Forget the FBI cache; the Podesta emails show how America is run

[MikeWB]

The emails currently roiling the US presidential campaign are part of some unknown digital collection amassed by the troublesome Anthony Weiner, but if your purpose is to understand the clique of people who dominate Washington today, the emails that really matter are the ones being slowly released by WikiLeaks from the hacked account of Hillary Clinton's campaign chair John Podesta. They are last week's scandal in a year running over with scandals, but in truth their significance goes far beyond mere scandal: they are a window into the soul of the Democratic party and into the dreams and thoughts of the class to whom the party answers.

The class to which I refer is not rising in angry protest; they are by and large pretty satisfied, pretty contented. Nobody takes road trips to exotic West Virginia to see what the members of this class looks like or how they live; on the contrary, they are the ones for whom such stories are written. This bunch doesn't have to make do with a comb-over TV mountebank for a leader; for this class, the choices are always pretty good, and this year they happen to be excellent.

They are the comfortable and well-educated mainstay of our modern Democratic party. They are also the grandees of our national media; the architects of our software; the designers of our streets; the high officials of our banking system; the authors of just about every plan to fix social security or fine-tune the Middle East with precision droning. They are, they think, not a class at all but rather the enlightened ones, the people who must be answered to but who need never explain themselves.

Let us turn the magnifying glass on them for a change, by sorting through the hacked personal emails of John Podesta, who has been a Washington power broker for decades. I admit that I feel uncomfortable digging through this hoard; stealing someone's email is a crime, after all, and it is outrageous that people's personal information has been exposed, since WikiLeaks doesn't seem to have redacted the emails in any way. There is also the issue of authenticity to contend with: we don't know absolutely and for sure that these emails were not tampered with by whoever stole them from John Podesta. The supposed authors of the messages are refusing to confirm or deny their authenticity, and though they seem to be real, there is a small possibility they aren't.

With all that taken into consideration, I think the WikiLeaks releases furnish us with an opportunity to observe the upper reaches of the American status hierarchy in all its righteousness and majesty.

The dramatis personae of the liberal class are all present in this amazing body of work: financial innovators. High-achieving colleagues attempting to get jobs for their high-achieving children. Foundation executives doing fine and noble things. Prizes, of course, and high academic achievement.

Certain industries loom large and virtuous here. Hillary's ingratiating speeches to Wall Street are well known of course, but what is remarkable is that, in the party of Jackson and Bryan and Roosevelt, smiling financiers now seem to stand on every corner, constantly proffering advice about this and that. In one now-famous email chain, for example, the reader can watch current US trade representative Michael Froman, writing from a Citibank email address in 2008, appear to name President Obama's cabinet even before the great hope-and-change election was decided (incidentally, an important clue to understanding why that greatest of zombie banks was never put out of its misery).

The far-sighted innovators of Silicon Valley are also here in force, interacting all the time with the leaders of the party of the people. We watch as Podesta appears to email Sheryl Sandberg. He makes plans to visit Mark Zuckerberg (who, according to one missive, wants to "learn more about next steps for his philanthropy and social action"). Podesta exchanges emails with an entrepreneur about an ugly race now unfolding for Silicon Valley's seat in Congress; this man, in turn, appears to forward to Podesta the remarks of yet another Silicon Valley grandee, who complains that one of the Democratic combatants in that fight was criticizing billionaires who give to Democrats. Specifically, the miscreant Dem in question was said to be:

"... spinning (and attacking) donors who have supported Democrats. John Arnold and Marc Leder have both given to Cory Booker, Joe Kennedy, and others. He is also attacking every billionaire that donates to [Congressional candidate] Ro [Khanna], many whom support other Democrats as well."

Attacking billionaires! In the year 2015! It was, one of the correspondents appears to write, "madness and political malpractice of the party to allow this to continue".

There are wonderful things to be found in this treasure trove when you search the gilded words "Davos" or "Tahoe". But it is when you search "Vineyard" on the WikiLeaks dump that you realize these people truly inhabit a different world from the rest of us. By "vineyard", of course, they mean Martha's Vineyard, the ritzy vacation resort island off the coast of Massachusetts where presidents Clinton and Obama spent most of their summer vacations. The Vineyard is a place for the very, very rich to unwind, yes, but as we learn from these emails, it is also a place of high idealism; a land of enlightened liberal commitment far beyond anything ordinary citizens can ever achieve.

Consider, for example, the 2015 email from a foundation executive to a retired mortgage banker (who then seems to have forwarded the note on to Podesta, and thus into history) expressing concern that "Hillary's image is being torn apart in the media and there's not enough effective push back". The public eavesdrops as yet another financier invites Podesta to a dinner featuring "food produced exclusively by the island's farmers and fishermen which will be matched with specially selected wines". We learn how a Hillary campaign aide recommended that a policy statement appear on a certain day so that "It wont get in the way of any other news we are trying to make – but far enough ahead of Hamptons and Vineyard money events". We even read the pleadings of a man who wants to be invited to a state dinner at the White House and who offers, as one of several exhibits in his favor, the fact that he "joined the DSCC Majority Trust in Martha's Vineyard (contributing over $32,400 to Democratic senators) in July 2014".

(Hilariously, in another email chain, the Clinton team appears to scheme to "hit" Bernie Sanders for attending "DSCC retreats on Martha's Vineyard with lobbyists".)

Then there is the apparent nepotism, the dozens if not hundreds of mundane emails in which petitioners for this or that plum Washington job or high-profile academic appointment politely appeal to Podesta – the ward-heeler of the meritocratic elite – for a solicitous word whispered in the ear of a powerful crony.

This genre of Podesta email, in which people try to arrange jobs for themselves or their kids, points us toward the most fundamental thing we know about the people at the top of this class: their loyalty to one another and the way it overrides everything else. Of course Hillary Clinton staffed her state department with investment bankers and then did speaking engagements for investment banks as soon as she was done at the state department. Of course she appears to think that any kind of bank reform should "come from the industry itself". And of course no elite bankers were ever prosecuted by the Obama administration. Read these emails and you understand, with a start, that the people at the top tier of American life all know each other. They are all engaged in promoting one another's careers, constantly.

Everything blurs into everything else in this world. The state department, the banks, Silicon Valley, the nonprofits, the "Global CEO Advisory Firm" that appears to have solicited donations for the Clinton Foundation. Executives here go from foundation to government to thinktank to startup. There are honors. Venture capital. Foundation grants. Endowed chairs. Advanced degrees. For them the door revolves. The friends all succeed. They break every boundary.

But the One Big Boundary remains. Yes, it's all supposed to be a meritocracy. But if you aren't part of this happy, prosperous in-group – if you don't have John Podesta's email address – you're out.

[rmstock]

Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton arrives on her campaign plane at Martha's Vineyard Airport on 20 August 2016. Photograph: Carolyn Kaster/AP
US elections 2016
Opinion
Forget the FBI cache; the Podesta emails show how America is run
Thomas Frank  Monday 31 October 2016 11.00 GMT
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/31/the-podesta-emails-show-who-runs-america-and-how-they-do-it

  "WikiLeaks' dump of messages to and from Clinton's campaign chief offer
   an unprecedented view into the workings of the elite, and how it looks
   after itself
   
    * The Hillary Clinton email controversy explained: what we know so far
   
   The emails currently roiling the US presidential campaign are part of
   some unknown digital collection amassed by the troublesome Anthony
   Weiner, but if your purpose is to understand the clique of people who
   dominate Washington today, the emails that really matter are the ones
   being slowly released by WikiLeaks from the hacked account of Hillary
   Clinton's campaign chair John Podesta. They are last week's scandal in
   a year running over with scandals, but in truth their significance goes
   far beyond mere scandal: they are a window into the soul of the
   Democratic party and into the dreams and thoughts of the class to whom
   the party answers.
   
   The class to which I refer is not rising in angry protest; they are by
   and large pretty satisfied, pretty contented. Nobody takes road trips
   to exotic West Virginia to see what the members of this class looks
   like or how they live; on the contrary, they are the ones for whom such
   stories are written. This bunch doesn't have to make do with a
   comb-over TV mountebank for a leader; for this class, the choices are
   always pretty good, and this year they happen to be excellent.
   
   They are the comfortable and well-educated mainstay of our modern
   Democratic party. They are also the grandees of our national media; the
   architects of our software; the designers of our streets; the high
   officials of our banking system; the authors of just about every plan
   to fix social security or fine-tune the Middle East with precision
   droning. They are, they think, not a class at all but rather the
   enlightened ones, the people who must be answered to but who need never
   explain themselves.

   [Video :
    'We learned to fight back': Dreamers campaign against Donald Trump ]
   
   Let us turn the magnifying glass on them for a change, by sorting
   through the hacked personal emails of John Podesta, who has been a
   Washington power broker for decades. I admit that I feel uncomfortable
   digging through this hoard; stealing someone's email is a crime, after
   all, and it is outrageous that people's personal information has been
   exposed, since WikiLeaks doesn't seem to have redacted the emails in
   any way. There is also the issue of authenticity to contend with: we
   don't know absolutely and for sure that these emails were not tampered
   with by whoever stole them from John Podesta. The supposed authors of
   the messages are refusing to confirm or deny their authenticity, and
   though they seem to be real, there is a small possibility they aren't.
   
   With all that taken into consideration, I think the WikiLeaks releases
   furnish us with an opportunity to observe the upper reaches of the
   American status hierarchy in all its righteousness and majesty.
   
   The dramatis personae of the liberal class are all present in this
   amazing body of work: financial innovators. High-achieving colleagues
   attempting to get jobs for their high-achieving children. Foundation
   executives doing fine and noble things. Prizes, of course, and high
   academic achievement.
   
   Certain industries loom large and virtuous here. Hillary's ingratiating
   speeches to Wall Street are well known of course, but what is
   remarkable is that, in the party of Jackson and Bryan and Roosevelt,
   smiling financiers now seem to stand on every corner, constantly
   proffering advice about this and that. In one now-famous email chain,
   for example, the reader can watch current US trade representative
   Michael Froman, writing from a Citibank email address in 2008, appear
   to name President Obama's cabinet even before the great hope-and-change
   election was decided (incidentally, an important clue to understanding
   why that greatest of zombie banks was never put out of its misery).
   
   The far-sighted innovators of Silicon Valley are also here in force,
   interacting all the time with the leaders of the party of the people.
   We watch as Podesta appears to email Sheryl Sandberg. He makes plans to
   visit Mark Zuckerberg (who, according to one missive, wants to "learn
   more about next steps for his philanthropy and social action"). Podesta
   exchanges emails with an entrepreneur about an ugly race now unfolding
   for Silicon Valley's seat in Congress; this man, in turn, appears to
   forward to Podesta the remarks of yet another Silicon Valley grandee,
   who complains that one of the Democratic combatants in that fight was
   criticizing billionaires who give to Democrats. Specifically, the
   miscreant Dem in question was said to be:
   
   "... spinning (and attacking) donors who have supported Democrats. John
   Arnold and Marc Leder have both given to Cory Booker, Joe Kennedy, and
   others. He is also attacking every billionaire that donates to
   [Congressional candidate] Ro [Khanna], many whom support other
   Democrats as well."
   
   Attacking billionaires! In the year 2015! It was, one of the
   correspondents appears to write, "madness and political malpractice of
   the party to allow this to continue".
   
   There are wonderful things to be found in this treasure trove when you
   search the gilded words "Davos" or "Tahoe". But it is when you search
   "Vineyard" on the WikiLeaks dump that you realize these people truly
   inhabit a different world from the rest of us. By "vineyard", of
   course, they mean Martha's Vineyard, the ritzy vacation resort island
   off the coast of Massachusetts where presidents Clinton and Obama spent
   most of their summer vacations. The Vineyard is a place for the very,
   very rich to unwind, yes, but as we learn from these emails, it is also
   a place of high idealism; a land of enlightened liberal commitment far
   beyond anything ordinary citizens can ever achieve.
   
   Consider, for example, the 2015 email from a foundation executive to a
   retired mortgage banker (who then seems to have forwarded the note on
   to Podesta, and thus into history) expressing concern that "Hillary's
   image is being torn apart in the media and there's not enough effective
   push back". The public eavesdrops as yet another financier invites
   Podesta to a dinner featuring "food produced exclusively by the
   island's farmers and fishermen which will be matched with specially
   selected wines". We learn how a Hillary campaign aide recommended that
   a policy statement appear on a certain day so that "It wont get in the
   way of any other news we are trying to make – but far enough ahead of
   Hamptons and Vineyard money events". We even read the pleadings of a
   man who wants to be invited to a state dinner at the White House and
   who offers, as one of several exhibits in his favor, the fact that he
   "joined the DSCC Majority Trust in Martha's Vineyard (contributing over
   $32,400 to Democratic senators) in July 2014".

   [Video :  How does the US electoral college work? ]
   
   (Hilariously, in another email chain, the Clinton team appears to
   scheme to "hit" Bernie Sanders for attending "DSCC retreats on Martha's
   Vineyard with lobbyists".)
   
   Then there is the apparent nepotism, the dozens if not hundreds of
   mundane emails in which petitioners for this or that plum Washington
   job or high-profile academic appointment politely appeal to Podesta –
   the ward-heeler of the meritocratic elite – for a solicitous word
   whispered in the ear of a powerful crony.
   
   This genre of Podesta email, in which people try to arrange jobs for
   themselves or their kids, points us toward the most fundamental thing
   we know about the people at the top of this class: their loyalty to one
   another and the way it overrides everything else. Of course Hillary
   Clinton staffed her state department with investment bankers and then
   did speaking engagements for investment banks as soon as she was done
   at the state department. Of course she appears to think that any kind
   of bank reform should "come from the industry itself". And of course no
   elite bankers were ever prosecuted by the Obama administration. Read
   these emails and you understand, with a start, that the people at the
   top tier of American life all know each other. They are all engaged in
   promoting one another's careers, constantly.
   
   Everything blurs into everything else in this world. The state
   department, the banks, Silicon Valley, the nonprofits, the "Global CEO
   Advisory Firm" that appears to have solicited donations for the Clinton
   Foundation. Executives here go from foundation to government to
   thinktank to startup. There are honors. Venture capital. Foundation
   grants. Endowed chairs. Advanced degrees. For them the door revolves.
   The friends all succeed. They break every boundary.
   
   But the One Big Boundary remains. Yes, it's all supposed to be a
   meritocracy. But if you aren't part of this happy, prosperous in-group
   – if you don't have John Podesta's email address – you're out.

   More comment  Topics US elections 2016  WikiLeaks   US politics  Hillary Clinton  "

[MikeWB]

rmstock, I don't like to these leftist garbage jew-run sites on purpose. don't give them a link. if you must link, link to archive.is instead since they don't get revenue or SEO boost from links.

[rmstock]

This Guardian opinion piece is one of the better articles on the
WikiLeaks Podesta emails. For people who have no clue where to start
investigating on WikiLeaks this is the one to read. Credit where credit
is due. That in defiance of The Guardian Editor in Chief an opinion
piece like this still got published is very remarkable and noteworthy,
hence should contain all the details here as well. Articles like this
are earning the Donald his seat behind the Resolute Desk.

[rmstock]

Martha's Vineyard as featured inside the movies :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spartan_%28film%29
  "[ ... ]
   As the team prepares an assault in Dubai, a news broadcast reports that
   Laura and her college professor were discovered drowned while sailing
   off the coast of Martha's Vineyard. [ ... ]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ghost_Writer_%28film%29
"[ ... ]
   The writer travels to Old Haven on Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts,
   where Lang and his wife Ruth (Olivia Williams) are staying [ ... ]"