Bombthrowers
A media cover-up of a left-wing political scandal has two phases.
It never happened.
Everyone does it.
After spending a day in phase 1 on the Susan Rice unmasking story, we’re now in phase 2.
What we’re dealing with is a conspiracy in which those at the top minimize their exposure and those at the bottom have the most exposure
Phase 2 means the media emphasizing that Rice’s actions were within the scope of her authority. And that unmasking names isn’t illegal. And this is just the law.
Yes and no.
Abuses of power can involve actions that are legal in and of themselves. Buying stocks is legal. Buying stocks with insider information is a crime. Susan Rice unmasking the names of Trump associates is not illegal, though it’s about as unethical and tainted as anything can get. But if that information was then employed, passed along or leaked by anyone in the chain, it becomes a crime.
What we’re dealing with is a conspiracy in which those at the top minimize their exposure and those at the bottom have the most exposure. Rice was not (presumably) stupid enough to begin emailing anything to a reporter. But she was likely the tip of the spear in accessing that information. Information that she did not, despite the media’s claims, actually need to do her job.
Her only real use for the material was political. And anyone who understands how government works knows it
Her only real use for the material was political. And anyone who understands how government works knows it.
What has been established at the moment is a legal Watergate made possible by Obama and his people doing, as usual, what should have been inconceivable, eavesdropping and then exploiting the material in a political conflict at home. Establishing how the material was abused is what would make it a definite crime.
This article first appeared at FrontPageMag.
Daniel Greenfield is a New York City writer and columnist. He is a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and his articles appears at its Front Page Magazine site.
