“You need both a public and a private position…”

-Excerpt from one of Hillary Clinton’s paid speeches

Last Friday, our government formally accused Russia of interfering with our “elections” by hacking various political organizations, including Clinton’s campaign & the DNC. The department of homeland security’s statement also seems to imply that WikiLeaks is being directed by or conspiring with Moscow. Now, the talking heads & various senators are prattling on about cyber security and how the United States should respond to the godless commie-bastards’ evil cyber-plans to undermine the sacred institution of democracy. Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin’s spokesman has denied Russian involvement, saying that the accusation was “rubbish.”

With no evidence available to them, the people of the United States will simply have to choose whether to believe the White House or the Kremlin — but the real question, in this writer’s opinion is…

Why Should We Care ?

Though government officials have been tripping over themselves in a concerted effort to discover who was responsible for the recent series of leaks, it seems they’ve paid zero attention to what they leaked. As supporters’ of Bernie Sanders are painfully aware, the DNC leaks of July confirmed much of the corruption they’d suspected — as the democratic national convention kicked off, it was revealed that top DNC officials, who are supposed to be neutral, had secretly worked with Clinton’s campaign, colluding with the media to suppress inconvenient stories & even to smear her opponent because of his religion. And that’s just one small part of the first leak.

Simply put, there is no word better than “corruption” to describe what the DNC emails exposed — and isn’t exposing corruption a good thing? Even if the Russians really were responsible, shouldn’t we thank them for detecting the corruption of our public officials instead of rattling our sabers at them? Did the hackers harm the people of the United States simply by showing them the truth? No, they did not — they helped us!

Exposing Corruption is a Good Thing

July’s email leaks revealed that DNC officials, pretending to be neutral arbiters, had schemed to undermine the Sanders campaign from the beginning of the primaries and spoke with open contempt of both him & his campaign staff, even routinely using vulgar language to refer to them. Instead of apologizing, however, Clinton & the DNC immediately deflected the scandal by blaming the Russians, saying they were the “victims of a crime,” as if that excused them from addressing the fact that they’d rigged the primaries.

Since July, leaked documents from the Clinton Foundation revealed what appears to be strong evidence of “pay-to-play” (aka selling US ambassadorships) and leaked emails show that the Clinton campaign secretly paid “pundits” & “journalists” to write articles & appear on TV…

Clinton’s Paid Wall Street Speeches

Now, let’s look at the most recent leaks — last Friday (Oct. 7th), WikiLeaks released another load of emails, this time from Clinton’s campaign chair, John Podesta. These emails contain parts of the transcripts for Clinton’s private speeches at events hosted by big banks & financial institutions, which she promised to “look into” releasing exactly 249 days, 5 hours, & 31 minutes ago (at the time of this writing).

The details are still emerging but — so far — we’ve learned that Clinton has “public” & “private” policy positions, her “dream” is free trade all around, she wants the United States to become the “number one oil and gas producer,” & she believes that reform of the financial industry should come from within the industry (aka Wall Street should be regulated by… um, Wall Street, I guess)

These must be the private positions because — publically — Clinton claims that she’ll be tough on Wall Street & oppose free trade deals.

“My dream is a hemispheric common market”

-Hillary Clinton

The John Podesta Emails

In addition to the transcripts, WikiLeaks released more than 5,000 of Podesta’s emails in three batches since Friday, some of which appear to contain evidence that Clinton’s campaign illegally coordinated with David Brock’s super-PAC and that Donna Brazile, the DNC’s totally neutral vice-chair, had forwarded emails she received from Sanders’ campaign to Clinton’s.

“I want to see us become the number one oil and gas producer”

-Hillary Clinton

And everything we’ve gone over is really just the tip of the email-iceberg — Julian Assange has said that WikiLeaks is sitting on 50,000 emails of Podesta’s and journalists are still mining (or should I say fracking…?) the emails for further information.

So, we’re supposed to be mad that

Russian hackers told us the truth ?

While Hillary Clinton & John Podesta are busy stirring up anti-Russian feelings, voters should be rejecting what the whole thing is based on — the assumption that these hacks are harmful to the United States’ interests. Sure, they’re harmful to the blatantly corrupt career-politicians of the democratic party but there’s no reason we should be mad about the ongoing email leaks — even if Russia is responsible, isn’t it a good thing when corruption is exposed & people are told the truth?

Whoever is hacking the democrats’ emails isn’t “interfering with US elections,” as the director of national intelligence put it — they’re interfering with corrupt politicians’ attempts to deceive voters. Like Snowden’s now-famous revelation of the NSA’s spying program,† the victims are not the people — the victims are politicians who think it’s unfair that hackers are making it harder for them to hide the truth from the public.

What? You want an order of cries with your never-taking-responsibility-for-your-own-actions-burger? Or a glass of whine, perhaps? Want us to call a “Wa-a-A-ambulance” for you?

Stop Red Baiting, This is Not the 1950’s

(I can’t believe I actually have to say this)

Okay, so — in addition to the fact that these leaks, Russian or not, are actually helpful to the people of the US, something needs to be said about the possible consequences of democrats’ attitude about all of this, which is not only hilariously childish but dangerously irresponsible, too. While the department of defense appears to be convinced that Moscow is responsible for the leaks, the Clinton campaign has taken it even further by actually implying that their opponent may be some kind of KGB agent — and that’s called red baiting.

“Red baiting” is a term for when politicians accused or denounced other politicians for being communists, having communist ties, or even, heaven forbid, being a soviet spy, sent by Russia to steal our secret recipe. Until recently, red baiting was mostly a historically embarrassing practice from the 1950’s — but democrats appear to be reviving this slimy tactic, which may be one of the stupidest things they’ve done in 2016. Clinton & her campaign, however, don’t seem to understand how it might be a dumb idea to risk stirring up cold-war prejudices & anti-Russian feelings by slinging public accusations, both at Russia & at politicians we dislike, implying Russia is our enemy, which is, at the very least, crappy diplomacy (incidentally, a quality we value in a president).

Russia (or Whoever):

Thanks for Exposing US Corruption !



“I’m for truth, no matter who tells it. I’m for justice, no matter who it’s for or against”

-Malcolm X

Consider this article to be a statement of my gratitude or, dare I say, my invitation to hackers everywhere — please, intrude upon the private files of our politicians! If their inboxes are filled with evidence of corruption, the fault is theirs — & theirs alone. And you know what? My invitation stands — even if your pay-checks are stamped from Moscow.

In fact, I hope they give you a raise!

If democrats dislike it when their corruption is exposed, they should avoid it by not being corrupt — not by attacking transparency organizations, like WikiLeaks. Why should the public feel any sympathy for the wealthy politicians who deceive them? Their regret is only that they did not deceive us more thoroughly — let the politicians prove their honesty by standing with those who tell the truth, whoever — & wherever — they are.

In solidarity,

John Laurits

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Notes

† Speaking of Snowden — I’d like to take this opportunity to note the irony (well, *hypocrisy* really) of the US lecturing anyone on the morality of cyber privacy. I wonder if US officials would like to complain about the injustice of having their communications intercepted by other countries to Germany’s leaders or any of the other countries they were caught spying on?

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