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This is not a scandal. If true, but embarrassing leaked emails had been obtained by a non-state actor, news outlets would do what news outlets do, and they wou

by JackFr 10y ago

This is not a scandal. If true, but embarrassing leaked emails had been obtained by a non-state actor, news outlets would do what news outlets do, and they would publish it. There would by cries to investigate and prosecute from the embarrassed party but typically at the end of the day little would come of it. The fact that it was a state actor is a red herring. Would it had made any difference if it were an unknown US hacker? Further, Hillary Clinton truly has no one to blame but herself for her FBI problems. Four years of dissembling and foot dragging caused this. Additionally, what the Wikileaks hack shows is that her carelessness almost certainly meant that top secret emails were hacked by an adversarial state actor as well.

tptacek 10y ago
Not only do they not show that, but emails using the official State Department mail servers were in fact hacked by Russia during the same time period. Her mails were very possibly safer on her own server. Further, Wikileaks didn't leak her State Department emails. The State Department emails we saw were published by the US Government. Wikileaks published hacked emails from the DNC and from John Podesta.
bradford 10y ago
> The fact that it was a state actor is a red herring. Would it had made any difference if it were an unknown US hacker? I think it makes a huge difference. The specific parties involved and their intent matters. Suppose this were a shooting instead of hack. If an unknown US citizen shoots up a mall, it's a headline. If a member of a Foreign military shoots up a US mall, it's an international incident.
- kodablah 10y ago
  Inaccurate analogy. There are several analogies one can come up with to emphasize the "who" over the "what" and there are several analogies that can do the opposite. In this case, even if the "who" matters in some other context, it shouldn't matter with regards to the "what" which is the same regardless. So while the who does matter, that's a different question and a different discussion and arguably shifts the discussion away from the what.
  - bradford 10y ago
    The analogy is the least important part of my statement. I'm not entirely clear on what you're saying. Just to be clarify, suppose that the hack was done either by a script kiddy, or a nation state. Are you saying it doesn't make a difference?
    - kodablah 10y ago
      To the original question of "Would it had made any difference if it were an unknown US hacker?", I believe it would not have made any difference in the election which is what I believe is implied by the question. As to whether it makes a difference at all, sure it does in other contexts (e.g. foreign diplomacy), but the email writers and the contents are what helped make the difference in the election. Blaming the releasers is like blaming SMTP or computers, it shifts responsibility.
paulmd 10y ago
> Four years of dissembling and foot dragging caused this. This is an interesting reminder what this whole scandal is actually about - Benghazi. The whole dragnet search through emails was actually impelled by a frantic search for some way to claim that Clinton caused the death of American ambassadorial staff by malice, or at least gross negligence. This is a concept that has been thoroughly investigated and debunked at this point. In fact we've probably spent more Congressional time on this than Watergate at this point, and they haven't found a single misdeed. It's the biggest McGuffin since Citizen Kane. But that's how you do it when you're determined to manufacture a scandal - if you can't find dirt then you can go digging and find some point of non-compliance with the investigation, just like how an investigation of Bill Clinton's blowjob was turned into an investigation of (gasp) perjury. With enough months in front of a Congressional panel, everyone will slip up sooner or later. After all, as the lawyers say - "everyone commits three felonies a day", and it's probably more than that for a government official given all the regulations they need to comply with. They will eventually find something. By the way, back in the day Watergate was actually a big scandal and news outlets certainly would not have knowingly published private communications that were illegally wiretapped. I think that really goes to show how far American values have fallen since the 70s. Our media has abandoned their journalistic values, and is little more than an outlet for tabloid gossip and clickbait.
treebeard901 10y ago
> Would it had made any difference if it were an unknown US hacker? Yes, especially if it was done or aided by a domestic three letter agency.

by JackFr 10y ago

tptacek 10y ago

Not only do they not show that, but emails using the official State Department mail servers were in fact hacked by Russia during the same time period. Her mails were very possibly safer on her own server. Further, Wikileaks didn't leak her State Department emails. The State Department emails we saw were published by the US Government. Wikileaks published hacked emails from the DNC and from John Podesta.

bradford 10y ago

> The fact that it was a state actor is a red herring. Would it had made any difference if it were an unknown US hacker? I think it makes a huge difference. The specific parties involved and their intent matters. Suppose this were a shooting instead of hack. If an unknown US citizen shoots up a mall, it's a headline. If a member of a Foreign military shoots up a US mall, it's an international incident.

kodablah 10y ago
Inaccurate analogy. There are several analogies one can come up with to emphasize the "who" over the "what" and there are several analogies that can do the opposite. In this case, even if the "who" matters in some other context, it shouldn't matter with regards to the "what" which is the same regardless. So while the who does matter, that's a different question and a different discussion and arguably shifts the discussion away from the what.
- bradford 10y ago
  The analogy is the least important part of my statement. I'm not entirely clear on what you're saying. Just to be clarify, suppose that the hack was done either by a script kiddy, or a nation state. Are you saying it doesn't make a difference?
  - kodablah 10y ago
    To the original question of "Would it had made any difference if it were an unknown US hacker?", I believe it would not have made any difference in the election which is what I believe is implied by the question. As to whether it makes a difference at all, sure it does in other contexts (e.g. foreign diplomacy), but the email writers and the contents are what helped make the difference in the election. Blaming the releasers is like blaming SMTP or computers, it shifts responsibility.

paulmd 10y ago

> Four years of dissembling and foot dragging caused this. This is an interesting reminder what this whole scandal is actually about - Benghazi. The whole dragnet search through emails was actually impelled by a frantic search for some way to claim that Clinton caused the death of American ambassadorial staff by malice, or at least gross negligence. This is a concept that has been thoroughly investigated and debunked at this point. In fact we've probably spent more Congressional time on this than Watergate at this point, and they haven't found a single misdeed. It's the biggest McGuffin since Citizen Kane. But that's how you do it when you're determined to manufacture a scandal - if you can't find dirt then you can go digging and find some point of non-compliance with the investigation, just like how an investigation of Bill Clinton's blowjob was turned into an investigation of (gasp) perjury. With enough months in front of a Congressional panel, everyone will slip up sooner or later. After all, as the lawyers say - "everyone commits three felonies a day", and it's probably more than that for a government official given all the regulations they need to comply with. They will eventually find something. By the way, back in the day Watergate was actually a big scandal and news outlets certainly would not have knowingly published private communications that were illegally wiretapped. I think that really goes to show how far American values have fallen since the 70s. Our media has abandoned their journalistic values, and is little more than an outlet for tabloid gossip and clickbait.

treebeard901 10y ago

> Would it had made any difference if it were an unknown US hacker? Yes, especially if it was done or aided by a domestic three letter agency.