Should Journalists Ignore Some Leaked Emails? (backchannel.com)

Tuesday Lawrence Lessig issued a comment about a leaked email which showed complaints about his smugness from a Clinton campaign staffer: "I'm a big believer in leaks for the public interest... But I can't for the life of me see the public good in a leak like this..." Now mirandakatz shares an article by tech journalist Steven Levy arguing that instead, "The press is mining the dirty work of Russian hackers for gossipy inside-beltway accounts." This is perfectly legal. As long as journalists don't do the stealing themselves, they are solidly allowed to publish what thieves expose, especially if, as in this case, the contents are available to all... [But] is the exploitation of stolen personal emails a moral act? By diving into this corpus to expose anything unseemly or embarrassing, reporters may be, however unwillingly, participating in a scheme by a foreign power to mess with our election...

As a 'good' journalist, I know that I'm supposed to cheer on the availability of information... But it's difficult to argue that these discoveries were unearthed by reporters for the sake of public good...
He's sympathetic to the idea that minutiae from campaigns lets journalists "examine the failings of 'business as usual'," but "it would be so much nicer if some disgruntled colleague of Podesta's was providing information to reporters, rather than Vladimir Putin using them as stooges to undermine our democracy." He ultimately asks, "is it moral to amplify anything that's already exposed on the internet, even if the exposers are lawbreakers with an agenda?"

Comments

Snowden also did something illegal

[NotInHere]

also, look at watergate. Journalists both used that content.

Re:Snowden also did something illegal

[0100010001010011]

Pentagon Papers

New York Times Co. v. United States, 403 U.S. 713 (1971), was a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court on the First Amendment. The ruling made it possible for the New York Times and Washington Post newspapers to publish the then-classified Pentagon Papers without risk of government censorship or punishment.

Re:Snowden also did something illegal

[Xenographic]

Well, the GOP offices have been firebombed ("Nazi republicans get out"). Someone here on Slashdot was calling that a "Reichstag fire" (yeah, umm, so where are the riots over it? oh, right... the GOP doesn't stage those). People on the Democratic payroll (MoveOn, specifically) were responsible for staging the violence at Trump rallies and then blamed Sanders supporters for it. Oh, and there was a mysterious DC "robbery" (where nothing was taken) with the guy shot twice in the back in the middle of the night. Who was an insider that may have been responsible for some leaks. Don't worry! Fact checkers "debunked" that due to there being "no evidence" on the same day (investigate? why?). The killer has not been caught.

But we can ignore that because Russia? If Putin wanted to influence the elections, it's pretty clear that he could've just donated to the Clinton foundation like Qatar, Saudi Arabia and everyone else.

Re:Snowden also did something illegal

[Anonymous Coward]

You've lost track of the story, which is about campaign emails stolen from the DNC and Clinton's campaign manager. This isn't about State Department emails sent and received during Clinton's time as Secretary. The emails in question were not part of the public record, and not subject to FOIA.

Ignore them only if it hurts your political master

[ArtemaOne]

If it is the bad guy instead, go for it, expose them! But it seems we already do this.

Messenger

[phrobot]

Would journalists have ignored Nixon's crimes if Deep Throat was a Russian?

Palin was treated differently.

[Salo2112]

These was none of this navel gazing when Sarah Palin's emails were stolen. In fact, the press crowdsourced reading them in their search for dirt on her. Why would this be any different for Hillary Clint..... Oh, party affiliation. Forgot. Carry on, then.

Re:Palin was treated differently.

[jordanjay29]

Stolen is an interesting term for a routine publication of a former governor's communications.

Yes, selecting the US president isn't "gossip"

[raymorris]

Agreed. The article tries to cast this is "for gossip". No. Kim Kardashian's emails would be gossip. An inside look at the actions of the US Secretary of State, who is running for President, is far more important than mere gossip. As is bringing to public scrutiny the process used to select the candidates. The purpose of the DNC is to put people in charge of running a superpower nation, and to strongly influence the policies of the United States. How that's done, by whom, for what reasons and what the back room deals are is all information of importance to The People.

Re:Yes, selecting the US president isn't "gossip"

[Anonymous Coward]

Not only that, email isn't "a private record."

The company I work for made it very clear that we should not treat email as anything private, that anything we say in email should be considered being on the public record.

Not because they were afraid of being hacked, but because emails, as "written documents," can be subjected to subpoenas.

If you're using your work email account to "gossip" you're doing it wrong. Since all the emails leaked so far have been used by Clinton campaign staffers for Clinton's campaign, they're all fair to report on.

Re:Yes, selecting the US president isn't "gossip"

[Gavagai80]

Those parts of the emails are valid to report on. Stuff like a staffer thinking Lessig is smug is not valid to report on. It's like the diplomatic cable leaks a few years ago -- a few of them were important revelations in the public interest, and most of them were unimportant gossipy personal stuff that unnecessarily strained all sorts of international relationships. Good reporters report on the part that matters, bad reporters just try to find something salacious to poke a bee hive.

Re:Scientists have proven

[bmo]

To date, the Clinton campaign has not once attacked the veracity of the emails.

Not. Even. Once.

They have bobbed, weaved, prevaricated, projected, and otherwise produced non-sequitur "answers" to the questions about the content. But not once have they said "well, that one there, that's false, we never said that." Instead we get tall tales of Russians hacking the DNC -with no evidence - just the Clinton campaign's say-so.

All attacks are upon the messenger(s) and not the facts. And it's amazing how these emails match up with reality.

That tells me a lot. It tells me that the emails are real, and that once Hillary assumes office, the heat is not going to be off. [grumpy cat]Good[/grumpy cat].

Karma is a bitch.

--
BMO

Re:Scientists have proven

[bongey]

Any programmer with python can EASILY VERIFY THEY ARE REAL. http://dailycaller.com/2016/10...

Re:Scientists have proven

[Xenographic]

Actually, I saw one on the news saying they'd seen some of their emails up there and then they waffled about non-specific "inaccuracies." They clearly said it was their email, but they weren't giving any specifics about what they believed was inaccurate.

So that tells me the DNC email was really leaked. I'd say it's a time to "trust but verify"--that is, don't blindly trust anything you read, but corroborate it yourself with other evidence.

The other meaning of Orwellian

[poity]

"[...]The argument that to tell the truth would be ‘inopportune’ or would ‘play into the hands of’ somebody or other is felt to be unanswerable, and few people are bothered by the prospect of the lies which they condone getting out of the newspapers and into the history books." -George Orwell, The Prevention of Literature

The truth remains the truth, even if unsavory people are beneficiaries of it.