Clinton Campaign: Russia Leaked Emails to Help Trump (washingtonpost.com)
An anonymous Slashdot reader quotes the Washington Post:
A top official with Hillary Clinton's campaign on Sunday accused the Russian government of orchestrating the release of damaging Democratic Party records in order to help the campaign of Republican Donald Trump -- and some cyber security experts in the U.S. and overseas agree. The extraordinary charge came as some national security officials have been growing increasingly concerned about possible efforts by Russia to meddle in the election, according to several individuals familiar with the situation.
Late last week, hours before the records were released by the website Wikileaks, the White House convened a high-level security meeting to discuss reports that Russia had hacked into systems at the Democratic National Committee... Officials from various intelligence and defense agencies, including the National Security Council, the Department of Defense, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, attended the White House meeting Thursday, on the eve of the email release.
Clinton's campaign manager told ABC News "some experts are now telling us that this was done by the Russians for the purpose of helping Donald Trump." Donald Trump's son later responded, "They'll say anything to be able to win this."
Late last week, hours before the records were released by the website Wikileaks, the White House convened a high-level security meeting to discuss reports that Russia had hacked into systems at the Democratic National Committee... Officials from various intelligence and defense agencies, including the National Security Council, the Department of Defense, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, attended the White House meeting Thursday, on the eve of the email release.
Clinton's campaign manager told ABC News "some experts are now telling us that this was done by the Russians for the purpose of helping Donald Trump." Donald Trump's son later responded, "They'll say anything to be able to win this."
Trump actually lobbied to change the Republican platform to favor Russia over the Ukraine -- one of seven strange Russia connections clearly documented by Josh Marshall.
"Post-bankruptcy Trump has been highly reliant on money from Russia, most of which has over the years become increasingly concentrated among oligarchs and sub-garchs close to Vladimir Putin," for example. And then there was the "secret financing" for a Soho real estate project from Russia and Kazakhstan. Even Trump's campaign manager, Paul Manafort, "spent most of the last decade as top campaign and communications advisor for Viktor Yanukovych, the pro-Russian Ukrainian Prime Minister and then President whose ouster in 2014 led to the on-going crisis and proxy war in Ukraine."
I haven't been following Trump's campaign closely, but his ties to Russia are really clear.
Why does Hillary always claim some sort of big conspiracy every time she gets caught doing something? Perhaps, she should just concentrate on keeping her nose clean to begin with.
The idea wasn't to help the Trump campaign - it was to demonstrate that Clinton was chosen as the nominee before any elections were held. Neither candidate is acceptable for President of the United States. Both have demonstrated a lengthy history of poor judgment, failure to take accountability for their actions, and a complete lack of moral compass. Based on recent business dealings, it appears Trump thinks "I've put too much money into this project" is an acceptable reason for not paying amounts HE AGREED to. And Clinton appears to believe she's above the employment agreements millions of Americans enter into every day - don't bring your own device is an easy rule to follow. Despite Clinton not being charged, she treated the State communications requirements like they meant nothing and disrespect for rule of law seems to be a primary motivation for the recent acts of violence. The young man who was arrested in the Baton Rouge police killings didn't fit the typical narrative - no mental illnesses or disorders, irrational hatred of religious groups, or other "radical" behavior. By all appearances, he reached a breaking point where the current situation was no longer compatible with his moral system and made the most powerful (whether it was effective is debatable) statement he could. If police officers are going to execute innocent people in cold blood, perhaps an innocent person executing a police officer would create a dialogue about the increasing militarization of our police forces.
to me, unless you can show the integrity of the original messages was compromised, then the "who did it" does not matter as much as "what the emails say".
Then you are a fool and you deserve to be ruled by Putin / Trump.
Look it up. Lies by omission are the easiest ones. All he needs to have done is a) hidden the emails which help Clinton and b) hidden the ones which hinder Trump and c) kept the ones which guarantee his control over Trump.
The accusation is extremely serious and a big risk. It's probably true because if they get found out that it isn't they lose big time. Putin has every reason to prefer a buffoon like Trump over Clinton. There's also pretty good evidence he's interfering with European politics, so why shouldn't he do the USA too? Still, this needs better evidence and confirmation than we have now.
Putin has every reason to prefer a buffoon like Trump over Clinton.
Why would Putin fear Clinton? He has beaten her repeatedly in the arena of foreign policy. What was her foreign policy experience prior to becoming secretary of state? She accompanied Bill on some trips and visited hospital and schools with the other wives while the Bill and the other actual players met elsewhere and discussed the issues and problems of the day?
I'm not trying to be sexist, women are perfectly capable at doing the job be it SOS or POTUS, but this particular person's experience was PR fluff stuff not actual foreign policy. When that crisis happened on the other side of the world and the phone rang at 3am she answered the phone and passed it to Bill saying "its for you".
She was made Secretary of State in 2008 for one and only one reason. To get the Clinton political machine behind Obama, to bind her future to his. This "machine" still controlled the Democratic party, and still does to this day as we saw with Sanders. To offer her something credible for her resume for her next attempt at the office of POTUS as a consolation promise. She was not selected because of her foreign policy experience, there was none, and her performance indicates on the job training didn't help her much.
She really is in the same league as Trump with respect to foreign policy, neither to be feared by the Russians.
Putin allowed these to be released to poke Obama in the eye. No more, no less. The fact that they feed into a long standing story of dishonesty and fraud on the part of the Clintons is incidental. He saw maximum value to let them go right before the DNC, because he knows, like I do, that these e-mails aren't going to decide the election. It wasn't worth holding them until November, as they'd be ineffectual then with all the mud flying in the last couple of weeks.
They are, however, one of hundreds of data points that will decide this election.
He doesn't "support Trump" at all. He'd prefer a HRC in charge - less risk, but he doesn't believe he could turn a US election anyway with any of his tools available. Those who believe otherwise are conspiracy theorists.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
The problem is the asymmetry here. What do you think a cache of RNC emails would show?
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
Story about how she received bribes for allowing Russia to buy 20% of the USA uranium production. She clearly stated how she wouldn't take foreign donations to her foundation while at state, would ask for a waiver to do it if it came up, and would disclose if it happened. She took the bribe, didn't ask for a waiver, didn't disclose it, and failed to report it on her taxes and had to amend them years later after she was caught. She showed "Intent" in hiding the donations because they were bribes.
Did you link to the right article? I see some bad things for her, but not the stuff you were talking about.
1) The foundation wasn't supposed to accept foreign government donations, she didn't. Though she may have taken donations from people who had connections to foreign companies with significant government ties.
2) The foundation was supposed to publicly disclose all the donations to the foundation, apparently this guy who donated, a Canadian, reported on his tax form that he made a bunch of donations that the foundation didn't publicly disclose. I don't know if this was a mistake, deliberate, or some kind of misunderstanding.
3) During this period Bill Clinton got a $500k fee to speak to a Russian bank.
4) There's nothing I saw there about hers or the foundation's taxes. I have no idea where you got the idea she hid something on her taxes.
All the bad looking stuff is Bill Clinton, who ran the foundation, accepting donations or work from people who had a connection to businesses who might be affected by the State Department.
As for "approving something the State Department wouldn't normally even consider". She was only one of multiple people who had a say on the approval. If anything her fighting it would have been the more unusual action.
I'm not sure why people bring up her email scandal.
Because it's the only scandal, where after a critical investigation, there's evidence that she really did do something wrong.
Her problem is most politicians do everything they can to avoid the appearance of impropriety. The Clintons on the other hand, Bill in particular, don't really seem to care about the appearance because they think they'll be attacked regardless.
So you get stuff like this where Bill Clinton is constantly dealing with a bunch of people he should really be avoiding. I don't think Hillary was biased when it came to doing her job, but it does lead to some fishy optics.
I stole this Sig
That they were terrified of the loudmouth Donald Trump and grew increasingly terrified as he completely sabotaged their own attempt at coronating their own hand-picked stooge to run against Hillary in 2016.
The only difference between them and the Democrats? The RNC failed to derail Trump and the DNC and Hillary Clinton vociferously denied colluding to railroad Bernie Sanders.
The difference is also in expectations. Everyone *expects* the RNC and its major donors to guide a hand-picked favorite son into November. It's who they are. They don't operate under ideological banner that promotes free, open and fair elections -- they want to gut the Voting Rights Act, for example.
The Democrats, including Hillary Clinton, promote themselves as the guarantors of democracy, extending and protecting the franchise and voice of all people. Which is now being exposed for what it was all along -- a sanctimonious fiction and a bill of goods. Instead they spent their time promoting their own handpicked favorite and undermined a worthy and successful challenger.
I try not to buy into the Hillary is corrupt meme. But at this point, there's just too much evidence she's conniving and fundamentally not honest. And I'm not a Trump supporter, but I do have a certain admiration for the way he eviscerated the Republican party.
If the source of the emails is a Russian hacker, who's to say that any of the content is genuine? What if some of it were doctored? Source can't be trusted.
It's not an excuse. It's an explanation. Those are different things.
The problem with the emails is their source. WikiLeaks has shown great interest in anti-US material, and comparatively very little interest in anything that disparages Russia. Their bias has been analysed pretty thoroughly, and it calls their motives into question. That, in turn, means we must question the integrity of anything they release.
For example, consider the differences in the edited and un-edited versions of the Collateral Murder video. The raw footage shows a pretty typical battle, where a group of men, some of them armed, are loitering in an area where American troops have been under attack all morning. The edited version shows a group of men, and highlights that two of them are not armed, and in a slow-motion frame comparison, shows that one of the apparent weapons was actually a telephoto camera lens, then shows them being attacked by American fire. There are numerous other differences.
There's a huge difference in context between the two versions, which Assange himself has said was intentional for "political effect". In the raw video, the soldiers' actions are justified, though mistaken. In the edited version, they're portrayed as ruthless killers intentionally targeting civilians.
Now WikiLeaks has released a bunch of emails. That's great, but we must ask: what editing has been done here? Did they (or their possibly-Russian source) strip out any emails that conflict with the "DNC is corrupt" narrative? Are the emails signed? Is it possible or probable that some of the damning emails edited or completely faked?
These sorts of questions should be raised every time a leak is made public. The leakers always have an agenda, and it may not necessarily be to "inform the public".
With all that in mind, consider again what's being said. There is no denial of the emails' existence, and little discussion of the emails' content. Instead, at this point there's just a request to consider the trail the emails have followed, and the impact that has on their credibility.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Ahem: "Almost immediately after her resignation, Wasserman-Schultz was given a position within the Clinton campaign as an honorary chair. " http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
So no she was not thrown under the bus. She did her job and was rewarded.