A former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) software engineer who was convicted for carrying out the largest theft of classified information in the agency’s history and of charges related to child abuse imagery was sentenced to 40 years in prison on Thursday.
The 40-year sentence by US district judge Jesse Furman was for “crimes of espionage, computer hacking, contempt of court, making false statements to the FBI, and child pornography”, federal prosecutors said in a statement. The judge did not impose a life sentence as sought by prosecutors.
Joshua Schulte was convicted in July 2022 on four counts each of espionage and computer hacking and one count of lying to FBI agents, after giving classified materials to the whistleblowing agency WikiLeaks in the so-called Vault 7 leak. Last August, a judge mostly upheld the conviction.
Russia has, by the overwhelming evidence, interfered the most in recent history. Casting it off as, “bUt EVEryOnE DoES iT” doesn’t stop us from recognizing the chief offender.
That seems awfully convenient. Though when state secrets are leaked to Russia and said individuals flee to Russia, those connections… Well, they’re tangible and in plain-sight.
Repeating your first point regarding whataboutism – kinda of strange – is a race-to-the-bottom mindset. Admission that Russia does interfere only lends credence to my points. Neither does “many countries interfere!” make it right.
Such a peculiar cognitive dissonance between:
and
I want a source for this. What I know is that Russia spent $300 million since 2014 to influence foreign elections. That’s a lot of money! But, spread that out over multiple countries and multiple election cycles and it seems very clear that Russia has not interfered the most. The 2024 presidential race has, so far, already surpassed $300 million. What it looks like is Russia, like every oil&gas company, influences US elections. It’s bad, it’s not special.
US’s elections are pay-to-play thanks to clownish Supreme Court decisions like Buckley v. Valeo (which found that money is speech and limiting speech is a violation of the 1st amendment), the Bennett decision (which found that public campaign financing is unconstitutional because it dilutes the value of private spending and thus private “speech”) and, of course, the Citizens United decision which I’m sure you’re already familiar with. We have a problem and blaming it all on Russia is unserious.
Also, in the course of looking things up for this argument, did you know that AIPAC is set to spend more than $100 million this election cycle to defeat US candidates opposed to the genocide in Gaza. In one election! In one country!
You’re talking about Snowden? State secrets were leaked to the world and then he fled to Russia to avoid going to US prison. That doesn’t really imply he leaked secrets on behalf of Russia, merely that Russia was willing to shelter him for political gain.
When did I ever say anything about it being right? My only point is that Russia isn’t unique and blaming everything on Russia is 🤡