December 18, 2015

It's not exactly the Watergate break-in — is it? — but Bernie Sanders's campaign broke into Hillary Clinton's confidential voter information.

I guess the defense is she was asking for it, being out there in the DNC database with a software error.

Here's the story in The Washington Post:
Officials with the Democratic National Committee have accused the presidential campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders of improperly accessing confidential voter information gathered by the rival campaign of Hillary Clinton, according to several party officials. Jeff Weaver, the Vermont senator’s campaign manager, acknowledged that a staffer had viewed the information but blamed a software vendor hired by the DNC for a glitch that allowed access. Weaver said one Sanders staffer was fired over the incident. The discovery sparked alarm at the DNC, which promptly shut off the Sanders campaign’s access to the strategically crucial list of likely Democratic voters.... 
By the way, how did the Watergate burglars get through the door into the offices of the Democratic National Committee? Sanders's people made their virtual entry into a place within the DNC where they didn't belong through a software glitch (or so they say), so let's explore the analogy. How hard was it for the Watergate burglars to get in where they knew they didn't belong? I don't think the main thing was how hard or easy it was to get through the door. It was that they didn't belong there and they chose to go in. The ease of breaking in wasn't the crux of the wrongdoing!

So how hard was it?
Then we went up to the eighth floor, walked down to the sixth–and do you believe it, we couldn’t open that door, and we had to cancel the operation.... Eduardo was furious that Gonzales hadn’t been able to open the door. Gonzales explained he didn’t have the proper equipment, so Eduardo told him to fly back to Miami to get his other tool.... I said there wasn’t adequate operational preparation. There was no floor plan of the building; no one knew the disposition of the elevators, how many guards there were, or even what time the guards checked the building. Gonzales did not know what kind of door he was supposed to open. There weren’t even any contingency plans.... Gonzales got back from Miami that night with his whole shop. I’ve never seen so many tools to open a door. No door could hold him. This time everything worked. Gonzales and Sturgis picked the lock in the garage exit door; once inside, they opened the other doors and called over the walkie-talkie: “The horse is in the house.” 
The horse is in the house!

A horse named Bernie.

ADDED: Bernie goes on the attack:
Jeff Weaver, Sanders' campaign manager, held a press conference on Friday in which he described how the Democratic National Committee was unfairly choking off the "lifeblood" of the campaign.... "Individual leaders of the DNC can support Hillary Clinton in any way they want, but they are not going to sabotage our campaign..."...

26 comments:

Laslo Spatula said...

"... a staffer had viewed the information but blamed a software vendor hired by the DNC for a glitch that allowed access..."

Seems like he just stumbled into it, like:

""... on an 18-year-old girl who was sleeping at his apartment after partying with him, penetrating her by accident.... [H]e said his penis might have been poking out of his underwear when he happened upon the young woman sleeping off a night of drinking.... "

Accidental penetration everywhere, it seems.

I am Laslo.

rhhardin said...

Within a week of starting college, everybody in the dorm knew how to pick locks.

Curiously, nothing was ever taken.

Ignorance is Bliss said...

...but I'm sure Hillary!'s email server was secure...

glenn said...

"It's not exactly the Watergate break-in"

If a Republican did it, it would be.

MadisonMan said...

If Hillary!! complains about this, it would be normal for me (were I a journalist) to ask about her email servers.

So I wonder if Hillary!! will complain.

mccullough said...

Hillary doesn't protect confidential information and Bernie doesn't respect it.

These are the Dem front runners. Perfect

Writ Small said...

Watergate was way before my time, so I never understood the political defense of calling it a "3rd rate burglary."

The illegal act was incompetent, so there's no reason for concern? Probably I'm missing something.

Sebastian said...

"The ease of breaking in wasn't the crux of the wrongdoing!" Good thing you added the exclamation point, cuz without it we might have thought the ease of it was the crux of it. You, a law professor! I take it you, a law professor, don't teach criminal law/procedure.

cubanbob said...

Why is this of any importance other than deflection? Clinton as a cabinet officer committed numerous felonies and is still the Democrat Party nominee. That is the scandal.

Lord Whorfin said...

Those that forget history are condemned to repeat it.

khesanh0802 said...

Hilary must have been using her personal server. We know how secure that is.

Lord Whorfin said...

Those that forget history are condemned to repeat it.

CWJ said...

Analog break-ins are SO last century.

Fen said...

Of more interest to me is the inside baseball angle - why is WaPo reporting this?

How did they get the story?

How much does this article dovetail with the talking points given to them by Hillary Clinton's team?

Why is WaPo's byline Helderman, Gearan and Wagner when it was written by a Clinton staffer?

When will democrat operatives like WaPo be subject to campaign finance law?

How can Clinton people attack Citizen's United when they do worse here?

Bill Peschel said...

Let's see if I get this straight:

China hacks into protected U.S. servers, steals information: Shrug

Sanders staffer enters DNC database through unsecured entry: Fired

Hillary leaves top secret emails on unencrypted private server: We're done with that already!

Mary Beth said...

Nathaniel Goss Pearlman (born October 7, 1965, in Manhattan, New York and raised in Boulder, Colorado) is an American political technology consultant aligned with the Democratic Party. In 1997, he founded NGP Software, Inc., a company which provides political software to a majority of federal Democrats including most Democratic candidates for President (including Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, Graham, Edwards, Obama, and Clinton) in both 2004 and 2008. He was chief technology officer for Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign and an early practitioner in the area of computers and politics.[1] In 2010, NGP Software merged with the Voter Action Network to become NGP VAN.

Let the conspiracy theories start!

traditionalguy said...

Private Server Disease. Hillary is a carrier.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Picking the lock at the Watergate isn't the fun story. The fun story is how they actually got caught--one of them put a piece of duct tape over one of the interior door locks after they'd opened it, to keep that door from relocking. A young security guard walking the building saw the duct tape, removed it, and kept patrolling--close call, but no problem. These genius burglars then notice the tape missing, conclude (I guess) that the tape fairy made off with it, and put ANOTHER piece of tape back in the same place! The same guard comes back by after a while, notices a fresh piece of tape, immediately deduces that there must be someone else in this building that should be empty, runs to call the cops, and helps catch all the burglars.

Putting the tape over the latch in the first place was a little lazy, but maybe understandable. Putting the 2nd piece of tape there, though...that took some really impressive stupidity.

clint said...

I wonder if someone can make a link between this and Hillary Clinton's private email server.

She couldn't even keep her server safe from Bernie Sanders -- and you really think the Chinese didn't hack her?

William said...

This is a clear case of entrapment. Unfortunately it was Sanders who fell into it. The back door was left open so that te RNC or, ideally, the Trump campaign could enter. It's all very discouraging. This should have been a teachable moment about the risks our fragile democracy faces from the fascist tactics of Republican thugs. Instead , we get a page B32 story about the over eagerness of Sanders' young volunteers.

jr565 said...

It sounds like dems can't protect secure information And are breaking into secured sites to get info. Not exactly giving us a lot of faith in democrats on either front.

khematite said...

What did Bernie know, and when did he know it?

campy said...

"This should have been a teachable moment about the risks our fragile democracy faces from the fascist tactics of Republican thugs."

Don't worry, William. In six months the narrative will be: "Hey, remember when somebody hacked Hillary!'s campaign?"

mikee said...

Bernie's bigger problem is that he has been a socialist for 50 years. He has watched socialism fail again and again and again, worldwide. And he is still a socialist.

"And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all."

Joe said...

I wouldn't be surprised if the "glitch" was insufficient rights access, which meant that even the most innocuous query would pull in results from the Hillary campaign.

walter said...

Does this mean there's an actual reason to watch their debate tomorrow?
Or is it all "What difference at this point does it make?"

"The back door was left open" I can't believe Sir Spatula is not going to exploit that.