5 ms·

Even if Satan himself proved he was real and aided Wikileaks by publishing true information, I'd be all for it. What's being suggested is that they selectively

Even if Satan himself proved he was real and aided Wikileaks by publishing true information, I'd be all for it. What's being suggested is that they selectively publish true information by not publishing certain things that don't suit a particular agenda. This accusation is being asserted without evidence, and can therefore be dismissed without evidence.

jamespo 9y ago
Indeed, just a coincidence since http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/11/01/russias-fsb-to-wikileaks-we-could-destroy-you/ http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/11/01/russias-fsb-to-wikileaks... wikileaks hasn't posted anything meaningful about Russia
- IncRnd 9y ago
  Pretty sure that wikileaks has disclosed information on Russia. Your link was from 2010, eight years ago. https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/russia/ https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/russia/
darawk 9y ago
> This accusation is being asserted without evidence, and can therefore be dismissed without evidence. What? There's plenty of evidence. Wikileaks consistently published information damaging to Hillary Clinton in the run-up to the election, and published zero information damaging to Trump.
- jarfil 9y ago
  Unless you can prove that WikiLeaks received some information damaging to Trump and then REFUSED to publish it, all you're saying is that nobody sent them such information.
- belorn 9y ago
  Assange intention has been rather clear after the statement Hillary gave as the Secretary of State during cablegate and the involvement of US diplomats in the Swedish investigation. I don't get it why people think that he is supposed to be unbiased in his view of her and trump. What is a normal reaction to be publicly declared a murderer and enemy combatant (with an implied statement to be droned) for publishing documents from people involved in the US military that wanted to give the public information? In the context of what he perceive she has done against him, what is the likeliest outcome if he comes into contact with damaging information and a request to publish it? "No thank you, only if you provide equally damaging information on her opponent or else it will look bad?".
- culot 9y ago
  Obviously they should have withheld their timely and important trove of Clinton's wrongdoing until they had roughly an equal amount of material on her primary political opponent. That seems totally reasonable.
- fareesh 9y ago
  That is not evidence that they knowingly selectively leaked anything.
Y_Y 9y ago
"If Hitler invaded Hell, I would make at least a favourable reference to the devil in the House of Commons." - Churchill
- fareesh 9y ago
  Satan was an appropriate analogy for someone who tells you the truth about the world because of his alleged role in the famous Garden of Eden story.
roywiggins 9y ago
So the intelligence community's conclusion that the GRU hacked the RNC, and the Republican administration CIA director's endorsement of that report doesn't hold any weight whatsoever? When the civil servants and the political appointees of two administrations from different parties all three agree that the DNC and RNC were both hacked and exactly one set of data was leaked, does that carry no weight at all? If it wasn't true, why isn't the RNC chair out there insisting they weren't hacked?
- fareesh 9y ago
  It has nothing to do with Wikileaks
philangist 9y ago
It's also a ridiculous argument since Wikileaks does not have a monopoly on leaking secrets. Any whistleblowers who were censored by Wikileaks can not only find another channel to release their original documents, but also have another piece of important news about a provable systematic bias in Wikileaks'publishing patterns.
- roywiggins 9y ago
  Supposing that the GRU hacked the DNC and RNC, but only gave WikiLeaks the DNC stuff, the RNC stuff would not see the light of day. Now maybe that exculpates Wikileaks, since they didn't have the RNC stuff to leak. Maybe it implicates them- if they knew the info was from Russia, and knew that Russia was trying to damage Clinton, and coordinated with the GRU to maximally damage her. Both things could be true. On the third hand, Assange spent time suggesting that the information definitely didn't come from Russia, and suggesting it might have been Seth Rich. But information came out the shows that he was talking with Guccifer 2.0, who was widely suspected (at the time!) to be GRU and if he wasn't, was meant to be a Romanian hacker, not a DNC whistleblower. So there's at least tenuous evidence that Assange was willing to both work with Russian intelligence and rope in an entirely unrelated death to muddy the waters on where the info came from.
  - fareesh 9y ago
    > Maybe it implicates them- if they knew the info was from Russia, and knew that Russia was trying to damage Clinton, and coordinated with the GRU to maximally damage her. Both things could be true. Going by my earlier comment - I would coordinate with the Satan to release true information, the source of the information does not necessarily contaminate its truthiness. Publishing true information, as a hypothetical whistleblower organization, is my hypothetical raison d'etre. This only ever becomes suspect if I am selectively publishing, or if I am aware that I am selectively publishing. In this case there needs to be evidence of either. Conversations with biased parties are not evidence unless they clearly state that the selective publishing is known. It's also extremely important to realize what exactly the voters learned from the emails. CAP President Neera Tanden, and a prominent figure in HRC's campaign, expressed sharp criticisms for her favored candidate's judgment. DNC Chair Donna Brazille emailed privately about how the statistical job growth under President Obama was essentially a "technical" win, but had very little impact on people's lives. She also went on to leak debate questions to her favored candidate, exposing one of hundreds of different instances of a party-wide effort to sabotage the primary process. Contrast this with the RNC primary. Virtually the entire party leadership loathed then-candidate Trump. As opposed to rallying around him, they actively rallied against him. In October there were discussions of replacing him on the ticket. Even at the convention, Ted Cruz reportedly went off-script and asked attendees to vote their conscience, as opposed to voting for candidate Trump. The divisions in the GOP were laid bare for the world to see. The divisions in the DNC stayed hidden from voters. Voters only learned much after the election that Donna Brazille contemplated replacing Hillary Clinton with another candidate after she fainted on 9/11, an event that ironically followed weeks of mainstream media outrage against "right wing conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton's Health", which also included a pickle-jar opening gag on a late night talk show. What truths would Wikileaks have exposed about the RNC that weren't already publicly known? Is this an empty box containing any convenient allegation? One of the USA's major political parties sabotaged the primary process, engaged in debate cheating, media manipulation and bird-dogging, all for a candidate whom many of the party's own leadership found wanting in terms of judgment. After all this - the outrage seems fixated on the messenger, Wikileaks, as if their alleged selective leaking somehow absolves the Democrats of these monumentally disgusting actions. If you look at the election from the perspective of damage done to candidates - the sheer volume of substantiated negative press received by candidate Trump makes it really difficult to argue that voters could have somehow heard something else from the RNC's emails that would changed their minds about him.
wybiral 9y ago
But it's still important to be aware of the bias in a source. Supposed I'm biased against you and I report that you hacked into Bob's computer and I have evidence to prove it. I paint that to make you look like some kind of cyber villain and neglect to report the important fact that Bob asked you to do it. If the reader knows about my bias towards you then they know to take my reporting with a grain of salt because even if it is true, it might not be the whole story.
- belorn 9y ago
  you mean like this map (http://wilkins.law.harvard.edu/projects/2017-08_mediacloud/Graphics/Fig7_11.pdf http://wilkins.law.harvard.edu/projects/2017-08_mediacloud/G...) created by a harvard study? You are right of course, it is important to know the bias of sources which is why so many fact checking sites popped up after 2016. Before then I would always go wikipedia for unbiased information. Sadly we live in a time where the majority of news papers has a clear and sometimes publicly stated political leaning and bias. Often this can be traced through ownership since many are now owned by the same entity. If the emails and documents was leaked today then hopefully fact checking sites would be all over it and pulling it apart regardless who originally published them. I do recall a few people were looking at checksum and correlate statements to previously public information, but nothing news worthy came out of that.
  - wybiral 9y ago
    It's impossible to eliminate bias. Even if it's not political bias some people just naturally agree more with one side of an issue or are more interested in certain subjects. But that doesn't mean that bias is irrelevant. In my opinion, having followed WikiLeaks over the years, I think it's safe to say that they have an anti-western intelligence/military bias. That doesn't mean that what they publish is untrue. It just means that I'm skeptical about their motives and sources when they release something and I make it a point to try and find a good counter-balance to their take on the issue. Because they probably only presented a tiny portion of the truth that fit their agenda.
    - 9y ago

jamespo 9y ago

Indeed, just a coincidence since http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/11/01/russias-fsb-to-wikileaks-we-could-destroy-you/ http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/11/01/russias-fsb-to-wikileaks... wikileaks hasn't posted anything meaningful about Russia

IncRnd 9y ago
Pretty sure that wikileaks has disclosed information on Russia. Your link was from 2010, eight years ago. https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/russia/ https://wikileaks.org/spyfiles/russia/

darawk 9y ago

> This accusation is being asserted without evidence, and can therefore be dismissed without evidence. What? There's plenty of evidence. Wikileaks consistently published information damaging to Hillary Clinton in the run-up to the election, and published zero information damaging to Trump.

jarfil 9y ago
Unless you can prove that WikiLeaks received some information damaging to Trump and then REFUSED to publish it, all you're saying is that nobody sent them such information.
belorn 9y ago
Assange intention has been rather clear after the statement Hillary gave as the Secretary of State during cablegate and the involvement of US diplomats in the Swedish investigation. I don't get it why people think that he is supposed to be unbiased in his view of her and trump. What is a normal reaction to be publicly declared a murderer and enemy combatant (with an implied statement to be droned) for publishing documents from people involved in the US military that wanted to give the public information? In the context of what he perceive she has done against him, what is the likeliest outcome if he comes into contact with damaging information and a request to publish it? "No thank you, only if you provide equally damaging information on her opponent or else it will look bad?".
culot 9y ago
Obviously they should have withheld their timely and important trove of Clinton's wrongdoing until they had roughly an equal amount of material on her primary political opponent. That seems totally reasonable.
fareesh 9y ago
That is not evidence that they knowingly selectively leaked anything.

Y_Y 9y ago

"If Hitler invaded Hell, I would make at least a favourable reference to the devil in the House of Commons." - Churchill

fareesh 9y ago
Satan was an appropriate analogy for someone who tells you the truth about the world because of his alleged role in the famous Garden of Eden story.

roywiggins 9y ago

So the intelligence community's conclusion that the GRU hacked the RNC, and the Republican administration CIA director's endorsement of that report doesn't hold any weight whatsoever? When the civil servants and the political appointees of two administrations from different parties all three agree that the DNC and RNC were both hacked and exactly one set of data was leaked, does that carry no weight at all? If it wasn't true, why isn't the RNC chair out there insisting they weren't hacked?

fareesh 9y ago
It has nothing to do with Wikileaks

philangist 9y ago

It's also a ridiculous argument since Wikileaks does not have a monopoly on leaking secrets. Any whistleblowers who were censored by Wikileaks can not only find another channel to release their original documents, but also have another piece of important news about a provable systematic bias in Wikileaks'publishing patterns.

roywiggins 9y ago
Supposing that the GRU hacked the DNC and RNC, but only gave WikiLeaks the DNC stuff, the RNC stuff would not see the light of day. Now maybe that exculpates Wikileaks, since they didn't have the RNC stuff to leak. Maybe it implicates them- if they knew the info was from Russia, and knew that Russia was trying to damage Clinton, and coordinated with the GRU to maximally damage her. Both things could be true. On the third hand, Assange spent time suggesting that the information definitely didn't come from Russia, and suggesting it might have been Seth Rich. But information came out the shows that he was talking with Guccifer 2.0, who was widely suspected (at the time!) to be GRU and if he wasn't, was meant to be a Romanian hacker, not a DNC whistleblower. So there's at least tenuous evidence that Assange was willing to both work with Russian intelligence and rope in an entirely unrelated death to muddy the waters on where the info came from.
- fareesh 9y ago
  > Maybe it implicates them- if they knew the info was from Russia, and knew that Russia was trying to damage Clinton, and coordinated with the GRU to maximally damage her. Both things could be true. Going by my earlier comment - I would coordinate with the Satan to release true information, the source of the information does not necessarily contaminate its truthiness. Publishing true information, as a hypothetical whistleblower organization, is my hypothetical raison d'etre. This only ever becomes suspect if I am selectively publishing, or if I am aware that I am selectively publishing. In this case there needs to be evidence of either. Conversations with biased parties are not evidence unless they clearly state that the selective publishing is known. It's also extremely important to realize what exactly the voters learned from the emails. CAP President Neera Tanden, and a prominent figure in HRC's campaign, expressed sharp criticisms for her favored candidate's judgment. DNC Chair Donna Brazille emailed privately about how the statistical job growth under President Obama was essentially a "technical" win, but had very little impact on people's lives. She also went on to leak debate questions to her favored candidate, exposing one of hundreds of different instances of a party-wide effort to sabotage the primary process. Contrast this with the RNC primary. Virtually the entire party leadership loathed then-candidate Trump. As opposed to rallying around him, they actively rallied against him. In October there were discussions of replacing him on the ticket. Even at the convention, Ted Cruz reportedly went off-script and asked attendees to vote their conscience, as opposed to voting for candidate Trump. The divisions in the GOP were laid bare for the world to see. The divisions in the DNC stayed hidden from voters. Voters only learned much after the election that Donna Brazille contemplated replacing Hillary Clinton with another candidate after she fainted on 9/11, an event that ironically followed weeks of mainstream media outrage against "right wing conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton's Health", which also included a pickle-jar opening gag on a late night talk show. What truths would Wikileaks have exposed about the RNC that weren't already publicly known? Is this an empty box containing any convenient allegation? One of the USA's major political parties sabotaged the primary process, engaged in debate cheating, media manipulation and bird-dogging, all for a candidate whom many of the party's own leadership found wanting in terms of judgment. After all this - the outrage seems fixated on the messenger, Wikileaks, as if their alleged selective leaking somehow absolves the Democrats of these monumentally disgusting actions. If you look at the election from the perspective of damage done to candidates - the sheer volume of substantiated negative press received by candidate Trump makes it really difficult to argue that voters could have somehow heard something else from the RNC's emails that would changed their minds about him.

wybiral 9y ago

But it's still important to be aware of the bias in a source. Supposed I'm biased against you and I report that you hacked into Bob's computer and I have evidence to prove it. I paint that to make you look like some kind of cyber villain and neglect to report the important fact that Bob asked you to do it. If the reader knows about my bias towards you then they know to take my reporting with a grain of salt because even if it is true, it might not be the whole story.

belorn 9y ago
you mean like this map (http://wilkins.law.harvard.edu/projects/2017-08_mediacloud/Graphics/Fig7_11.pdf http://wilkins.law.harvard.edu/projects/2017-08_mediacloud/G...) created by a harvard study? You are right of course, it is important to know the bias of sources which is why so many fact checking sites popped up after 2016. Before then I would always go wikipedia for unbiased information. Sadly we live in a time where the majority of news papers has a clear and sometimes publicly stated political leaning and bias. Often this can be traced through ownership since many are now owned by the same entity. If the emails and documents was leaked today then hopefully fact checking sites would be all over it and pulling it apart regardless who originally published them. I do recall a few people were looking at checksum and correlate statements to previously public information, but nothing news worthy came out of that.
- wybiral 9y ago
  It's impossible to eliminate bias. Even if it's not political bias some people just naturally agree more with one side of an issue or are more interested in certain subjects. But that doesn't mean that bias is irrelevant. In my opinion, having followed WikiLeaks over the years, I think it's safe to say that they have an anti-western intelligence/military bias. That doesn't mean that what they publish is untrue. It just means that I'm skeptical about their motives and sources when they release something and I make it a point to try and find a good counter-balance to their take on the issue. Because they probably only presented a tiny portion of the truth that fit their agenda.
  - 9y ago