Activist publishes 11,000 Wikileaks Twitter direct messages
An activist has published 11,000 direct messages on Twitter between the Wikileaks account and a group of its supporters. The direct messages were published by Emma Best on her own website. Her Twitter account states that she is a journalist on the East Coast. Best has been critical of Wikileaks and has advocated for government transparency. Some of the direct messages were previously published, but this is the first time all of the direct messages have been posted.
The messages show that Wikileaks wanted the GOP to defeat Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential elections. "We believe it would be much better for the GOP to win," the Wikileaks account states to a supporter named "Emmy B" in one of the messages from 2015.
Why would they do that?
Clinton: I don't recall joking about droning Julian Assange
Oh.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @01:50PM (33 children)
What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Let's hope all of Asange's PMs, emails, et al, are released.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @01:55PM (25 children)
Wikileaks/Assange are nothing like government.
A government takes resources from people by decree, often against their will, at the point of a gun; and, a government wages violent war, kill (and arguably murdering) people.
This ain't no goose and gander comparison.
(Score: 3, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @02:07PM (17 children)
This ain't no goose and gander comparison.
Speaking as one who once supported Wikileaks, Wikileaks chose to become an agent of Putin's government in spreading anti-Democrat (dis)information during an election. When they chose to become an agent for a government, they lost any moral high-ground they might have had. Last I checked, Putin's government has been taking resources by decree (Russia is considered a kleptocracy by many economists because of how they seize assets and then divvy them up among Putin's insiders), and is certainly guilty of murdering plenty of people, not just via their anti-gay "unofficial" pogroms, but by shooting down airliners and murdering dissidents at home and abroad in numerous ways, including using banned nerve agents on civilians in the UK.
This is absolutely a goose and gander comparison, and Assange/Wikileaks deserves to hang by their own petard.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @02:22PM (8 children)
Typical Democrat stance. First it was "Ohhhh, Wikileaks GOOOOD!" Then it was, "But, muh HILLARY!"
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @03:23PM (7 children)
It isn't about Hillary. Wokileaks was about transparency and publishing things people should know
They were supposedly somewhat objective. When they began gearing their releases for political effect they lost the neutrality and became yet another shadowy organization.
(Score: 1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @04:07PM (6 children)
Wow.
What is the point of restricting themselves to leaking documents that are not of a political nature? What is the point of free speech if not to challenge political power?
The ctrl-left is so far gone, it's hopeless. The DNC massively fucked up in choosing Hillary Clinton. How that happened is something we should know.
We need to know, because we need to decide whether the Democratic Socialists of America can save the Democratic Party from neoliberalism. If the DSA cannot, then we must abandon the Democratic Party entirely and throw our support behind perhaps the Green Party or a national revival of the Progressive Party.
Let me put it another way. The DSA is the only way to save capitalism at this point without becoming an alt-right fascist shithole country.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @05:40PM (3 children)
We already know: "It was her turn."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @08:32PM (2 children)
And she would've gotten away with rigging the Democratic party primaries if it wasn't for those meddling Bernie Bros. And the Russian hackers too!
(How dare they expose her corruption.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @10:50PM (1 child)
Considering your ilk fell for a con man, thanks for pointing out the speck in someone else's eye while ignoring the beam in yours.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2018, @03:19AM
If you have any evidence to support the assertion that Bernie Sanders is a con man then please provide links to support it.
Or did you just ignorantly assume that all critics of Clinton must be Trump supporters?
(Score: 5, Disagree) by PartTimeZombie on Wednesday August 01 2018, @09:50PM (1 child)
Please stop with the fiction that there is a left in US politics.
There is a right and there is a far-right. Any illusion that any group with "Socialist" in their name will be allowed to have any national role in politics is stupid.
The people who run America will never let any of that happen.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 03 2018, @12:48PM
Left and right are relative.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @02:30PM
I'm not saying the Republicans are, mind you. But, maybe you should do some introspection.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 01 2018, @02:51PM (2 children)
Nope, telling the truth is never a bad thing. There may need to be more of it being done and it may need to be done less selectively but that doesn't mean we're better off not knowing.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @05:00PM (1 child)
While I agree with your general sentiment there are always outliers where it is better to hide the truth at least for a little while.
Beware the absolute statements!
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 01 2018, @05:22PM
Yeah, I assumed we could take that for granted. General principles do not need to cover all specifics.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Thexalon on Wednesday August 01 2018, @03:09PM
Assumes facts not in evidence, namely that Assange knew that the people he was talking to were Russian intel. Just because the talking heads on MSDNC say so repeatedly doesn't make it true, any more than the talking heads on Fox Snooze saying something repeatedly makes it true. I searched the messages for mentions of "Russia" and "GRU", and found nothing indicating that he did in fact know.
Which, again, if Assange didn't know he was dealing with Russian intel, is completely irrelevant.
Ahh, this is the part where I'm confused: How is this material "hanging" them? Unless you didn't actually read it, of course, or decided that "Hurts the Democrats" = "illegal".
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Whoever on Wednesday August 01 2018, @03:14PM (2 children)
It's "hoist", not "hang".
A petard is a type of bomb. It was used to blast open gates. The petardier would make the petard and attach it to the enemy's gates. If it exploded too soon, the petardier would be hoisted by his own petard.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @03:46PM (1 child)
LOL Back to the future Biff Tannen.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @04:32PM
Make like a tree and get out of here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @04:20PM (5 children)
Stealing, with of without a gun, is still stealing.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @04:33PM (4 children)
Did Assange steal documents? Nope. Next!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @06:05PM (3 children)
Some, yes. Some were stolen and given to him. And yet, he's some type of hero? I say put the hiding coward on the street and let the world have at him.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @06:15PM (2 children)
He did nothing the New York Times and Washington Post didn't engage in a few decades ago. We used to call it "journalism", it's actually mentioned in the Bill of Rights.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @10:59PM (1 child)
Well, excuse me if I deny Assange any and all rights granted in the US Constitution due to the fact that the weaselly coward is not a US citizen, or even in the US. He's hiding out in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. And I believe a foreigner releasing those documents violates US law.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday August 02 2018, @02:26PM
No, you should excuse me, because as you say, Assange is not a US citizen, nor does he reside in the US. No jurisdiction. If some American tells him something, and he repeats is, he has broken no US law, and certainly no enforceable US law.
Let's say you post some meaningless nonsense insult about some petty despot in some God-forsaken country halfway around the world. Does that little prick have some right to abduct your ass, haul you into court in his own country, charge you, try you, convict you, then execute you?
No jurisdiction means, "Nyaah, nyaah, nyaah, you can't touch me if you respect your own laws!"
But, the US respects no laws - not even it's own laws.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Thursday August 02 2018, @12:13AM
Wikileaks/Assange are nothing like government.
The DNC is not part of the government either...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @05:03PM (3 children)
"Sauce", not "good". The expression is "what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander".
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Wednesday August 01 2018, @05:24PM (2 children)
It's either nowadays. You might want to keep up.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @11:02PM (1 child)
What's sauce for the buzzard is good for the gander?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 02 2018, @03:12PM
Well, what's sauce for the Buzzard is probably either mango habanero or white gravy. Which are both also good. Ganders, they're outside my area of expertise.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @07:03PM (2 children)
I don't really care if they are. But are you saying that they should not have released the DNC emails, and that The People shouldn't have been informed that the DNC was heavily biased against Bernie, amongst other things? The only tragedy is that the same didn't happen to the RNC, and various other parts of government.
(Score: 2) by J053 on Wednesday August 01 2018, @09:08PM (1 child)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 01 2018, @11:15PM
So? It's good that it was released at all, regardless of who it may or may not have "helped". I believe people are ultimately responsible for their own votes anyway, regardless of any attempted indirect interference to sway them.