The DNC Email Leaks

Mike Dwyer

Mike Dwyer is a former writer and contributor at Ordinary Times.

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108 Responses

  1. LTL FTC says:

    If Trump can be said to have a second-level strategy, it is to reduce the marginal value of a scandal down to nearly nothing. Any other candidate would have ground messaging to a halt at any number of occasions, to backtrack, apologize, give a redeeming speech on the controversial issue, and on and on until dropping out. Trump instead doubled down, making opposition commentary a boring and familiar laundry list of outrages.

    These emails, which told us nothing new, are the sort of thing we feign shock at in order to appear pro-good government. We are way past that now.Report

    • pillsy in reply to LTL FTC says:

      This exactly. Trump and has top advisors routinely say and do more outrageous things on public platforms (Twitter, TV, RNC speeches, et c.) then are in those emails, but we’re supposed to pretend that these point to some horrible truth about the DNC. Especially since a lot of the “worst” stuff came down the pipe when Sanders was directly attacking the DNC as corrupt. Of course they were pissed at him!Report

    • Stillwater in reply to LTL FTC says:

      If Trump can be said to have a second-level strategy, it is to reduce the marginal value of a scandal down to nearly nothing.

      Only his own scandals. Seems to me he’s playing a really high stakes game attempting to thread the needle between dismissing scandals about his own past doings and parlaying Clinton/DNC/Dem scandals into maximal partisan winners. (Of course, the fact that Trump is a sociopath eliminates the cognitive dissonance which would otherwise make such a threading near impossible to pull off.) Eg, Trump has effectively (from an electoral rather than logical pov) shifted the focus of blame for scandals he’s embroiled in onto corrupt judges, or the liberal PC media, etc., while simultaneously denying that Clinton scandals – just their mere existence irregardless of the evidence in play – are anything other than absolute evidence of her or the Dem party’s corruption. Which is good (even if cynical) politics.

      Hillary won’t win the scandal battle against Trump. So the more the campaign is focused on the scandalous behavior of the other side (and negativity in general) the higher the likelihood of a Trump victory, seems to me.Report

      • LTL FTC in reply to Stillwater says:

        It won’t be a tactical election like 2004, that’s for sure. Nobody will be smacking their head over $300k in ads going to Nevada instead of Ohio, or a ballot initiative in Colorado that brings out just the right microtargeted sliver.Report

        • Stillwater in reply to LTL FTC says:

          Agreed, but I also think that if Hillary adopts a tactical strategy of personally playing the negative game, she’s gonna lose (not the election necessarily, but the going-negative game. He’ll crush her.) In my view, what she needs to do is let the PACs and media hammer on Trump’s scandalous past (and present, no doubt) and merely pick off the already ripened low hanging fruit.

          My worry for her, given her past behavior, is that she somehow thinks she needs to engage a battle personally to win the war. She doesn’t. The more she let’s other people get dirty engaging the fight, while she stays above it by staying positive in her message, the better off she’ll be. (Tactically. 🙂 But perhaps I’m biased: I just don’t think she’s very good at retail politics. Better to let experienced hands play that role.Report

          • LTL FTC in reply to Stillwater says:

            There is a thin line between staying above it and taking the condescending tone her surrogates have taken with Sanders supporters. Hillaryland is full of people for whom Trump’s words are ugly and crazy enough to make him unfit for the presidency. Obviously, that’s not everybody. Will Hillary treat those people as voters to be wooed, or treated as demented?Report

            • Stillwater in reply to LTL FTC says:

              Will Hillary treat those people as voters to be wooed, or treated as demented?

              “Will” or “should”, right?

              Hillary quite infamously said she (well, “we” unfortunately) was/were gonna put a lot of coal miners outa business. She also has a track record of hiring really incompetent people who make really bad decisions to her inner circle. So there’s just no telling! But given the relevant evidence the prospects of staying on the high side don’t look promising.Report

          • Mo in reply to Stillwater says:

            I think Hillary has decided to go for the competence game. That’s the game that you need to win. If the battle field ends up being over who should make the call when the chips are down, she can win that.Report

  2. trizzlor says:

    It would be helpful right from the start to distinguish between acts that look bad and acts that actually *are bad*. So far all I’ve seen is a number of e-mails where DNC staffers express their frustrations with Sanders (no shit, the guy’s not a Democrat after all) and propose some ways to malign him which don’t go anywhere. Is there some smoking gun that I’m missing? If not, then we’re just talking about whether this *looks bad*, which is an entirely different conversation that depends on how the story was broken, how fast someone falls on their sword, and how much coverage it continues to get.

    One thing I will say is that DWS’s role is both to *do* good and to *look* good, so her resignation is appropriate but not indicative.Report

  3. Dark Matter says:

    I would assume the Russians want Hillary in the White House. Presumably they have all the emails from her server and can blackmail her with whatever she wanted to hide from the public.Report

  4. Michael Drew says:

    The place this election has gone to, with the Democratic Party seriously accusing Putin of meddling in our election (and he seriously may be!) by revealing bias over the presidential nomination decision at the top of the putatively impartial party apparatus – bias which they now don’t even try to deny – in order to deflect the story, and then with what’s going on on the other side, both Trump himself, and the newly-clarified reporting on his financial ties to oligarchs close to Putin, is just completely off the wall now.

    We’re off the rails, folks. We’re on unfamiliar ground now.Report

  5. North says:

    Yeah DWS has resigned. That’s probably going to cut what little staying power this story had right out from underneath it. Reading Bernie’s response to her resignation also is saying to me (though I am biased) that he’s sticking to his original deal with the Dems. If he was planning on raising a big fuss over this I wouldn’t expect him to be releasing such a level response to DWS resigning. And if Bernie doesn’t raise a stink over this it’s going to be over pretty fast because Bernie’s really the only one in a position to control that narrative. Trump certainly can’t.Report

    • Will Truman in reply to North says:

      Yeah, Bernie has demonstrated a capacity for Team Player that’s been missing for most of his career. Good for him.

      (Just give me my post-convention bounce and let it roll like ’08 and I’m a happy camper.)Report

      • North in reply to Will Truman says:

        I assumed Bernie would fall in on this but I’m actually surprised how firmly he’s team playered on the matter so far. I wonder what the hell HRC promised him. I mean yeah he got some planks on the platform and a fine position in the convention. Maybe something if they take the senate? A committee chair promise? Something that would make him really want the Dems to not just win but clean up the house?Report

    • Mike Dwyer in reply to North says:

      Jill Stein has jumped on this one too…inviting Sanders to join her on the Green ticket. Obviously he isn’t going to take the bait, but as I noted in the OP, 3rd party candidates might get some play this year.Report

      • North in reply to Mike Dwyer says:

        Sure, and maybe she’ll get the Green’s closer to 2%. I don’t see how, if one factors in the Libertarian party cannibalizing the GOP this comes out any better than a wash for Trump/HRC though I think on the margins the Libertarians have more pull than the Greens. The further right, especially the libertarian variety, have a lot more cachet and money in America than Steins passel of post capitalist enviro hippies.Report

    • Michael Drew in reply to North says:

      What can this do for Bernie now? Bernie’s not going to make more of this because obviously it doesn’t help him for this to hurt Clinton therefore help Trump now.

      But that doesn’t make it go away faster or slower. This is bad, looks horrible for the party, and reinforces and confirms negative senses people already. had about the party, Clintons, and that relationship (and the Clintons’ relationships to institutions generally).

      Bernie is irrelevant now; this is bad and proceeds on its own logic now. Could be not a big deal, but it’s not made bigger or smaller by Bernie playing it down (sort of). If he tried to play it up he might actually make it smaller by focusing on himself, who for the moment is a marginalized, minor entity. As it stands, it is instead intensely about central, dominant entities.Report

      • North in reply to Michael Drew says:

        I dunno Michael, if DWS was still sitting on her job as DNC chair I’d be more inclined your way but with her handing in her resignation I just don’t see the story getting a lot of play unless there’s further revelations or unless a public figure really pushes the narrative. Bernie, as the allegedly harmed party, would be the natural person to have capacity to push this and keep it alive. I don’t think Trump or third party candidates can pull it off because they’re just nakedly trying to lure voters (and likewise HRC’s peeps can’t downplay it for the same reason). I could easily be wrong but without Bernie pushing it I imagine this will sputter out in a day or two depending on how soon the next interesting news-numnum pops up.Report

        • Mo in reply to North says:

          And it looks like Trump is already petulantly insulting Sanders over not blowing up over it. So he probably hurts cross-over appeal there.Report

        • Michael Drew in reply to North says:

          You’re don’t see the story getting a lot of play? Then you’re closing your eyes.Report

        • Kimmi in reply to North says:

          “unless there’s further revelations”
          … a few ways this plays out:
          1) The Russians really want Clinton to win (stupid and wrongheaded, that, but… it could be truth anyway. I am inclined to think otherwise, judging by what the (private!) spies say about Clinton in general.)
          If this is the case, this is the Russians killing the story.
          2) PR folks are giving Wikileaks an easy win, free press, and knifing Clinton for fun and giggles. In this case, expect more revelations as we get closer to the election.
          3) PR folks are trying to do a lot with a little. Everything is obvious, including the “game was rigged” stuff. In this case, expect no more revelations, and the punch was as good as we get. DWS may be a poor headhunt, but it’ll be interesting what a mentally unstable Clinton does with that. Unpredictable from me — she doesn’t have the “mob boss” loyalty issues that GWB had.
          4) Hackers got what they wanted, and are keeping it all quiet. Leak enough that people aren’t going to look too hard before the sword falls. [Send in the FBI?]Report

  6. Mo says:

    I’m somewhat surprised Priebus taunted DWS over this. I’m pretty sure this is one of those, “There by the grace of god I go” situations for the RNC.Report

  7. To sum up: some DNC staffers sent emails suggesting going after Bernie in some pretty reprehensible ways.

    1. It didn’t happen.
    2. None of them were named Clinton.

    But this is another Clinton scandal because …
    Anybody?Report

    • Kimmi in reply to Mike Schilling says:

      Because this is what she was promised in return for not blowing up the party in 2008.
      She was promised a clear line to the president, and to not get murdered in the meantime (translation: here, have a job where you can pay off your debts).Report

    • Marchmaine in reply to Mike Schilling says:

      I’m pretty sure our friend Dave Barry has gotten to the nub of this:

      NEWS BULLETIN – Following a scandal involving damaging leaked emails from Democratic National Committee staffers, party officials have announced that DNC head Debbie Wasserman Schultz will not speak at the convention, because, quote, “there is no such person as Debbie Wasserman Schultz.”

      Report

  8. Jaybird says:

    If you were worried about what Debbie Wasserman-Schultz was going to do after resigning, I have some good news.

    Hillary Clinton has named her the honorary chair of Hillary’s 50-state program.Report

    • pillsy in reply to Jaybird says:

      So… the bare minimum to let her save face and not pull a Cruz?Report

      • Jaybird in reply to pillsy says:

        I don’t think “pulling a Cruz” was ever on the table.

        Unless we’re mean something like “get booed at the end of her speech” when we say “pull a Cruz” in which case… yeah, this ain’t gonna help much with that.Report

        • pillsy in reply to Jaybird says:

          I’m pretty sure she’s not speaking anymore. But in any event, they probably wanted her to step down without a fight.

          Hell, the Clinton campaign wanted her to step down months ago.Report

          • Jaybird in reply to pillsy says:

            NPR (like, 20 minutes ago) said that she’s doing the opening gavel.

            If that’s accurate, we can still see if the DNC merely ties the number of official people booed at the national convention or manages to exceed it!Report

            • Marchmaine in reply to Jaybird says:

              Good plan. Though honestly, I’d put the odds on “Not booed” then whisked away to what is it called again? 50-states of unity?

              http://media.thehill.com/services/player/bcpid2764968418001?bctid=5049060425001&bckey=AQ~~,AAAAAEA-5AE~,7pYsU79IKz2CB7rS1-yZzf130eU-6On5Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Marchmaine says:

                NPR also happened to mention that she got booed at a speech being given to Florida delegates this morning.

                Eh, no biggie. It’s an opportunity for the DNC to tell the Berniebros to grow the hell up and get on board if they don’t want Trump to kill us all in a rain of nukular hellfire.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Jaybird says:

                There’s video!

                .@DWStweets booed off the stage at her own FL delegation breakfast @NBCNews pic.twitter.com/GMe0g9t1JQ— Andrea Mitchell (@mitchellreports) July 25, 2016

                Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Jaybird says:

                As it turns out, DWS will *NOT* be gaveling in the convention.

                “I have decided that in the interest of making sure that we can start the Democratic convention on a high note that I am not going to gavel in the convention,” Wasserman Schultz said.

                “I stepped down the other day because I wanted to make sure that having brought us to this momentous day and to Philadelphia and planned the convention that is going to be the best one that we’ve ever had in our party’s history that this needs to be all about making sure that everyone knows that Hillary Clinton would make the best president,” she said.

                She said she asked Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, secretary of the Democratic National Committee, to take her place opening the proceedings at 4 p.m. Monday.

                Wasseman Schultz declined to answer further questions.

                So the possibility now exists that there will be fewer people booed at the podium than at the Republican convention.Report

              • Morat20 in reply to Jaybird says:

                While I’m no fan of DWS, I’m kinda of curious — there were what, a handful of emails out of 20,000 selectively leaked that seemed to inspire some outrage?

                And not a one of those seemed to progress into any action. (If it had, I didn’t hear about it).

                So like…where’s the beef, as it were? I’m hearing lots about the DNC being in the tank for Clinton, but all I’m seeing as evidence are what, two emails that didn’t get acted on. Two emails AFTER Clinton had, effectively, won and AFTER Sanders had gone full “The DNC is rigged against me”.

                And then a lot of hypothesizing about field clearing, debate schedules, and the like with exactly zero evidence of anything nefarious despite the big email dump.

                So I get wanting DWS out of a job because she certainly hasn’t been a great head of the DNC, but I don’t get the ceremonial scalping and 30-second hate here.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Morat20 says:

                Oh, I haven’t looked at a single email. I have no idea what the beef is (or whether there’s any beef at all).

                I just know that it looks bad to the point where it’s resulted in DWS having to hide her face at the convention lest she be booed off of the stage.Report

              • Tod Kelly in reply to Jaybird says:

                It’s actually just a sign of how wonderfully everything is working.Report

              • Alan Scott in reply to Jaybird says:

                Jaybird: I just know that it looks bad to the point where it’s resulted in DWS having to hide her face at the convention lest she be booed off of the stage.

                Dude, DWS was unpopular enough with Sanders supporters that she would have been bood offstage *before* the email leak.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Alan Scott says:

                True enough, but before the email leak, she was a speaker.

                And, for a brief couple of hours, she was in charge of the opening gavel.

                I’d say that there was a tipping point recently and it seems tied to the email leak.Report

              • Stillwater in reply to Jaybird says:

                I’d say that there was a tipping point recently and it seems tied to the email leak.

                Definitely. The leak provided tangible, inarguable, not plausibly-denied evidence of DWS/DNC pro-Clinton nefarity. It was either DWS or the Berner vote, seems to me.

                Tho Clinton once again tried to both eat and have her cake.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Stillwater says:

                And now I’m wondering if Bernie’s speech worked as a steam valve to prevent booing tomorrow or not.

                I reckon that, if it did, we have nothing to worry about on Thursday.

                If it didn’t…Report

              • Kimmi in reply to Morat20 says:

                Again, this is either the russians killing the story, or someone doing wikileaks a favor. If the latter, I’m certain we will discover that they’ve gotten far more than is currently available.

                Actually, we’ll discover it plain period, the FBI are investigating, and they’re at least competent at discovering what’s been took.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Morat20 says:

                Oh! I did see a tweet in my twitter line that discussed a donor getting an appointment somewhere in return for their help.

                Rod Blago… er, the former Governor of Illinois is currently in jail for that sort of thing.Report

              • Morat20 in reply to Jaybird says:

                Actually, I read a more in-depth discussion of that. Suffice it to say…not really.

                Of course, the first clue there’s nothing there is when all the news reports go to bloggers who don’t seem to link the actual email.

                From what I’ve read, it was a call for lists of candidates for boards and commissions. This apparently surprises some people, but there’s a HUGE overlap between “big donors to a party” and “politically active Democrats”. (You’d be SHOCKED to know that there have been people who donated to the DNC, then ran for Congress and won!).

                I mean color me shocked that people willing to donate to the party are politically active and often have very political interests, including a desire to work towards some issue.

                In short, basic sausage making. They’re asking anyone invested in the party for suggested candidates and compiling lists. And while I’m sure HRC has no real need to ask outside of her staff for candidates for her Cabinet or SCOTUS, she’s probably going to be asking for some suggestions from the party when it comes to filling out the Presidential Committee on [Blah-Blah-Blah] that no one has ever heard of.

                And yeah, I have no doubt that being a big supporter of the party probably gets your name on the top of the list if you’re really into…whatever it is.

                What are you supposed to do? Ban anyone who has donated to the party (which includes every office holder, pretty much) from suggesting candidates for boards and committees? Tell donors to the party thanks for your interest in X and support of our party, but we can’t even ASK you who you think is a good fit to head up a Committee on your primary interest?

                I swear, the most painful think about this election has been watching naive 20-somethings discover politics amidst some of the worst conspiracy mongering crap.

                God, the number of people screaming about DWS getting an honorary chair in HRC’s campaign is depressing. Do they not realize that it’s a “We’re letting you resign and pretend it’s not you being fired if you don’t make a fuss”, face-saving gesture?

                Eva Longoria is a freaking honorary chair. I’m sure HRC lets her call all the big shots.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Morat20 says:

                I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about, then.

                I have no idea why DWS even resigned. It’s a show of weakness, if you ask me. Makes you wonder if Hillary isn’t trying to sabotage the Democratic Party.Report

              • Marchmaine in reply to Jaybird says:

                @jaybird

                Eva Longoria is a freaking honorary chair. I’m sure HRC lets her call all the big shots.

                So… Wales it is.Report

              • Morat20 in reply to Jaybird says:

                I’m curious — why do you routinely do stuff like that? You mentioned an email, I went into depth on what I learned about it (which was rather difficult, as it was reported via the Daily Caller and they didn’t actually give the full email, just selective quotes.)

                You then ask a question you know the answer to, rather than respond in any relevant fashion. You didn’t dispute facts, offer an alternative opinion, or in anyway advance the conversation.

                It’s not trolling exactly, but it’s not an attempt at conversation or communication either. It’s not an attempt to be funny, or to make a point, or anything.

                And you do it a lot.

                Why? I mean, what’s your goal there? Not here, about DWS and Clinton, but in general. This isn’t a verbal tic you only unleash when Clinton is the subject.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Morat20 says:

                You asked what meat there was in the emails and I told you that I haven’t read any, just that it looked bad.

                (My evidence for it looking bad, for the record, is DWS’s resignation and the fact that she got booed and is no longer doing the opening gavel.)

                I then remembered seeing one piece of something that might be meat, which was from the twitters that pointed out that there was, apparently, a quid pro quo offered in the emails which is, apparently, illegal and has, apparently, sent politicians to jail in the past.

                In response, you wrote a long email about how it wasn’t a big deal, this sort of thing happens all the time, and besides wikileaks is bad.

                So I shrugged and agreed with you and speculated about why DWS would have resigned in the first place.

                As for why I don’t do it for Trump, it’s that we don’t have a single voice on this website that is pro-Trump and I find that somewhat odd and indicative that we are living in some sort of a bubble.

                I think that living in a bubble is bad. As such, I think it incumbent upon myself to try to come up with arguments that people in bubbles will find uncomfortable.

                Would you be happier if I didn’t ask these kinds of questions?Report

              • Morat20 in reply to Jaybird says:

                Let me sum up why DWS resigned:

                1) She was on her way out, to be replaced by a Clinton pick.
                2) She’s gotten a lot of flack for the 2014 losses.
                3) The Sanders supporters hate her, as she’s been a convenient scapegoat for the fact that Sanders lost. And by “scapegoat” I mean they blame her personally for things the DNC doesn’t actually control (like the dates of the primaries — States set that, the rules of primaries — like who can vote and when they have to register, and even the way the primaries are organized — again, the State parties handle that). So whether she is the devil incarnate or not, in the tank for HRC or not, she HAS been accused of a number of things she literally couldn’t have had control over.

                So you have a figure loathed by a small, but loud, minority and blamed — both justly and injustly — for a variety of things, some of which she might actually be responsible for. She’s in the last days of her job anyways, she’s not popular with multiple major party figures, and her performance hasn’t been great (even if you can argue anyone’s would have sucked in 2014).

                So she was given an ‘honorary’ position as a face-saving gesture, and shown the door a few months early.

                Which is, bluntly, about the most common move in both business and politics when someone gets too unpopular and has too little support. It’s the political equivalent of a golden parachute for a CEO that saw some nasty losses and some bad PR.

                “Resign for ‘family reasons’ or be fired”. Call her the fall guy — perhaps for her sins, perhaps for imaginary ones. Doesn’t matter. Nobody goes to the mat for a CEO whose retirement is only a few months away.

                Would you be happier if I didn’t ask these kinds of questions?

                I’d be happier if I thought you cared about the answers, actually. Or any sort of back and forth.

                You ask, I answer, and instead of engaging in my response you ask another question, often of only barest relevance to my answer. The Socratic method is useful at times, but not the way you’re applying it.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Morat20 says:

                Oh, I understand why she resigned. I had no questions about that.

                The only questions were whether it was an indicator of deeper turmoil and deeper problems coming on the horizon.

                I think that it is one hell of an indicator… specifically the whole “opening gavel” to “no opening gavel” part.

                I care about the answers insofar as the answers are useful for helping me figure out any greater patterns.

                Bernie is one hell of an indicator.
                The first day at the convention? One hell of an indicator.

                You seem to be arguing that things aren’t as bad as they seem (and have been for a very long time).

                I’m arguing that things are very, very bad. Maybe not bad to the point where Trump will get elected… though I still think that he will… and we will all be saying we have no idea how it happened… but maybe they’re not that bad yet.

                But we’re not on a vector that tells me that tomorrow will have better indicators than today does.

                Mostly because of all of the denial that people seem to be in.Report

              • Morat20 in reply to Jaybird says:

                From what’s trickling out, the issue was apparently DWS was…very dense.

                Admittedly, a lot of people are throwing her under the bus, but it’s being leaked everywhere that major players (Obama and Clinton both) wanted to toss her as much as a year ago, but decided the optics would be worse at the time.

                As for Doom and Gloom — or not doom and gloom — everyone is trying to forecast the future and read tea leaves on the actions of what are, bluntly, the most heavily invested partisans that exist. (Nobody else goes to a convention).

                I’m not particularly doom and gloom for a few reasons — mostly boiled down to “I’ve seen this crap before (PUMA’s in 2007, the 1992 convention)”, the polls showing Sanders supporters more behind Clinton than Clinton supporters were behind Obama at this point, etc.

                And frankly, 8 years of Obama have pretty much made me immune to the weekly noise doomcasting. I think social media and people clustering in echo-chambers has really magnified the worst of the “horse race” mentality of elections. Our elections last MONTHS, but people obsess over daily or weekly fluctuations as if they’re the one key thing that’ll win or lose the campaign, despite the fact that tomorrow it’ll be a different thing.

                But hey, if you want horse race news — at least the DNC convention has gotten ex-Presidents, ex-Presidential candidates, and the big name politicians to attend rather than be strangely busy. And also the runner-up to endorse.

                However messy the convention is (and watching Sanders get booed by his own supporters was really a mixed emotion moment — I mean he saddled that horse himself, but I still felt bad for him), they’re almost always this messy. And compared to the CF of the GOP convention, at least the Dems managed a VP roll-out without stepping on their own wang.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Morat20 says:

                If you are finding solace in saying “well, I’m comparing this to the Republicans and GOLLY AREN’T THE REPUBLICANS EVEN WORSE?!?!?” about this, then you’re not noticing how bad the foundation of the house is.

                Maybe there won’t be any boos tomorrow.
                Or tonight during the important headliner speeches.

                Man, won’t the Republicans look like chumps who couldn’t run a convention under those circumstances?Report

              • Mike Dwyer in reply to Morat20 says:

                She DID have control over the debates and even the folks at MSNBC were saying that the debate schedule seemed designed for minimal viewership.

                Jaybird also brings up another point, which is that Democrats seem to be losing more and more jobs that aren’t in the White House, yet everyone is claiming the death of the GOP. If that’s true, then why the hexk are Dems losing so many races?Report

              • Morat20 in reply to Mike Dwyer says:

                If the debates are all you’ve got, that’s pretty much paid to “the DNC was in the tank for Hillary”.

                As for DWS being bad at her job, I’m not going to argue there.Report

              • DensityDuck in reply to Morat20 says:

                ” she was given an ‘honorary’ position as a face-saving gesture, and shown the door a few months early. ”

                And it was, no doubt, simply a matter of inconvenient timing that the showing-of-the-door happened to coincide with Day 2 of the Democratic National Convention.Report

              • Mike Schilling in reply to Jaybird says:

                So is Don Siegelman, former governor of Alabama, for reappointing someone who made a contribution to a ballot proposition he approved of to an unpaid position on a regulatory board. It’s not quite auctioning off a Senate seat.

                Anyway, if you put presidents in jail for appointing donors to cushy ambassadorships, you might as well move the Oval Office there.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Mike Schilling says:

                Well, if both sides have guys in prison for it, I guess it’s not illegal?Report

              • Kolohe in reply to Jaybird says:

                Siegelman is a member of the Democratic party.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Kolohe says:

                OH! I should have known by the fact that he didn’t mention the party.Report

              • Mike Schilling in reply to Jaybird says:

                You’ve never read about the Siegelman case? It’s what you see when you look up “railroading” in the dictionary. Unlike Blagoyovitch, who was guilty as hell. Or if you want a Republican, look up Duke Cunningham.Report

              • Kolohe in reply to Mike Schilling says:

                President Obama could have pardoned him a while ago, but that would require Obama to give a darn about injustices that are poltically risky to take on.

                I should say that taking on injustices that have no political payoff.Report

              • Mike Schilling in reply to Kolohe says:

                You couldn’t think of a way to blame Hillary?Report

              • Kolohe in reply to Mike Schilling says:

                Not her portfolio yet. But every day he serves between late January and early August of next year is on her ledger.Report

              • Guy in reply to Morat20 says:

                Was the dump actually selective? The wikileaks philosophy seems to generally be “here’s everything, search it yourself.”Report

              • Morat20 in reply to Guy says:

                *shrug*. They claim they have more. But then Assange is ALWAYS claiming there’s more, and it’ll shake the world, and it doesn’t happen.

                Secondly, even if Wikileaks has dumped everything — they got the info from a Russian hacker who may or may not have given them everything.

                So it’s kind of hard to tell, but I do imagine that the DNC has produced more than 20,000 emails over the last year or so.

                Lastly, the fact that Wikileaks deliberately published CC numbers and SSN of donors has me REALLY down on “trusting Wikileaks”.Report

    • Marchmaine in reply to Jaybird says:

      I was actually wondering what happens when an apparatchik gets caught apparatchiking… now I’m trying to figure out if this is the political equivalent of Westminster or Wales.Report