No, Assange did not lie.

[John Newman]

On Wed, Mar 22, 2017 at 11:55:06AM -0400, Steve Kinney wrote:
> 
> 
> On 03/22/2017 09:19 AM, John Newman wrote:
> 
> >> Comey said something interesting today that nobody???s picked up
> >> on yet because they???re so distracted by this other stuff, which
> >> I can understand. He was asked specifically if WikiLeaks was
> >> furnished their information on Podesta and the phone calls by the
> >> Russians, and Comey said no.
> > 
> > Just curious, and maybe I'm overlooking something obvious - how
> > does Comey know where Wikileaks got its info? I didn't realize he
> > was on wikileaks staff which, if true, would actually be the most
> > important piece of info to come out of this hearing so far... :P
> 
> Perhaps "no" was shorthand for, "The widely repeated assertion that
> Russia penetrated the DNC's mail servers and gave their contents to
> Wikileaks is an obvious lie."
>
> Why obvious?
> 
> The Russian Hacking claim was first made in an October, 2016 press
> release from DHS that attributes it to "the USIC."  No less an
> Independent Security Authority than Bruce Schneier has asserted that
> the public was not told about Russian Hacking until /after/ the
> election, in support of his position that the story was not intended
> to affect U.S. election results.  How deep does this bullshit go?
> "All the way down" apparently.
> 
> Since there is no such agency or department as "the United States
> Intelligence Community," that means the content of the initial press
> release is not attributable to any auditable process or responsible
> party.  Worse, it does not actually say "Russia did it."  Instead it
> says that the leak was consistent with Russia's motives and methods.
> That's all it actually says, but it says that in a context where an
> uncritical reader can have no doubt that it said "Russia did it and we
> have proof."  The rest of the press release is a lengthy statement
> assuring us that Russia, despite its digital superpowers, can not
> alter the actual election results.
> 
> A second, post-election press release makes more detailed assertions,
> and presents graphics depicting information about "hacking groups,"
> already available to the public, to support the belief that "we know
> all the details about how Russia did it."  Nothing connects these
> completely generic diagrams to the DNC servers - but "seeing is
> believing" and plenty of people do believe.
> 
> A third and even more lengthy and elaborate press release falsely
> calls itself a declassified intelligence report.  I say "falsely"
> because it bears no classification or distribution markings, no
> declassification notice, and no redaction markings.  This very
> jargon-dense fake intelligence report reiterates previously made
> assertions in Hollywood style spook-speak obviously calculated to
> confuse and impress a naive audience.
> 
> We are consistently told that the red hot smoking gun evidence that
> proves Russia Did It can not be released to the public because it is
> Top Secret.  Presumably, releasing any evidence at all would
> compromise sensitive methods and sources.  But...  News flash:  When
> you tell the opposition what you know and when you knew it, you have
> already compromised your sensitive sources and methods.  Meanwhile,
> when an intelligence service creates a 100% convincing impression that
> it is waging political warfare against its domestic audience through
> Big Lie propaganda, the resulting loss of confidence and prestige does
> more damage to The National Security than the release of /one/
> fragment of evidence in support of the propaganda narrative could
> possibly do.
> 
> There's an old political slogan used by resistance movements:  "The
> whole world is watching."  We can update that today:  "The whole world
> is laughing."  And not just at the illiterate buffon in the Oval
> Office:  The NeoLiberal DNC and its partisans at CIA are equally
> laughable thanks to their grim determination to keep pushing their
> favorite Big Lie narrative, as if there was no other grounds to
> demonize the illiterate buffoon's Administration.

I watched the relevant bit of testimony and what Comey actually
said, in answer to the question regarding wikileaks being supplied
by Russian intelligence, was something like "we assessed the Russians
used some kind of cut-out" (I'm paraphrasing from the 52-second
clip I just watched).

Which doesn't mean shit to me, for reasons I stated earlier. I don't
feel compelled to believe him, nor do I feel compelled to believe
he actually knows for any certainty. Sure, he /may/, but data to
back up that conclusion has not been released... as you've stated,
the Russian attribution for the DNC hacks (as publically stated)
is so thin as to be a fucking joke.  Perhaps there is some data
from NSA sources they don't want to reveal that makes them more
confident of attribution, or perhaps its just a Big Lie. Or perhaps
its some toxic mix :P

> 
> > For that matter, how does wikileaks really know where they got
> > their info? A state actor is not going to come out and say "hey im
> > from the FSB, Putin loves you! -  here is some more shit.."
> 
> That's dangerously close to the classic propaganda technique called
> Argument From Ignorance:  "Your failure to prove me wrong, proves me
> right."  Not quite that, but dangerously close.

Sure, except I'm not trying to prove anything. I'm just pointing
out how murky all this stuff is... and, really, I could give a fuck
where wikileaks gets its info, so long as its accurate.  Which, to
my knowledge, they've always been careful about, and have yet to
screw up :P

John
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