6 ms·

What exactly in the DNC emails would you call a corrupt practice? The purpose of the 2016 political email "leaks" was entirely embarrassment and to create the

What exactly in the DNC emails would you call a corrupt practice? The purpose of the 2016 political email "leaks" was entirely embarrassment and to create the aura that the emails were proof of corruption.

willcipriano 4y ago
How can the emails be both embarrassing and not embarrassing at the same time?
- permo-w 4y ago
  a leak in and of itself is embarrassing. the content may not be
  - dylan604 4y ago
    Sadly, today, I don't think an email leak itself is embarassing. It's more like "yup, email is weak, and we don't think about its security at all, so this is normal". Today, the only thing embarrassing is for the person whose job it is to leak specific emails didn't do the leaking.
kome 4y ago
Rigging the primary against Bernie Sanders: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/14/16640082/donna-brazile-warren-bernie-sanders-democratic-primary-rigged https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/14/16640082/...
- shadowgovt 4y ago
  From the text of that article: "The 2016 Democratic primary wasn’t rigged by the DNC, and it certainly wasn’t rigged against Sanders."
  - kome 4y ago
    "But Democratic elites did try to make Clinton’s nomination as inevitable, as preordained, as possible." so, i guess it was rigged
    - shadowgovt 4y ago
      Reasonable people can disagree on what "Rigged" means. For example, the 45th President of the United States never won the popular vote, yet was elected. Was the election "rigged?" Well, no; the laws of the US do not guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the post popular votes and they never have. Or, yes, because the laws of the US are stacked against the demonstrated will of the people via the vote. It's the same with the DNC. The DNC leadership did some things that can be considered subjectively unsavory. But they broke no laws, nor party rules. The rules themselves do not favor a candidate like Sanders (the Democratic party tilts heavily towards something like seniority, especially relative to their peer major party; Sanders was an outlier who ran an outlier campaign).
- ianhawes 4y ago
  Rigging a primary would, by definition, involve the alteration or removal of votes cast. There is no evidence of this in the stolen emails nor outside the stolen emails. The above article mentions leaked emails that bashed Sen. Sanders. That is not an example of corruption.
  - boomboomsubban 4y ago
    >Rigging a primary would, by definition, involve the alteration or removal of votes cast There are many ways to rig an election without altering any of the votes cast. The clearest example is elections in one party states, where your only choice is to vote for the approved candidate. But there are much less overt ways too
croes 4y ago
"The leaks resulted in allegations of bias against Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign, in apparent contradiction with the DNC leadership's publicly stated neutrality,[6] as several DNC operatives openly derided Sanders' campaign and discussed ways to advance Hillary Clinton's nomination. Later reveals included controversial DNC–Clinton agreements dated before the primary, regarding financial arrangements and control over policy and hiring decisions"
JacobThreeThree 4y ago
Giving one candidate debate questions in advance. https://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/donna-brazile-wikileaks-fallout-230553 https://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/donna-brazile-wikilea...
- ianhawes 4y ago
  That would hardly qualify as corruption. The DNC is well within its rights to determine how they wish to conduct their debates. A single question that was not posed in the exact same form would not meet the definition of corruption. Ethically weak? Sure.
  - mandmandam 4y ago
    ...It's very, very hard to take your comments in good faith. MANY people have taken the time to point out other DNC corruption. Please consider aligning your position a little more with reality.
    - eli 4y ago
      Seems like it’s just the one point repeated in different articles? No need to question anyone’s sincerity. The reality is the emails were hacked and released in order to damage the Clinton campaign by a foreign power that wanted her to lose (or win but severely weakened). This is much more serious than some unseemly infighting within the DNC. Nothing in the Clinton emails was a crime, right?
      - brigandish 4y ago
        It would be a frightening world indeed if all unethical behaviour was covered by law, and worrying to think that the defence for unethical behaviour could possibly be to point to the absence of a law for it.
  - president 4y ago
    Lots of lawyers and CYA means you can do things that are bad but won't break the law and gives an out for people on online forums to defend you with "but it didn't qualify as legal corruption!".
DeWilde 4y ago
Didn't they clearly show bias from the DNC against Bernie? [0] This also resulted in the DNC apologizing to Bernie. [1] And did it not result in the DNC chair CEO, CFO, and Communication Director resigning? [2] With actual email proof, public apology, and resignations it seems to me that there was more than just an aura of corruption. Or do you still disagree? [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/07/24/here-are-the-latest-most-damaging-things-in-the-dncs-leaked-emails/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/07/24/he... [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-dnc-statement-idUSKCN1052BN https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-dnc-statemen... [2] https://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/02/politics/dnc-ceo-resigns-in-wake-of-email-scandal/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/02/politics/dnc-ceo-resigns-...
- cafard 4y ago
  You may recall that Sanders caucused with the Democrats but had not run previously as a Democrat.
  - DeWilde 4y ago
    I'm not denying that, but if the DNC claims that it is unbiased in this race, yet by actions isn't, isn't that lying?
  - whimsicalism 4y ago
    Is it policy to only leak debate questions ahead of time to candidates who have previously run as democrats? I must have missed it in the party platform.
- shadowgovt 4y ago
  There isn't anything corrupt about having bias against Bernie any more than it's "corrupt" that DNC leadership has a bias against Donald Trump. Party leadership is allowed to have preferences; the party isn't the public, it's a party. The primary election's purpose is to show the party who the public favors (because it is, ostensibly, politically-suicidal to run an unpopular candidate). And in the end, the actual votes favored Clinton over Sanders. These votes may have been influenced by the party leadership suggesting to the rank-and-file that Clinton was a better candidate, but as it's not a general election that's well within their purview to do. (Whether state machinery should be used to run elections for what is essentially a private political club is a great question that I think people should be asking about the way elections are structured in each state).

willcipriano 4y ago

How can the emails be both embarrassing and not embarrassing at the same time?

permo-w 4y ago
a leak in and of itself is embarrassing. the content may not be
- dylan604 4y ago
  Sadly, today, I don't think an email leak itself is embarassing. It's more like "yup, email is weak, and we don't think about its security at all, so this is normal". Today, the only thing embarrassing is for the person whose job it is to leak specific emails didn't do the leaking.

kome 4y ago

Rigging the primary against Bernie Sanders: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/14/16640082/donna-brazile-warren-bernie-sanders-democratic-primary-rigged https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/14/16640082/...

shadowgovt 4y ago
From the text of that article: "The 2016 Democratic primary wasn’t rigged by the DNC, and it certainly wasn’t rigged against Sanders."
- kome 4y ago
  "But Democratic elites did try to make Clinton’s nomination as inevitable, as preordained, as possible." so, i guess it was rigged
  - shadowgovt 4y ago
    Reasonable people can disagree on what "Rigged" means. For example, the 45th President of the United States never won the popular vote, yet was elected. Was the election "rigged?" Well, no; the laws of the US do not guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the post popular votes and they never have. Or, yes, because the laws of the US are stacked against the demonstrated will of the people via the vote. It's the same with the DNC. The DNC leadership did some things that can be considered subjectively unsavory. But they broke no laws, nor party rules. The rules themselves do not favor a candidate like Sanders (the Democratic party tilts heavily towards something like seniority, especially relative to their peer major party; Sanders was an outlier who ran an outlier campaign).
ianhawes 4y ago
Rigging a primary would, by definition, involve the alteration or removal of votes cast. There is no evidence of this in the stolen emails nor outside the stolen emails. The above article mentions leaked emails that bashed Sen. Sanders. That is not an example of corruption.
- boomboomsubban 4y ago
  >Rigging a primary would, by definition, involve the alteration or removal of votes cast There are many ways to rig an election without altering any of the votes cast. The clearest example is elections in one party states, where your only choice is to vote for the approved candidate. But there are much less overt ways too

croes 4y ago

"The leaks resulted in allegations of bias against Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign, in apparent contradiction with the DNC leadership's publicly stated neutrality,[6] as several DNC operatives openly derided Sanders' campaign and discussed ways to advance Hillary Clinton's nomination. Later reveals included controversial DNC–Clinton agreements dated before the primary, regarding financial arrangements and control over policy and hiring decisions"

JacobThreeThree 4y ago

Giving one candidate debate questions in advance. https://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/donna-brazile-wikileaks-fallout-230553 https://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/donna-brazile-wikilea...

ianhawes 4y ago
That would hardly qualify as corruption. The DNC is well within its rights to determine how they wish to conduct their debates. A single question that was not posed in the exact same form would not meet the definition of corruption. Ethically weak? Sure.
- mandmandam 4y ago
  ...It's very, very hard to take your comments in good faith. MANY people have taken the time to point out other DNC corruption. Please consider aligning your position a little more with reality.
  - eli 4y ago
    Seems like it’s just the one point repeated in different articles? No need to question anyone’s sincerity. The reality is the emails were hacked and released in order to damage the Clinton campaign by a foreign power that wanted her to lose (or win but severely weakened). This is much more serious than some unseemly infighting within the DNC. Nothing in the Clinton emails was a crime, right?
    - brigandish 4y ago
      It would be a frightening world indeed if all unethical behaviour was covered by law, and worrying to think that the defence for unethical behaviour could possibly be to point to the absence of a law for it.
- president 4y ago
  Lots of lawyers and CYA means you can do things that are bad but won't break the law and gives an out for people on online forums to defend you with "but it didn't qualify as legal corruption!".

DeWilde 4y ago

Didn't they clearly show bias from the DNC against Bernie? [0] This also resulted in the DNC apologizing to Bernie. [1] And did it not result in the DNC chair CEO, CFO, and Communication Director resigning? [2] With actual email proof, public apology, and resignations it seems to me that there was more than just an aura of corruption. Or do you still disagree? [0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/07/24/here-are-the-latest-most-damaging-things-in-the-dncs-leaked-emails/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/07/24/he... [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-dnc-statement-idUSKCN1052BN https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-dnc-statemen... [2] https://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/02/politics/dnc-ceo-resigns-in-wake-of-email-scandal/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/02/politics/dnc-ceo-resigns-...

cafard 4y ago
You may recall that Sanders caucused with the Democrats but had not run previously as a Democrat.
- DeWilde 4y ago
  I'm not denying that, but if the DNC claims that it is unbiased in this race, yet by actions isn't, isn't that lying?
- whimsicalism 4y ago
  Is it policy to only leak debate questions ahead of time to candidates who have previously run as democrats? I must have missed it in the party platform.
shadowgovt 4y ago
There isn't anything corrupt about having bias against Bernie any more than it's "corrupt" that DNC leadership has a bias against Donald Trump. Party leadership is allowed to have preferences; the party isn't the public, it's a party. The primary election's purpose is to show the party who the public favors (because it is, ostensibly, politically-suicidal to run an unpopular candidate). And in the end, the actual votes favored Clinton over Sanders. These votes may have been influenced by the party leadership suggesting to the rank-and-file that Clinton was a better candidate, but as it's not a general election that's well within their purview to do. (Whether state machinery should be used to run elections for what is essentially a private political club is a great question that I think people should be asking about the way elections are structured in each state).