- Dubious case for Russian involvement, motive weak
- How much do you punish anyone for telling the truth?
- The Pentagon Papers
- Poisoned fruit, whistle-blowing and tattling, legitimacy
The “news” media continues to talk about Russia as if it was assuredly and was the sole perpetrator of hacking of DNC e-mails with the clear purpose of helping get Donald Trump elected even though the NSA is not fully confident in such conclusions by other agencies that must rely on it for relevant information!! Former high-ranking intel officers maintain the information about DNC political corruption revealed through the Wikileaks organization was the consolidated result of an inside leak, others suggest that one of the accusing agencies is the source of leaks and created the Russian boogeyman story. Wikileaks founder Julian Assange denies Russian government involvement, indeed that no foreign government was his source and ridiculed the substance of the recent intelligence agency report saying otherwise.
There is incredibly little discussion by the dominant media of how Trump’s election helps the Russian government. Instead they just raise the boogeyman issue to avoid talking about DNC underhandedness in nominating Hillary Clinton, the person they were so much in the tank for. As Trump policy adviser Kellyann Conway intones: “Donald Trump is going to increase the defense budget, he’s going to modernize our nuclear capability, he wants to explore oil and gas. All of that hurts Russia and emboldens America,”
As we have pointed out throughout this phony Russian drama, that of course the Russians and other nations spy on us and so do we on them, grabbing every bit of cyber activity we possibly can for use however we think beneficial. The game so to speak is to make it hard to do. And as regards political influence in another country’s election, Barack Obama’s hands in particular are not clean.
What was revealed in the DNC e-mails, its truthfulness, is the most important political issue, not who revealed it or why. Mundane, however true matters do not raise concern if they are revealed, although they should raise concern if they were highly protected. Then the issue is security. What was revealed in the DNC leaks is important for the US body politic to know. That the DNC incompetently kept their corruption secret is not our problem. They should not have been subverting the political primary process, as was revealed. The DNC was embarrassed by the expose but in this matter what was revealed is more important than the fact that thievery goes on.
When the Pentagon Papers were stolen and leaked by Daniel Ellsberg the important issue for the political left was what was revealed, its accuracy and significance, (the significance was arguable) not about how it was obtained. Indeed they circled the wagons around Ellsberg, defending him, lionizing him. And according to the article linked to above, “The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the government had failed to prove harm to national security, and that publication of the papers was justified under the First Amendment’s protection of freedom of the press” stolen, improperly obtained, or not.
Why does the left and liberal media consider the corruption of the political system revealed in the DNC e-mails to be not something the public has a right to now? Why does the left, including by the way many of the same players back in the days of the Pentagon Paper scandal (including Hillary Clinton and her contemporaries) want to make an alleged perpetrator the issue now, but insisted Ellsberg’s admitted unauthorized appropriation was not the issue then?
The corrupt DNC political hacks didn’t want their chicanery leaked or hacked, but an outraged insider (strong motive) did leak it (most likely) or it was hacked. If it is the latter it is also clear according to technical authorities it was preventable (hacks on Republican internet servers were attempted but thwarted). The problem of spying on the Internet, is pervasive and has existed probably since the first data bit was transmitted over the Internet. DNC incompetence, is a more newsworthy issue than that hackers hack, or even that foreigners or their governments spy. That the accuracy of the political corruption revealed has not been denied nor exculpatory information provided is more newsworthy yet.
If, say in a business, someone was intent on finding scandal about others, to shake things up at work for whatever reason, and went around surreptitiously opening private lockers, and eventually found dead-to-rights evidence of something of a serious sort, say plans or actions that might help a rival company, or give someone in the company an unearned advancement over another. The finder tries to keep their own involvement secret because you really can’t predict how things go and better the intended result than the credit. In fact the revelation would most likely not enhance the exposer’s reputation. Does the company leadership properly get more concerned about whether the information was accurate and with tightening up access to key proprietary processes or worrying about who revealed it and how they found out? First things first.
The poisoned fruit concept is an arbitrary legal construct aimed at government and does not apply to the general public’s use of information they had no part in obtaining. It couldn’t. There is no restriction on the use of ill-gotten information by those not a party to its unlawful collection (or solicitation) in the realm of politics, business, espionage, family, or society. What is important is if the information is true. How information comes about is a separable issue that may or may not involve punishment of the person or organization that obtains information outside of channels or illegitimately. In short, in those realms the rightness or wrongness of how information was obtained does not necessarily impact the propriety of its use. As a general rule such actions may be properly prevented, or discouraged, in other cases the revelation protected, even appreciated as in the special case of the whistle blower.
Tattle tales
If one child tattles on another, does the parent ignore the information even though the tattler violated a rule of the household? A good parent would not if it represents a danger to the child or the household, although there may be some lessons to be taught the tattler.
As revealed, Hillary Clinton was an illegitimate nominee of the Democrat Party. Donald Trump is the legitimate next President of the United States.
R Mall
