4 ms·

The press "digging up dirt" is surely different than the illegal hacking and wholesale release of all private email correspondence. Deep Throat provided info on

• vkou 10y ago
  Leaking the Trump tax return was illegal. There was nothing illegal in the tax return. The Snowden leaks were quite probably illegal. Many of the things he leaked were not illegal. (Since this will never go to trial, we'll probably never know.) Should the press only report on legally-sourced information? They aren't a jury. Good news for us, though - both illegal leaks, and illegal hacks are illegal. We already have a mechanism to deal with bad behaviour in this space.
  • EdHominem 10y ago
    > The Snowden leaks were quite probably illegal. Not at all. It was required behavior. Until the government enacts a useful whistleblowing program someone who witnesses criminal actions has literally no legal choice but to leak. Ignoring it and hoping it goes away is the illegal option. I want my institutions to be fixable from inside but when they aren't, I simply want them fixed. Re Downvoter - I understand that you're upset but lashing out, especially against the truth, doesn't help.
    • mixedCase 10y ago
      It was illegal. Which does not stop it from being moral.
      • EdHominem 10y ago
        No, it was legal because it was a requirement which overrode all lesser orders. No law can compel you to break the law, or cover up abuses of it.
        • mixedCase 10y ago
          The way he went about it was (and is) illegal. The legal way would have gotten him nowhere, though.
          • EdHominem 10y ago
            That's not true though. No law can override your requirement to report a crime. If one does, it obviously isn't valid. He had every reason to think this was the minimum he had to do. Which has been shown to be true.
  • rhcom2 10y ago
    > We already have a mechanism to deal with bad behaviour in this space. I'm not sure if we do, that's kinda my point about why this makes me so uncomfortable. Clearly no one will be held accountable for the DNC hacks. I think I misread your original comment a little too, the press should definitely report on every thing we just mentioned. They definitely aren't a jury and once it's out, it's out. My issue is framing the actual leaks like they were "whistle blower" leaks like Deep Throat or Snowden. I guess that's mostly personal opinion on the value of the leaks though. The idea that our political discourse is now shaped by who can get what hacked information and how they can weaponize it (Trump's taxes, DNC's emails) scares the crap out of me. Even more so if it was a foreign government targeting one political party. I'm rambling a little but the future that this shows me looks terrible (and probably unstoppable).
  • TheCoelacanth 10y ago
    Not necessarily. There was some circumstantial evidence that the tax returns were leaked by his ex-wife, who would have every right to release the returns since they are also her returns.
• ChemicalWarfare 10y ago
  Not sure that there's actual conclusive proof that the phishing attack on Podesta's gmail account was in fact carried out by an entity affiliated with the Russian government. All of the other accusations that I've heard along the lines of russian hackers hacking into the actual "election hw/sw" were laughable. Funny thing is this alleged hacking was [supposedly] one of the reasons for demanding recounts in the states narrowly won by Trump and the only actual hard evidence discovered was "pro-Clinton discrepancies" in Detroit at which point the recount in the state of Michigan was stopped :)