For visitors from CTV’s coverage tonight on the Raise A Flag poll debacle, you can view a copy of the original results page as they appeared on the website here, and the comments thread in which readers of SDA got into the act to prove the poll result was “unaffected by votes” here.
UPDATE – now on Youtube
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation blog has picked up this story as well.
On the surface, it seems like a silly little story – until one understands that poll was never intended to record public opinion, but to influence it.
That’s a little more serious.
Though, admittedly, watching the provincial premier in front of the tv cameras sputtering about blogs and declaring that “small dead animals doesn’t speak for the people of Saskatchewan” was pretty darned funny.
(No kidding, Lorne – the poll results were already rigged by the time I drew attention to it here.)
Calvert said the poll will be back up once a “security fence” has been developed. He’s right about one thing – he doesn’t know about blogs.
Oh… we are so going to own this thing.
(As an aside, perhaps this helps illustrate how having the SGEU a “voting block” on your side can help push your favourite choice over the top.)
Updates
Heh.
CBC : “Online prankster foils gov’t poll”…
CKOM radio just played a clip of Calvert claiming someone “hacked” into the system and added 1000 votes… I wonder if he has any appreciation for how much cluelessness his handlers have confessed to. Do they not realize every 12 year old on the planet knows how to delete cookies to vote on any online poll as often as they wish?
From the comments this observation from “Altruistic” on the premier’s suggestion that the website was “hacked”…
I’m just back from the USA having worked there in the computer field for the last several years. My specialty was website programming, domain management, e- commerce, network security and system administration. I suppose I can thank Calvert’s lack of understanding for why I am unemployed in Saskatchewan. Attract high- tech industry? Judging by this latest incident, they don’t even know what high-tech industry is!
To top it off I interviewed with the company in Regina (whose headquarters are in Texas) that designs the Sask government software BEFORE I was hired on in the USA and I wouldn’t touch their technology with a ten foot pole. Remember that whole land titles software scam – over budget past due. I interviewed for that and ran like mad when I found out what they were doing. So again Saskatchewan continues the time-honored tradition of exporting people who excel in their profession.
Anyway, I wonder if the Calvert government would consent to a third party security audit if their computer system was hacked. Get the forensics guys in there right away to find out what happened. After all, someone may have stole our personal information and suscepted the whole province to identity theft. Who knows what OTHER problems a hacker caused besides this poll situation. It would be irresponsible to think they stopped at petty mischief when there is a mound of gold in the government computers for them to profit from. If nothing else, their website programmer and system admin need to be fired for allowing such an obviously blatant oversight to cause a province-wide security scandal.
Knowing this Mr. Calvert, I suggets you refrain from sprinkling the media with terminology such as “hack.” There are many of us out there who know what we are doing. You may want to consider hiring someone to help you spin what has happened. Failing that, just call it what it really is, “incompetence.”
I’m sure that’s a term Sakatchewan residents are familiar with, particularly in reference to their government.
Ouch.
Just saw the story…way to go kate!!
In my opinion it is not the ONLY poll set up to do just that: Influence and not record.
Didn’t know the word “BLLLLOG” could be uttered with as much contempt as Calvert was able to muster. Watching him squirm was delightful!
That was rich. But I think his discomfort with the situation had more to do with him being unfamiliar with computers than anything else.
If anyone can find an online clip of this, I’d appreciate it. (It may run again after the 11:00 CTV national news, but that’s just a guess).
make the socialist bastard squirm Kate, just make him squirm.
He looks like such a foooooooooool !!
He sure did look like a fool. I’ve never seen a Premier look like such a complete idiot before and I remember Tommy Douglas. He probably wasn’t briefed about this begore the press hit on him and there’ll be a major reaming when he gets back to the office.
RJM
Keifer Sutherland can kiss my big old butt too. He and his commie grandpa. But isn’t it just the way it should be when the CBC runs a popularity contest to see who is the greatest Canadian and comes up with the second biggest commie we’ve ever produced. Trudeau was the biggest and most destructive.
Help me Rhonda … this country is sick. No medicare can cure it either.
sorry, it took awhile. A “security fence” . . aka to the rest of the world as a firewall ??
Even more important, this shows that Calvert’s advisors, his political party and anyone within his professional circle of influence don’t know what blogging is. They’s never heard about it. They don’t talk about it and they certainly can’t fathom the value of blogging. Let’s be honest, every 11th grader in the province with a hotmail account has a blog. Politicians usually are one step behind but in Saskatchewan they are continuing the tradition of being 20 years behind.
I wonder if Calvert and his pals have ever heard of a newspaper?
That may be my misquote – may have said “security wall”. Working from memory, which may be sketchy as I was laughing pretty hard while he was talking…
Good on ya’ Kate! You really are one of my favourite bloggers in the whole wide world.
From that CBC article :
“[Calvert] added he doesn’t trust anything called “Small Dead Animals” especially when it encourages people to vote “no”.”
Sure, let’s trust the NDP instead! After all, they only rig online polls. What’s wrong with that?
We got Calvert’s “truth to power” right here at Small Dead Animals. Suck on it, Mr. Politician.
If the CBC had another poll, I betcha Wendy Mesley & Kate here would have to split the winnings…
Kate: YOU THE BLOGGER!
Oh and “Premier” Calvert – an Internet poll will never be scientific.
Only by calling people on the phone – or better still door-belling them – can you get a genuine poll.
What I can’t believe is the bull-crap coverage the CBC website gave this. What are they the mouthpiece for the Calvert government? – ‘the reason the poll was frozen at 90-10 was because of the tampering sda did.’
Talk about shooting the messenger – the poll was rigged well before the fine folks from SDA flooded it with No votes.
I’ve said it before…Despicable.
If these clowns are willing to lie over such a seemingly trivial poll such as this, what more important matters are they lying about?
Kate, you are a certified Canadian pajamahid – I say that with the greatest respect. I mean, if American politicians (and fawning/enabling media) can’t deal with being taken on by the blogs, how are socialist Canadian politicians and their running-dog media lackeys going to handle it? Not going to be pretty. Fight the power, girlfriend.
“CKOM radio just played a clip of Calvert claiming someone “hacked” into the system and added 1000 votes…”
That weak-assed excuse is a slap in the face to people from my generation who actually know stuff about computers. Calvert’s h6xx0r fantasy is absurd and won’t play outside of Estevan.
Let’s just clear the air and send in a forensic audit team to examine the version control system.
Most web applications use code repositories, Visual SourceSafe and WinCVS are two examples. What happens is that when you make changes to a webpage, it is timestamped. There is a paper trail which will either confirm or deny that The Sakatchewan Government just used public money to fake a poll; let’s see it.
Additionally, hacking is illegal; if someone just busted in to a government site then surely Mr. Calvert has evidence of this and will pursue the matter with the RCMP. Of course, an alternative explanation is that Mr. Calvert’s government just told a whopper. Or maybe Mr. Calvert is using techincal terms like “hack” that are beyond his technical understanding.
In any case, a forensic audit might help clear matters.
Way cool! You the best!
“Calvert said that is not what happened.
He added he doesn’t trust anything called “Small Dead Animals” especially when it encourages people to vote “no”.
Kate, buddy, congrats. When you make such a fool of such a dufus you know you are on right track.
Keep up the GREAT work . . you are important to a lot of us out here.
Thnx +++++
“Do you think Saskatchewan deserves a fair Energy Accord?”
That was the question. On the surface, it seems like a rather dumb question, sort of like asking someone if they like cold beer on a hot day.
But you have to remember who is asking the question.
It’s the NDP, after all.
Those are the guys who believe fairness is having someone who works for the government take home much more money than someone in the private sector who does the same job.
Like the liqour store employee vs the 7/11 clerk.
Or taxing the ass off of us unwashed peons so that the chosen ones in the public sector can live the good life.
So maybe in their feeble minds, it was a legitimate question.
Maybe we’re giving them too much credit.
Hacked! What does it say for the security of Saskatchewan government websites?
(I hope they have that question ready in the Leg. should it come up… )
I tried to find some other sources for this story by googling, however, I got no hits. Where can I find eitehr the video or audio link for this?
OT,
Gee is the Globe and Mail campaigning for the libs? Go to their web page right now. At the top headline “Trusts Poised to Soar” boasting the Libs 11th hour switch on Income trusts
And what of the Motion to bring down a sitting government? Go down the page about 11 or 12 lines in smaller print. Not really that important I guess.
I think the Premier was trying to say
that his advisors are hacks.
“I wonder if he has any appreciation for how much cluelessness his handlers have confessed to.”
And I wonder if he has any appreciation of SDA’s traffic. Every time you link to me it’s good for close to a thousand unique visitors. The sudden surge in votes simply reflects your site’s popularity.
Kate’s bulldozer link to me at the Western Standard gave me almost as many hits as there are people who will vote for the Premier of Saskatchewan in the next election.
Wait a minute.
“Most web applications use code repositories, Visual SourceSafe and WinCVS are two examples.”
It could be that they’re just using an old version of FrontPage. I did some consulting for the Alta Govt last year and you’d be *amazed* at what some parts of their Web infrastructure have been built with.
Way to go Kate. Is there anyway you can set it up so that the next time Commie Calvert opens his yap on this subject,somebody can hand deliver him a copy of “Internet for Dummies” in the House???
“Online prankster foils government poll”
How misleading. It makes it sound like you interfered with a legitimate poll before taking off on your skateboard. Oh well. As someone notorious — maybe Oscar Wilde — once said “I don’t read my reviews, I weigh them.”
Way to go, Kate! Looks like this one’s not quite finished yet…
Awesome Kate.
And wow, is that CBC article misleading! It says that “At one point, according to the Saskatchewan blog site, Small Dead Animals (www.smalldeadanimals.com), 77 per cent of the votes said “no” and 23 per cent said “yes”.”
You never said that… it was Virgil in the comments at 9:28 PM who said that. That would be like saying that if Star published a letter to the editor supporting banning abortions, the Star is pro-life.
Anyways, good job on showing how out-of-touch Calvert is.
“A culvert is a covered structure that conveys a flow under a road, railroad or other obstruction. Culverts are mainly used to divert stream or rainfall runoff to prevent erosion or flooding on highways.”
http://www.bbcamerica.com/genre/comedy_games/fawlty_towers/fawlty_towers.jsp
I’ve finally figured out what this scramble at the legislature reminds me of.
‘Oh my God… You do look like me!’ – first words from a very startled John Cleese
http://www.cleese.co.uk/
I’m just back from the USA having worked there in the computer field for the last several years. My specialty was website programming, domain management, e-commerce, network security and system administration. I suppose I can thank Calvert’s lack of understanding for why I am unemployed in Saskatchewan. Attract high-tech industry? Judging by this latest incident, they don’t even know what high-tech industry is!
To top it off I interviewed with the company in Regina (whose headquarters are in Texas) that designs the Sask government software BEFORE I was hired on in the USA and I wouldn’t touch their technology with a ten foot pole. Remember that whole land titles software scam – over budget past due. I interviewed for that and ran like mad when I found out what they were doing. So again Saskatchewan continues the time-honored tradition of exporting people who excel in their profession.
Anyway, I wonder if the Calvert government would consent to a third party security audit if their computer system was hacked. Get the forensics guys in there right away to find out what happened. After all, someone may have stole our personal information and suscepted the whole province to identity theft. Who knows what OTHER problems a hacker caused besides this poll situation. It would be irresponsible to think they stopped at petty mischief when there is a mound of gold in the government computers for them to profit from. If nothing else, their website programmer and system admin need to be fired for allowing such an obviously blatant oversight to cause a province-wide security scandal.
Knowing this Mr. Calvert, I suggets you refrain from sprinkling the media with terminology such as “hack.” There are many of us out there who know what we are doing. You may want to consider hiring someone to help you spin what has happened. Failing that, just call it what it really is, “incompetence.” I’m sure that’s a term Sakatchewan residents are familiar with, particularly in reference to their government.
Pravda aka CBC reported a pack of bullshit. They didn’t get what happened at all.
No wonder this is a pretend country .. eveything about it is pretend.
God help us all.
We know what happened.. the sask guv was cheating and through SDA they were caught with their pants down and no toiled paper in sight.
I just wish the CBC just once would stip suck holing to governments and be a news reporting media.
“A Gin and Orange, a Lemon Squash, and a Scotch and Water!”
It would appear the cheif export of Saskatchewan is stupid communism. I mean to say a cel phone invented in saskatchewan would need to be carried around in a wheel barrow. Just like the old Soviet Union would have done.
I onced marvelled at the way the soviets solved the problem of find a ball point pen that would work in zero gravity, by simply using a pencil. Then it occured to me that they didn’t have ball point pens in the Soviet union … too high tech Bwahhahahaa
If deleting cookies from your own web browser and voting more than once is considered hacking, I guess we’re hackers.
This is hilarious…
Basil Fawlty is the Premier of Saskatchewan.
Lorne is convinced that Saskatchewan would be a top-rate establishment if it wasn’t for the voters, who are merely sent along to annoy him and to prevent the smooth-running of the province. Incredibly class conscious, Lorne adopts attitudes of superiority that are quite unjustified. The voters are either objects of derision or scorn, or objects to improve his position in the socialist hierarchy.
http://www.btinternet.com/~c.tomlinson/basil.htm
Sociopathic types seek office or other places of power.
That’s why …. etc and so on ….
Kate: Calvert’s crew looks to be technically challenged, but can you prove anything worse than the following sequence of events?
1. Someone flooded the polls in a 1 hr. period (TRIVIAL TO DO IF THEY DID NOTHING BUT LOOK AT COOKIES).
2. Rather than shutting the poll Calvert’s crew rolled back the count and froze it. (INCREDIBLY STUPID AND MISLEADING. ANYONE WITH ANY SENSE WOULD HAVE ADDED A DISCLAIMER OR SUSPENDED).
3. Seeing a stuck counter sda happened on the scene and demonstrated the poll was frozen (BRILLIANT AND VERY PUBLIC).
The reason I ask is that as poorly written as cbc item is, with some clarification it would be consistent with the above.
I ran the ctv news network from top to bottom..nothing at all on it.
Today’s news headlines read like a supermarket tabloid. Fact or fiction?
Spacecraft Lands on Asteroid !
Cosa Nostra types seek hitman to assassinate Canada’s Prime Minister !
Saskatchewan farmgirl leads double life as an online prankster foiling the government !
“Anyway, I wonder if the Calvert government would consent to a third party security audit if their computer system was hacked.”
Your analysis looks bang on to me, Altruistic. I’d add that any “audit” that involved hiring a team of $800-a-day consultants from any company that has any business doings with the Sask. gub’mint or could possibly derive any future benefit would be somewhat compromised. I’ve seen that movie too many times. Should Calvert try to whitewash this sucker I suspect it will not stand up to peer review.
Bingo. I remember requesting a DB audit for a company I was with. They have a guy come in and go over the place, and he leaves in a couple hours saying everything is in tip-top shape. Well, wait a minute, there are obvious deficiencies, redundant data threatening corruption and some security risks – everything is ok? Turns out the owner was friends with the consulting company, they sent in a junior guy who did it pro bono (or is it au gratin?) Beware the company you keep fer sure.
Of course the term ‘hack’ was thrown around too loosely here. Goes to show how the media can influence even our vocabulary – we use words we don’t understand because they are common.
There are two possibilities here, online poll prankster, or security breech. If it was a prankster it reveals the incompetencies of every person involved in programming and implementing that poll and related software. If it was a breech then it means a criminal investigation as well as notifying the people of this province that their personal information may have been stolen. I wouldn’t want to be in their shoes tomorrow because no matter the outcome, it looks bad.
Either way, I’m looking forward to tomorrow to see whether we get a lie or the truth. OK, let’s be honest, I’m looking forward to exposing the lie they give us.
Congratulations Kate.
You scored one big point for the good guys. The more that kind of brainwashing-type garbage is brought to light the more chances there are for people to finally wake up.
Thanks. So fabulous.
The government is saying they received 1200 votes from on computer. I’m not that technical…is that really possible?
Gee, I’ve been busy for the last few hours. Wish I had been paying attention. This is soo funny. Way to go Kate. SDA does indeed own this thing. What an embarrassment. I can’t stop laughing. Actually, right now I’m just trying to wipe the smirk off my face.