First, a bit of background on what is going on so people don't think this is just coming out of nowhere. We started out trying to be nice to Cleve. We were kind enough to include him in our straw poll for the gubernatorial race even though we knew he had no shot in hell. What did we get for our trouble? Someone prodding a few hundred Indonesians on a message board into hammering our servers to vote for Cleve again and again (and again and again...). We tried to tell them to stop by pointing out that we could tell what was going on and if they stopped we wouldn't call out their candidate. They didn't take the hint, and so we called out Tidwell and his supporters on what they did to our poll. Then came the rambling, poorly-spelled comments about Cleve. They got so ridiculous that we had to amend our site policies to prohibit astroturfing and spamming, something that was never an issue with any of the 2008 candidates. In an email exchange with a Tidwell staffer inquiring why we seemed to be snubbing Cleve in our Senate race coverage, we made it clear that we find their astroturfing effort to be incredibly transparent and could easily trace it back to its source if we so chose. We communicated that we would just assume try to ignore their campaign as we didn't have many positive things to say about it, that seemed like a mutually beneficial arrangement. Evidently not everyone got the memo.

On Friday night, someone left a poorly-spelled comment accusing us of being part of a "Frazier cult" and making the laughable claim that Tidwell's supporters have never attacked any of the other candidates (you know, except for calling them cultists in the same breath). Here is the comment that was left, which also has an odd story about the purported author meeting Cleve Tidwell at an "El Paso Meetig":

Really a nice surprise to see Mr Tidwell is going to run for office. I heard Mr. Tidwell speak a number of years ago at a convention. I'm sure this is the same person as I looked up more information on his facebook. I knew then he would one day be a name in the political spotlight. I 'm so glad to see someone with real business experience and a warm individual stepping up to help our state.

This is what we have needed for a while. I am so tired of seeing people trying to make politics their complete life and we get the same old people always giving us there lines of bull. We need real people and people that talk to us like we are somebody. I assure you if you have heard this guy you will know what I mean. I think he was orginially from the south and it showed. Really a gemtleman. I remember when I talked with him after the meeting he gave me and everyone else that waited in line all the time we needed and seemed only interested in what I had to say. That's the kind of person I can rally around.

We do need help in Colorado

Got my support
Craig Platon

Needless to say we've been getting tired of these transparent attempts at astroturfing, especially after we've told them to knock it off so many times. After these comments, and some Tidwell people insisting they are not behind this spam campaign, we decided to put the issue to rest once and for all. We decided to figure out if Cleve has some massive legion of supporters spamming on his behalf, as his supporters contend, or if our theory that a small group of people have posting spam on his behalf was correct. What we discovered surprised even us.

The above comments were posted personally by Cleve Tidwell.

Cleve registered for his account on this site using an email address he had posted in other locations back in 2008 (before he started running for this office) and referred to as his "private address."

Now, go back and read those comments again with that in mind. Cleve Tidwell was posing as someone named "Craig Platon" and posting about how "he gave me and everyone else that waited in line all the time we needed and seemed only interested in what I had to say." He also describes himself as a "warm individual." This is a little narcissistic even for a would-be politician.

It is troubling to say the least that a candidate for United States Senate has no apparent ethical qualms with posting as imaginary people supporting himself. Simply posting under a psuedonym and dropping a comment saying something positive about himself would be bad enough, but posting this elaborate backstory is downright bizarre.

The most insulting part of all this is that Cleve had some of his staffers complain about this site in the comments on another blogger's post. One of them specifically defended Cleve by saying that we were unfair to act as if Cleve had anything to do with the spamming of our gubernatorial straw poll:

Now as for the Rocky Mountain Right. Your team had an issue with one person spamming a poll for Tidwell, and you assumed that Cleve told the person to do it. Afterwards, you have treated Cleve like he’s some Harry Potter villain by saying “The Candidate who must shall not be named” on the Gubernatorial straw poll. You also added the “Cleve Doctrine” on your rules about spammers. I would expect this type of treatment from CNN, but from a Conservative Blog?

If you're keeping track, Cleve's bizarre comment as "Craig Platon" was left on the straw poll post they are denying he had involvement with. I can only assume that Cleve's staffers are in the dark as to their candidate's behavior. Cleve should be ashamed of himself of putting them in the position of having to defend his dishonest spam comments and rambling emails.

Cleve: You need to realize right now that you do not have the right to post your lies on our sites without getting called out. Just because you decided to move here and try to put your name on a ballot does not mean that we will swallow your outrageous claims without question. You need to immediately issue a few apologies if you are half the "gemtleman" that your alter-ego Craig seems to think you are. Here a few aggrieved parties you may want to start with:

• The writers of every blog you have ever posed as a fake person on.
• Everyone who read your comments and believed they were reading something from a real supporter.
• The young, idealistic staffers you made carry water for you on this.

 UPDATE: Ben DeGrow unearths comments from Cleve under the name "Kattie Botts."

UPDATE 2: Here's one of the "Kattie Botts" comments re-posted at Slapstick Politics under the name "Stacy."

UPDATE 3: Here's a comment left on 5280.com in an identical writing style to Cleve's other comments smearing Bob Beauprez, Marc Holtzman, and Josh Penry.

UPDATE 4: From the Tidwell campaign site:

'Right on Right' on Crime

We at the Cleve Tidwell for Senate campaign are greatly dismayed at the thought of rogue individuals speaking on our behalf. Our volunteers are very enthusiastic, but we have sent instructions to anyone using emails on behalf of Cleve Tidwell or the Cleve Tidwell Campaign to use those accounts only with permission from our messaging team. Individuals that speak on our behalf or that support us, are encouraged to do so with the utmost civility. As conservatives, that is our goal.

We, too, are concerned with 'astroturfing' on our behalf and we appreciate only supporters that our genuinely interested in our platform. We encourage support, but discourage 'spamming'.

Our interest is in getting our message out in a very positive way. We are concerned that various websites may be getting responses from people, within our campaign or outside of our campaign in our name, that do not reflect our true values and message.

Please provide us with any information that you may have, so that we may do our own investigation. We would like to know who is behind this as well.

We can assure you that our best interest is served by being as transparent as possible and supporting true conservative debate.

Thank you for your assistance in this matter and we look forward to working with all our supporters in an open, honest, and transparent way.