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DNC serves WikiLeaks with lawsuit via Twitter
The Democratic National Committee on Friday officially served its lawsuit to WikiLeaks via Twitter, employing a rare method to serve its suit to the elusive group that has thus far been unresponsive.
As CBS News first reported last month, the DNC filed a motion with a federal court in Manhattan requesting permission to serve its complaint to WikiLeaks on Twitter, a platform the DNC argued the website uses regularly. The DNC filed a lawsuit in April against the Trump campaign, Russian government and WikiLeaks, alleging a massive conspiracy to tilt the 2016 election in Donald Trump's favor.
All of the DNC's attempts to serve the lawsuit via email failed, the DNC said in last month's motion to the judge, which was ultimately approved.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who has been holed up in Ecuador's London embassy for six years, is considering an offer to appear before a U.S. Senate committee to discuss alleged Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election, his lawyer said on Thursday.
WikiLeaks published a letter from the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday which asked Assange to make himself available to testify in person at a closed hearing as part of its investigation into whether Moscow meddled to help Donald Trump win the 2016 presidential election. "The U.S. Senate Select Committee request confirms their interest in hearing from Mr Assange," lawyer Jennifer Robinson said in a statement.
Julian Assange 'seriously considering' request to meet US Senate committee
Lawyers for Julian Assange say they are "seriously considering" a request from a US Senate committee to interview the WikiLeaks founder as part of its investigation into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 US election.
The Senate select committee on intelligence has written to Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he has been living for more than six years.
[...] The chairman of the committee, Richard Burr, wrote: "As you are aware, the Senate select committee on intelligence is conducting a bipartisan inquiry into Russian interference in the 2016 US elections. As part of that inquiry, the committee requests that you make yourself available for a closed interview with bipartisan committee staff at a mutually agreeable time and location."
The ultimate irony would involve Julian Assange avoiding Metropolitan Police arrest by somehow fleeing to the United States.
See also: Mueller subpoenas Randy Credico, who Roger Stone says was his WikiLeaks back channel
Previously: DNC's Lawsuit Against WikiLeaks is an Attack on Freedom of the Press
Related: Prominent Whistleblowers and Journalists Defend Julian Assange at Online Vigil
Ecuador Reportedly Almost Ready to Hand Julian Assange Over to UK Authorities
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Sunday August 12 2018, @04:41PM (3 children)
I don't normally look to twitter for good information, but this thread outlines how time and again during the primaries, Clinton got more delegates than the popular vote warranted, including states where despite winning the popular vote, Clinton won the delegate count (all due the anti-democratic practice of super-delegates): https://twitter.com/philosophrob/status/905118924311801864 [twitter.com]
Democrats complaining about election rigging is like Jeffry Dahmer complaining about how his steaks are cooked.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Sunday August 12 2018, @04:58PM
correction:
this: despite winning the popular vote, Clinton won the delegate count
to this: despite BERNIE winning the popular vote, Clinton won the delegate count
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 12 2018, @06:22PM (1 child)
That thread is pretty nitpicky. Most of the percentages are slightly off, which unsurprising given that some voting inefficiency is inevitable in a districted system instead of a popular vote system. Without seeing a chart of all of the states, it's hard to tell if they're cherry-picking. Obviously Hillary won the primary in both delegates (not counting super-delegates which have never affected a Democratic primary since the current system of having the general population vote in a primary was instituted) and votes, so it's not like this actually helped her win the primary, as much as some news reports may have used it (like the super-delegates) as a way to exaggerate her already substantial lead.
Of course, the Democrats chose to run their primary as a districted system instead of a popular vote system for similar reasons to why the United States originally chose to use the Electoral College: to make sure the election system chooses a candidate with broad support as opposed to strong support in a small number of areas. If Hillary consistently won more delegates than one would expect from her vote percentage, that means that districts that went for Bernie did so by larger margins than districts that went for Hillary. In other words, the results imply that Bernie had a concentrated base of excited supporters while Hillary had supporters everywhere. Which choice is the best for an electoral system is a matter for debate, but in this case Hillary won the popular vote of the primary as well by quite a bit, so it's not really an issue as both choices give the same winner.
(Obviously, the Democrats are in favor of the other choice for the general presidential election because they have trouble appealing to rural areas, but arguing to change the rules to ignore a constituency, even one that is a minority in population, seems like an undemocratic choice as opposed to changing their policies and messaging to actually represent as many people as possible. Bernie was a step in the other direction; Clinton at least had policies trying to help rural areas in her platform, although she clearly failed at messaging.)
(Score: 4, Interesting) by hemocyanin on Sunday August 12 2018, @09:03PM
It isn't nitpicky -- you have states where HRC would get say 4% more than she deserved, which means Bernie got 4% LESS than he deserved -- that's an 8% spread. Then of course there are states where Bernie flat out won -- like Wyoming -- but Clinton won the delegate count. https://pics.me.me/dem-caucus-wyoming-18-delegates-bernie-sanders-democrat-56-dem-7732106.png [pics.me.me] Bernie won 56% of the vote to get 39% of the delegates. That's some democracy.
My own personal experience in the WA caucus was a real eyeopener -- while Bernie won WA, the HRCbots did everything possible to make the win worth less than its true value because they understood that spread is what is vitally important and with only a little extra thumb on the scale, democracy is irrelevant. Ultimately, the DNC rigged it so that where Bernie would win, he would either lose or not get the full benefit of his win, and where HRC won, she almost always got a little extra to boot.
That's not nitpicking -- that's pointing out how rigged it was. Bernie would have needed a super-majority in order to get the benefit of a mere simple majority.