No sympathy for the she-devil

Bullhorn message to anyone now feigning (or worse yet, actually feeling) outrage at the hacking and public posting of Sarah Palin's "private" email: Please place the the crack pipe and the world's smallest violin on the floor in front of you, put your hands on your head, and slowly step away from the hypocrisy.

Quickly, from the top:

- Government officials are not entitled to an expectation of "privacy" in the performance of their jobs. They work for us ... in theory, anyway.

- Palin has a record of trying to shield official business behind "private" email addresses, of denying requests for "public" email content on this or that pretext, and over the last few days has even gone so far as to have her state's attorney general publicly instruct Alaska's state employees to commit a felony (obstruction of justice) by "resisting" subpoenas of said "private" emails pursuant to the TrooperGate probe.

- Sarah Palin's "private" email address seems, from the published screen shots, to have been used at least partially for official business -- and not just incidentally or in passing, but by design, as evidenced by her choice of user ID ("gov.palin").

If Sarah Palin doesn't want the public looking at her family snapshots and bitchy personal notes, she shouldn't store them on an account she's also apparently using to illegally hide stuff that the public is perfectly entitled to read.

And if Sarah Palin supports the American conception of limited government, she shouldn't have any problem with an individual citizen directly exercising the power delegated¹ to our public servants in USC Title 18, §2705.²

NOTES

1. Yes, delegated. What, did you think that government agents get their powers from their magical shiny badges or something? They get those powers from us. They're just doing the things we have the right to do, but instead in the usual course of things allow them to do for us. That's what we're always told constitutes the distinction between "public servant" and "petty criminal" when there's a need to justify something on their end. It goes both ways, or it doesn't go at all.

2. That would be the power to compel disclosure of stored electronic communications without prior notice to the owner in cases where such notice might result in certain adverse results. Results like, say, destruction of or tampering with evidence (something Palin has already demonstrated a yen for), or endangering the life or physical safety of an individual (something Palin and her running mate have publicly pledged to do to millions of Iraqi, Iranian, Afghan and Pakistani individuals, and to hundreds of thousands of American military personnel, if she can keep her dirty laundry out of sight and get elected). Be a dear, Mr. or Ms. Hacker, and let Sarah know within 90 days. After all, it's the law.