In the 1950s Senator Joe McCarthy led us to believe that there was a commie behind every bush. Old Joe would feel right at home in Washington these days, because over the past several weeks, our government has become obsessed with and paranoid about Russia, the likes of which I haven’t seen since 1962 when nuclear war was imminent. That year our fears were justified because Russian missiles were placed in Cuba and poised to launch against us. But now, over a half-century later, fear of missiles has been replaced with fear of missives. Russians are now credited with hacking into the emails of Clinton campaign chief John Podesta, the DNC, and other pro-Hillary folks, then arranging for those correspondences to leak to the media prior to last fall’s election. Democrats on the Hill, along with the liberal media have also gone so far as to characterize Russia’s alleged meddling as “hacking our election”, and blaming the Ruskies for Hillary’s loss to Donald Trump.
But facilitating the release of documents that reveals collusion, corruption and arrogance, is not meddling, it’s whistle blowing. Vladimir Putin didn’t help the DNC rig the debates and their convention in Hillary’s favor. Putin didn’t help CNN’s Donna Brazile give Hillary questions in advance of her debates with Bernie Sanders. Vlad didn’t tell DNC staffers to devise a strategy for discrediting Bernie over his religious beliefs. Mr. Putin didn’t help Hillary break the law by setting up private email servers in her home for the purpose of hiding pay-for-play schemes involving the State Department, her foundation, and foreign leaders. He also didn’t tell Jim Comey to investigate Hillary, nor did he tell Mrs. Clinton to call Trump supporters a “basket of deplorables.”
Hillary and her buddies brought this mess on themselves by being careless about how they communicated and schemed with each other. But if the Russians are responsible for helping to shine a light on systematic collusion and dishonesty, then Putin should be rewarded by our government for blowing the whistle on corrupt politics, and for pointing out security deficiencies upon which we need to improve going forward.
Of course, we can disagree on the politics of this fiasco, but it is important that we’re all on the same page when it comes to semantics. The truth is, I’m not sure that the media is fully aware of what hacking means, or how it might apply to either Putin, or to the folks who are blaming him for their failures.
The Urban Dictionary defines a hacker as “a person who gains unauthorized access to a computer WITHOUT the intention of causing damage.” U.D. goes on to say that someone who does the same thing WITH intent of causing damage is known as a “cracker”. Cracking, for example, would involve trying to shut down a power grid, or disrupt aviation traffic. Cracking is also what happens when someone breaks into a bank’s records, or to your personal account, and then steals money from either. In 2011 thousands of Bank of America customers had their debit card accounts cracked. In 2014, seven of the top fifteen banks were the victim of cracking. And last year, The Guardian reported that a Wisconsin security firm obtained over 270 million consumer emails accounts and passwords which allowed them to tap into all sorts of website transactions. By the way, 57 million of those accounts belonged to Russian consumers. I wonder what those folks think about us American meddlers?
Clearly then, what Putin is alleged to have authorized is not “cracking”. Whoever tapped into the unsecured emails of John Podesta did so to reveal data, not steal data. In that regard, the November 8 election was not cracked nor were votes compromised. Hillary lost because she ran a bad campaign, had high negatives, and because FBI director Comey went public (twice) about his concerns over her mishandling of government property while running the State Department. Meanwhile, the leaked emails from Podesta, the DNC, and CNN were just icing on the cake, but it was Hillary who cost Hillary the election. And so, if Putin helped to facilitate the transparency that American voters deserved, then we should be grateful.
To be honest, I never thought the Russians had interfered in our election. I know that because I voted at a precinct in Kernersville, and not once did I see a Russian messing with the voting machines. So yes, let’s be cautious and vigilant about Russia’s cyber capabilities, but let’s stop blaming Putin for putting Trump in the White House. That honor belongs to Hillary Clinton, whose schemes to discredit Bernie, rig the debates, hide emails, and insult millions of working class people, backfired. In a sense, then, she meddled in her own election, proving what we’ve known all along. Hillary is a cracker.
“Hacking” vs. “Cracking”
In the 1950s Senator Joe McCarthy led us to believe that there was a commie behind every bush. Old Joe would feel right at home in Washington these days, because over the past several weeks, our government has become obsessed with and paranoid about Russia, the likes of which I haven’t seen since 1962 when nuclear war was imminent. That year our fears were justified because Russian missiles were placed in Cuba and poised to launch against us. But now, over a half-century later, fear of missiles has been replaced with fear of missives. Russians are now credited with hacking into the emails of Clinton campaign chief John Podesta, the DNC, and other pro-Hillary folks, then arranging for those correspondences to leak to the media prior to last fall’s election. Democrats on the Hill, along with the liberal media have also gone so far as to characterize Russia’s alleged meddling as “hacking our election”, and blaming the Ruskies for Hillary’s loss to Donald Trump.
But facilitating the release of documents that reveals collusion, corruption and arrogance, is not meddling, it’s whistle blowing. Vladimir Putin didn’t help the DNC rig the debates and their convention in Hillary’s favor. Putin didn’t help CNN’s Donna Brazile give Hillary questions in advance of her debates with Bernie Sanders. Vlad didn’t tell DNC staffers to devise a strategy for discrediting Bernie over his religious beliefs. Mr. Putin didn’t help Hillary break the law by setting up private email servers in her home for the purpose of hiding pay-for-play schemes involving the State Department, her foundation, and foreign leaders. He also didn’t tell Jim Comey to investigate Hillary, nor did he tell Mrs. Clinton to call Trump supporters a “basket of deplorables.”
Hillary and her buddies brought this mess on themselves by being careless about how they communicated and schemed with each other. But if the Russians are responsible for helping to shine a light on systematic collusion and dishonesty, then Putin should be rewarded by our government for blowing the whistle on corrupt politics, and for pointing out security deficiencies upon which we need to improve going forward.
Of course, we can disagree on the politics of this fiasco, but it is important that we’re all on the same page when it comes to semantics. The truth is, I’m not sure that the media is fully aware of what hacking means, or how it might apply to either Putin, or to the folks who are blaming him for their failures.
The Urban Dictionary defines a hacker as “a person who gains unauthorized access to a computer WITHOUT the intention of causing damage.” U.D. goes on to say that someone who does the same thing WITH intent of causing damage is known as a “cracker”. Cracking, for example, would involve trying to shut down a power grid, or disrupt aviation traffic. Cracking is also what happens when someone breaks into a bank’s records, or to your personal account, and then steals money from either. In 2011 thousands of Bank of America customers had their debit card accounts cracked. In 2014, seven of the top fifteen banks were the victim of cracking. And last year, The Guardian reported that a Wisconsin security firm obtained over 270 million consumer emails accounts and passwords which allowed them to tap into all sorts of website transactions. By the way, 57 million of those accounts belonged to Russian consumers. I wonder what those folks think about us American meddlers?
Clearly then, what Putin is alleged to have authorized is not “cracking”. Whoever tapped into the unsecured emails of John Podesta did so to reveal data, not steal data. In that regard, the November 8 election was not cracked nor were votes compromised. Hillary lost because she ran a bad campaign, had high negatives, and because FBI director Comey went public (twice) about his concerns over her mishandling of government property while running the State Department. Meanwhile, the leaked emails from Podesta, the DNC, and CNN were just icing on the cake, but it was Hillary who cost Hillary the election. And so, if Putin helped to facilitate the transparency that American voters deserved, then we should be grateful.
To be honest, I never thought the Russians had interfered in our election. I know that because I voted at a precinct in Kernersville, and not once did I see a Russian messing with the voting machines. So yes, let’s be cautious and vigilant about Russia’s cyber capabilities, but let’s stop blaming Putin for putting Trump in the White House. That honor belongs to Hillary Clinton, whose schemes to discredit Bernie, rig the debates, hide emails, and insult millions of working class people, backfired. In a sense, then, she meddled in her own election, proving what we’ve known all along. Hillary is a cracker.