17,000 Leaked Names From DNC Hack Appear To Be Ticket Purchasers (thehill.com)

An anonymous Slashdot reader writes: The database of leaked names from the Democratic National Committee hack appears to be anyone who went to see the president, the vice president or other official DNC events dating back to 2013.
"When things like this happen, they are going to be losing support," says one woman who purchased a ticket to see President Obama speak in Texas. "I'm not going to be buying any more tickets. There should be much better safeguards in place."

Comments

why dnc make money from president?

[sittingnut]

fact that dnc, a political party, is allowed to make money out of people who want to see the president (a public official), says a lot about state of usa's so called democracy (which they want to export as a good thing to other countries with much bloodshed).

Re:why dnc make money from president?

[ScentCone]

You're (deliberately, I assume) pretending to misunderstand this. But let's clear up some stuff for you:

1) The DNC is not a political party. It's the committee formed by members of that party to run certain activities (like the events where the party's candidates try to muster more support - as campaign donations, more volunteering, more press coverage, etc) on behalf of the party's members.

2) Political parties are not the government. The Democrats, the Republicans, the Greens, the Communist Party USA ... they are all private associations that have nothing to do with the government. The government doesn't charter them, doesn't run them, doesn't tell them how to choose their candidates, or anything else. The government does, of course, tell them (and everyone else) how they're allowed to spend money if they want to maintain their non-profit status and stay out of legal trouble surrounding federal election law. But when one of these private associations, just like the local Boy Scouts troop or the local Save The Whales or Greenpeace groups wants to raise some money, they are perfectly free to...

3) Sell tickets to an event. It might be for a seminar, for an appearance by a popular musical act, a panel discussion with a documentary film director, or an appearance by any attraction, including a celebrity. Which brings us to...

4) The president is a celebrity. If he wants to throw his personal high profile public presence behind a movement or event or cause that he thinks it makes sense to support, he's welcome to. That's not the same as making a policy decision by vetoing a bill, issuing executive orders, choosing which laws to enforce or not, etc. A president showing up at an alumni event held at his school, because he likes and supports his alma mater, is perfectly reasonable - he knows that will increase the odds that alumni interest and donations will go up. It's the same reason that all celebrities appear at such events - their fame and popularity help to attract interest, buzz, and press coverage of something they want to see promoted. Political parties are no different than any other non-profit association of people that have some common goal. They all want and can use more attention and support. And the First Amendment guarantees that the government can't infringe on the rights of people to form such associations, and any citizen - including the commander in chief or Kim Kardashian - as the right to throw their visibility and support behind an association's promotional and fund raising efforts.

So, are you really thinking that when someone buys a ticket to an event (you know, the sort of thing that a group has to spend money to run (have you ever personally organized a large gathering ... rented a facility, catered meals, provided everything from janitorial services to security to transportation), that that means the politician who makes an appearance at that event (and event he or she publicly supports), that suddenly that same politician is going to change their view on, say ... whether or not to leave more troops in Iraq, whether to sign a budget bill, or whether to name a new person to run the IRS? People are buying tickets to a political party's fund raising event because they already like and agree with the person they're looking forward to seeing there.