BREAKING: Sarah Palin Yahoo! email account hacked
By Micah L. Sifry, 09/17/2008 - 3:11pm

It appears that someone has hacked into one or more of Sarah Palin's personal email accounts on Yahoo! and published some of the contents on the web. According to an entry on Wikileaks:

Circa midnight Tuesday the 16th of September (EST) activists loosely affiliated with the group 'anonymous' gained access to U.S. Republican Party Vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin's Yahoo email account gov.palin@yahoo.com and passed information to Wikileaks. Governor Palin has come under criticism for using private email accounts to conduct government business and in the process avoid transparency laws. The zip archive made available by Wikileaks contains screen shots of Palin's inbox, two example emails, address book and a couple of family photos. The list of correspondence, together with the account name tends to re-enforce the criticism.

The list of emails include an exchange with Alaskan Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell about his campaign for Congress.

Another screenshot shows Palin's inbox and an e-mail from Amy McCorkell, whom Palin appointed to the Governor's Advisory Board on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse in 2007.

The e-mail, a message of support to Palin, tells her not to let negative press get to her and asks Palin to pray for McCorkell, who writes that "I need strength to 1. keep employment, 2. not have to choose."

According to Kim Zetter of Wired Magazine, McCorkell confirmed that she did send the e-mail to Palin.

Following the release of this story, both Sarah Palin's better known account gov.sarah@yahoo.com and the gov.palin@yahoo.com account have been suspended or deleted as revealed by a test email sent to these addresses by Wikileaks. Although the reasons for the deletion of both accounts can not not yet be established, one interpretation is that Palin is trying to destroy her email records.

Wikileaks may release additional emails should they prove be of political substance.

I've asked several techPresident contributors to look into this story, and hopefully we'll have more to report soon. One very interesting element is the reference to "anonymous." This "group" -- a new kind of online network that up til now has been devoted to disruptive action against Scientology -- is very sophisticated and probably impossible to stop.

anonymous

You've got it wrong on anonymous. They've pretty much attacked anyone and anything that they fancy. They've hacked the owner of http://www.tektek.org and Gaia Online as well as others.

More proof Obama supporters are cultish fascists.........

Deniability is the only thing preventing us from knowing, but it clearly looks like an Ayers type effort against a government official.

Anonymous

This group of people (Anonymous) are not 'Obama supporters' and the flawed logic used to make that assumption is what keeps separating Americans into smaller groups more easily controlled by a corrupted government. Do not lump all Americans who support Barack Obama into the same group as Anonymous. It is a lazy argument and an offensive assumption.

Also, your use of the term "fascists" is interesting.

fascist (n):
• One who believes the state and its control is greater than the masses.
• an adherent of fascism or other right-wing authoritarian views
• a member of the Fascist party; a person with ultra-nationalist views

In regards to the efforts of his group (Anonymous), I would assume you actually mean something closer akin to "anarchists" (especially since you link this to "an Ayers type effort") as they apparently do not feel that the state and its control is greater than the masses (see their attacks on the church of scientology, etc.).

Attempts to denigrate your opponents is proof of a weak argument and should be discarded when attempting to support any opinion in an informed debate.

Yet, as Voltaire is quoted, "I disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it". That is the exact opposite of a fascist,even though I support Obama in this election.
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facts, truth, perception... there is a difference.

Trying to destroy her email records?

". . .Although the reasons for the deletion of both accounts can not not yet be established, one interpretation is that Palin is trying to destroy her email records. . ."

Here's a way out, totally irrational reason she may have suspened or deleted the accounts; Perhaps she wants to protect her privacy???

Just because Sarah writes to friends who also happen to be members of government doesn't equal "using private email accounts to conduct government business and in the process avoid transparency laws." Everyone rallies at her what a small population Alaska has and when that becomes evident because friends and co-workers can be the same in a small community, OH MY GAWD, she's conducting government business because she emails these people privately!!

Sean Parnell was running a campaign against long time Alaskan Republican Congressman Don Young (trying to oust one of the fat cats all the liberals profess to hate.) Conversing with a friend over his campaign is no one's business but their own.

Another email expresses support from a friend to Palin telling her don't give into negative press reports. Wow, major government work going on there. . .

A note of TRUTH that can be found in the record: The biggest reason Sarah Palin is so admired and supported here in Alaska was because she gave up a cushy 6 figure income by turning in the Head of the Republican Party who was conducting personal Republican Party business on the Government's dime through emailing and mailouts. Which mind you got her the wrath of the Republican Party up here and the most powerful people in dark corners against her. It would have been political suicide had it not become public. No, she was not the one who made it public, she refused to comment on it until a thorough investigation was done.

I'm so sick to death of all this twisting and wiggling that non-supporters of Palin are doing to try to make her actions look corrupt. They can't find anything legitimate that will stick so they have to go hacking into her personel emails. Interesting they didn't hack into O'Bama's. Even more interesting is that I bet a decent man like O'Bama can't stand the likes of those scum. He isn't afraid of taking her on for who she is without getting ugly; I wish his supposed supporters would trust the man they "profess" to trust so much.

Another note: Eighty percent of Alaskans support Sarah Palin as Governor. Guess who the other tweny percent consist of; Far right, develop Alaska until it looks like a parking lot, extremist conservatives who are very angry at her for turning on the Republican Party and big oil. And a couple of council board members from Wasilla that hate her and have always hated her and can't stand the fact she's been thrust into National fame.

Before you accuse me of drinking koolaide, I was the political cartoonist of the local paper while she was Mayor. (A fact these techPresident folks can check by my personal info) No one got her more angry then I did. I jumped on every little thing she did and criticised her and made a joke out of her. After all of that I can still say she's one of the most ethical politicians I have ever covered. Just as I believe O'Bama seems to be a very honored man.

If you're in the middle like I am ask yourselves this, "Why are her attackers going to such great lengths to slime her and twist her actions and words?" In Sarah's case I know it's because they can't find anything legitimate without wrapping it up in conspiracy theories and outlandish speculation.

It's actions like that towards O'Bama that made me lean towards him. Now actions like hacking into Palin's presonal mail are having me lean towards McCain. Pyscho supporters should scare any voting American.

One more thing: Republican Party, get off Sarah's case and stop forcing her to do your bidding. Your bidding sucks and America doesn't like you anymore. Let McCain and Palin be who they really are or no matter how much people like me are disgusted with O'Bama's supporters nothing in the world is going to convince us to allow the Republican Party as is to have the White House! We Alaskans will speak out the further you get that girl off of her true foundations.

Arctic Frost

Already connected to son of elected Democrat

look it up!

Yep and here is the link

"Yep and here" are some other "facts"...

The fact that a person supports an individual has nothing to do with the other people who also support that individual. In my post, my argument was that you have lumped ALL Obama supporters in with the Anonymous group. And that, Freedomfighter, is a logical fallacy. If that is not clear, please perform a google search on logical fallacies and research the term for yourself.

There are plenty of links out there to extremist groups. And some that it would appear Sarah Palin supports (at least as far as conjecture allows from the following link):

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/p-j-gladnick/2008/09/16/history-dept-chair-...

However, these links, these supposed connections are also false and not a discussion point. Why? Because they are also full of logical faults and prone to gross oversimplification and hasty generalization.

If your argument is:
1) A person who supports the candidacy of Barack Obama (no apostrophe) hacked into Sarah Palin's email in an effort to get to documents that may support some of the accusations against her and, in so doing, harm the Republican campaign, and,
2) This same person is a member of the group known as Anonymous

Then your argument is sound.

However, if your argument continues:
3) And since that person supports Obama, it is ipso facto causatory that all other people who support Obama would likewise hack into someone's email account, and,
4) are therefore "cultish fascists"

Then your argument is flawed. Much along the lines of 'All Democrats are liberal, left wing, baby-killer, wiccan, satanists- who hate God and America". Also, a patently false argument.

So, given your 'refute' of my post with the last two postings re: a Democratic Senator's hacker son, I still stand by my assertion that your argument is flawed and offensive.

Sarah Palin and John McCain are not my choice for the leaders of our Nation. However, even though I do use a computer and have for a long while, I have no plans of hacking into anyone's account, nor performing any other illegal actions in support of my candidates of choice.

When you categorize a large group of anything based upon the actions of an individual or a subset of the larger group, you are making a sweeping generalization based upon conjecture, prejudice and bigotry. Shall we assume then that ALL supporters of McCain/Palin are bigots? The proof could be offered that this could be the case since several emails have been sent around the country stating that Obama is a Muslim and that this is why he could not or should not be elected President (This is a false claim);

- If this is a country of equality AND freedom of religion, then this statement must be based upon bigotry against Muslims and a prejudice against non-Christian peoples globally
-The fact that Obama continually states he is a Christian, yet many Republicans believe he is lying about this, that must mean that a black man cannot be a true Christian in America, OR since his name is Barack Obama, he must be Muslim because no Christian can be named in such a way.
- Several Republican blogs continue to refer to Senator Barak Obama as "Osama", continually attempting to tie a Black American Senator to an Arab terrorist (one whose family has ties to George HW Bush and family) and would appear to be a blatant attack on a man based upon race and origin of name alone.

So, following your logic of proof that "This is why all Obama Supporters are cultish fascists..." based upon the action of a small group of people, then the corrollary of "this is why all Republicans are Prejudiced, bigoted hypocrites..." with your own statement adding weight to that argument in this forum, this would likewise be a valid argument. Since I have as many Republican friends as I do Democrats AND I respect them as people even though we chose to vote for different people, I know this is not the case and would never make that argument.

So, again I will ask that you refrain from hyperbole and stick to the facts that this person, a member of the group Anonymous, hacked into Sarah Palin's email account and should be held accountable. And, if you are truly a decent human being, apologize to the millions of people your argument is offensive to.

Regards.
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facts, truth, perception... there is a difference.

Deacon......you miss the point..........

You go off on some ethereal specific and miss what is going on. Your feeble attempt to mention Palin is absurd. I am talking about actual law breaking. I am talking about assaulting and blowing up on your opponents.
There are not cases of Democrats getting their email accounts hacking by the sons of Republicans. There are numerous examples of Obama supporters spamming and hacking anything that is conservative or Republican.

Take a look what spammers did to Greta Van Susteren's blog when she polled:

Should Todd Palin honor the subpoena and testify?
Scroll through the comments at the link below:

http://gretawire.foxnews.com/2008/09/19/on-the-record-live-vote-5/#comme...

Which point?

Your first post has the title of "More proof that Obama supporters are cultish fascists..."

I am not sure you are following my point. My point is that you are incorrect in your statement. And, based upon the links you use to support your argument (FOX News [an oxymoron if ever I heard one] and the HillBuzz, where the person posting cannot even spell Senator correctly [Terry Frank is not someone I would consider a reputable source for ANY non-partisan political information]) do not provide enough evidence to support your claims any more than the link provided shows Sarah Palin is tied to northern extremist groups.

So, my point is to not make inaccurate or false arguments and false accusations against a group of people only because they have a different opinion than you do.

My feeble attempt was to point out that not everything you read on the internet is factual. That cross posting misinformation to support your argument and then degrading your argument with hasty generalization claims only shows that you are not thinking through your body of evidence correctly.

Rationalization is the lowest form of human thought.

Do you see my point?

Regards.
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facts, truth, perception... there is a difference.

We are not going to see eye to eye.........

I reiterate what I said, the Obama movement is a fascist cult of personality. They will commit ANY act of aggression against ANYONE who stands between them and Obama. They could care less what Obama would do, just as long as he gets to the White House. Your insipid attack on Fox News is evidence to me, there is no point in telling you anything different.

No we are not,...

Especially as long as you continue to say "they" and "them" in grouping people together. As stated, I am one of the "them" you continue to attack in this fashion. Your attacks against a group of people show that you have not done any research beyond believing lock stock and barrel the propaganda of the party. That is an uninformed view and one that shows you have a closed mind immune to insightful thought. This kind of 'non-thinking' is what allowed the rise of Hitler in Nazi Germany among a citizenry that was at the forefront of thought immediately before the Nazis took power and used fear and hate to galvanize the people of Germany into a mindless mob against all those who were different, using labels such as "they" and "them" to categorize and dehumanize the world population, as well as groups of people within their own culture and society.

As long as people continue to see everyone else as "them", instead of "us" or "we", this country will continue its downward slide into anarchy and/or revolution.

Best of luck. Have a good weekend. Don't forget that some of your neighbors may be the "them" you rant about.

"What is objectionable, what is dangerous about extremists is not that they are extreme, but that they are intolerant. The evil is not what they say about their cause, but what they say about their opponents.", Robert F. Kennedy.
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facts, truth, perception... there is a difference.



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