No.


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FACT: That so-called “rule” was mentioned only AFTER the poll results were tallied. There is no rule noted on the home page of the website where the public casts votes. If there is a rule, how can anyone expect people to know about it if it is NOT posted at the site of the voting?


Also, in case anyone has forgotten, NO EVIDENCE has been presented showing that Adam Hill orchestrated or cast the multiple votes. For all we know Mr. Rice or Ed Waage himself orchestrated this kerfuffle. Can’t say for sure. Does anyone care enough to find out?


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And let’s just accept that the New Times now claims to have a “rule” against multiple votes. Can’t we all agree that with the way it is set up on the website, this supposed “rule” is absolutely unenforceable. When a rule is unenforceable, AND, it is not publicized, how can anyone reasonably expect the public to respect and abide by it?


But be that as it may, so far no one has presented ANY evidence as to prove who it was that orchestrated the multiple votes. Still waiting on that…


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Some consider the poll results evidence. I consider the insider Dem email evidence. So when you say ‘ANY’ evidence that really isn’t true. There is evidence.


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Sure enough, Mr. Rice. True. Anything can be submitted as evidence.But it is clear to everyone that the “evidence” you present is either irrelevant or doesn’t prove anything. if that is the extent of your evidence, case dismissed. You lost.


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A Dem mass email sent out hours before the repeated voting began is hardly irrelevant.


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@SLO, Why didn’t I get that email? I’m not on the DCC but I did ask someone about that, they received the same mass email that we got from Team Adam Hill (I had a copy, I’ll see if I can find it) I do get bulk emails from the Dems, nowhere have I seen an email that instructed us to vote more than once.


I don’t know who did this and I don’t care, without knowing for sure who did it, the subject is moot. I don’t believe that Adam Hill had anything to do with it, he’s been trying very hard to run a clean campaign, he can’t control everyone that supports him and who knows, maybe it was someone that doesn’t support him. I just don’t know.


All we should care about are the issues and how these candidates will handle those issues. Personally I don’t agree with Eds love of developers and I don’t feel that he’s strong enough to tackle the difficult issues that come before the BOS. He has done nothing for Pismo but cause a lot of us to live with a lot of stress trying to fight these massive developments. Hundreds of us don’t feel that he’s working for us, we feel that he’s working for the developers and that is a big issue that we are facing right now. There’s a lot of us fighting these developments and we never get a break, it’s just a constant battle to stop Pismo from ruining the 5 cities area. Our concerns fall on dead ears with Ed and the rest of the council. Adam and the rest of county are on our side and that is huge. It also appears that Ed is more against Adam then he is actually for doing anything. I haven’t heard much in the way of what he would different or better than Hill.


Go to SavePriceCanyon for more info (anyone interested)


Waage has not provided on good reason to ruin our beautiful area with these developments.


I like Ed Waage, he’s a nice man, I like Adam Hill he’s also a nice man. So it’s up to who can do a better job, I say Adam Hill.


Adam Hill all the way!


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I cannot believe what a mountain people are making over this gopher mound.


The New Times website has a cute php poll that is fun and often has silly things to vote on. No one implied that there was anything scientific and super secure about the process (feel free to correct me Ryan).


Then some over active political nerd throws a simple trick at the simple php poll and Horrors! The box it is stuffed!!! Quick call the NCIJTF!!


Seriously, with all this energy we could have written our elected officials, cooked some homeless people breakfast, then with our full belly’s we could be donating much needed blood! http://www.unitedbloodservices.org/


Seriously http://i.qkme.me/369eer.jpg


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