A Win For Trump: DNC Database Contractor Screws Inter‑Campaign Security Protection, Sanders Fires Staffers Who May Have Taken Advantage Of Breach, Wasserman Schultz Withholds Sanders's Access To His Own Data, Sanders Sues DNC, Etc. Ad Nauseam — UPDATED

Please read Sanders sues the DNC over suspended access to critical voter list by John Wagner, Abby Phillip and Rosalind S. Helderman of the WaPo. Then read BERNIE 2016, INC. v. DNC SERVICES CORPORATION, d/b/a DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE. That's not the whole story, but the WaPo article and the campaign's lawsuit against the DNC will give you the basics.

I had a friend, an amateur musician who fled Germany eventually to the US just prior to W.W.II. Her English was accented but formally perfect... I don't think I ever heard her commit a grammatical error or misuse a word, except one time as a device for emphasis: she said,
I IS REGUSTED!!
And so I is regusted. [sic] I am disgusted with the baldfaced attempt by the DNC to destroy Bernie's campaign by impugning his character, blaming him for an act he not only did not commit, but was not even informed of by DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz until 24 hours after the alleged blunder-or-plunder ("steal" was the word she used, IIRC)... at which time he found out who in his campaign may have poked around in Hillary Clinton's data (yes, may have, or may merely have assessed the depth of the vulnerability of each campaign's data to opposing campaigns' infringement) and fired them.

IANAL, but it surely looks to me like the DNC violated the terms of their contract with (at least) the Sanders campaign regarding informing them of the complaint in writing, giving them 10 days to attempt to resolve the matter, etc. In the lawsuit, the campaign alleges that, based on its prior fundraising using information from the voter data base, after access to that data was withheld by the DNC, the campaign was losing at least $600,000 per day in donations from Bernie supporters. (Full disclosure: I was one of 'em. Like most of Bernie's supporters, I didn't give much, but there were a lot of us.)

The real question here is just how much the DNC is legally permitted to do in behalf of former Secretary of State Clinton, who is clearly the "fair-haired girl" of the party leadership. IMHO, they have overreached their mandate and should be fined or jailed, or both.

I do not expect this to end well, except perhaps for Donald Trump, the putative Republican candidate. Sanders probably doesn't have the power (read: the money) to prevail in this lawsuit. And that means that his campaign will go to ground before it has had its full influence on Clinton's positions. No one expects Clinton to be rendered a socialist Democrat by Sen. Sanders's influence, but her positions have moved measurably leftward in small but visible ways since she has attempted to assure her ability to keep Sanders's voters after he (inevitably, IMHO) drops out.

I don't know exactly what I'll do when that sad event happens. I had planned to switch my support to Secy. Clinton as the lesser evil remaining in the race. The question now is just how angry I am at what she, or rather, her henchchair, has done. I've occasionally thought of bolting the Party at times in the last decade or more, and I can't even say right now that I won't do that if I feel Sanders has been unfairly treated.

This does not have to happen. In fact, it is easy to prevent... if only Clinton's supporters will fathom the consequences of what they are doing, and realize the inevitable reaction of Sanders supporters. Someone has to convince Ms. Clinton that it's not a done deal yet!

---

UPDATE Saturday morning 12/19: the DNC has restored Sanders's access to his own data (without which he had essentially no fundraising capability). A lot of Clinton supporters are still ranting, shouting for Sanders's flesh and blood; I'm still uneasy about what happens next. But if those Clinton supporters get their pound of flesh AND their jot of blood from Sanders, I shall stay home on Election Day. Politics is NOT about destroying your own, and despite my passionate hopes to see a Democrat become president in 2016, I will not participate or cooperate in such destruction. C'mon, Hillary supporters: do the right thing; move on.