Hypocrisy is not the problem
I don't care if Hillary Clinton or Pete Hegseth are hypocrites. I do care about America's national security.
Signalgate, our scandal du jour where Trump’s national security advisor accidentally added a journalist to a mobile chat in which sensitive information about on-going military operations was shared, has created an orgy of accusations of hypocrisy. After all, Trump campaigned in 2016 to chants of “Lock her up!” because as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton ran sensitive correspondence through her own private email server. Republicans who insist that Signalgate is no big deal are being hypocrites given how they roasted Hillary! Democrats who insist that Trump officials should be punished for Signalgate are hypocrites given how they defended Hillary to the hilt! Hypocrites! Hypocrites! Hypocrites!
I. Don’t. Care.
Hypocrisy is hardly the worst of vices. I would much prefer a bad man who feels enough shame that he wishes to at least appear to be a good man over a bad man who guiltlessly wears his badness with pride. I’ve sympathy for the person who espouses high ideals but succumbs to occasional temptation or foolishness and fails to be the person he wishes to be. (That certainly describes me.) There is, to be sure, something galling and at times even dangerous about the Tartuffe who cloaks predation in ostentatious virtue. At the end of the day, however, I am inclined toward the “hypocrisy is the compliment than vice pays to virtue” school.
As political argument, hypocrisy is the most debased kind of polemic. It’s literally vacuous. One can think that using off the shelf encryption for state secrets is no big deal and be a hypocrite. One can think that it’s dangerous to expose classified information to possible foreign hacking and be a hypocrite. The charge of hypocrisy never grapples with the actual substance of political choice and accountability. It’s a bit of virtue jockeying, and a good thing to argue when you don’t want to argue the substance. It’s a dodge and a distraction. It’s the stuff of partisan cable news pundits, PR flaks, and other wastes of your time.
What matters is what matters, the actions that people take and their effects in the world.
Signalgate is bad because Chinese and Russian intelligence target the communications of American national security officials. Both countries have very, very smart signals intelligence services with lots and lots of supercomputers that exist for the sole purpose of cracking codes. This is why the United States government spends millions and millions of dollars creating secure communications systems for national security officials. Maybe Signal is secure against the SVR or the PLA. I’m a law professor. I don’t know, but I doubt it. The United States government has spent a lot of time and effort and treasure on this question. It has come to the conclusion that encrypted commercial communications aren’t secure enough for national security secrets. Furthermore, other countries’ intelligence services have no doubt come to similar conclusions. If you are the Mossad or MI6 or DGSE or BND, these kind of antics mean that it’s riskier to share intelligence with the Americans. That hurts the United States. It’s an idiotic and pointless own goal.
Hillary’s emails were bad because Chinese and Russian intelligence target the communications of American national security officials. Both countries have very, very smart signals intelligence services with lots and lots of supercomputers that exist for the sole purpose of cracking codes. This is why the United States government spends millions and millions of dollars creating secure communications systems for national security officials. Maybe Hillary’s server was secure against the SVR or the PLA. I’m a law professor. I don’t know, but I doubt it. The United States government has spent a lot of time and effort and treasure on this question and has come to the conclusion that encrypted commercial communications aren’t secure enough for national security secrets. Furthermore, other countries’ intelligence services have no doubt come to similar conclusions. If you are the Mossad or MI6 or DGSE or BND, these kind of antics mean that it’s riskier to share intelligence with the Americans. That hurts the United States. It’s an idiotic and pointless own goal.
The fact that I am consistent in my reasoning on both cases is no great feather in my cap. It doesn’t tell you that I am right or that I am wrong. Perhaps it tells you that I am a virtuous person but probably not. The stakes in my saying any of these are really low and don’t tell you much about my character. Regardless, whether Nate Oman is a virtuous and intellectually consistent person is an utterly stupid and uninteresting question when it comes to these issues. Likewise, what matters is not whether GOP or Democratic messaging flaks are hypocrites or not.
What matters is the actual substance of national security. Who is a hypocrite and who is not a hypocrite just isn’t very important. Whether hostile intelligence agencies find it easier to access American secrets is important. Whether allies trust us to treat shared intelligence responsibly matters. I don’t really care if Hillary Clinton or Pete Hegseth are hypocrites. I do care if they are compromising the power and safety of the United States for personal convenience.
I care about that.
Problems on both sides need to be aired and corrected.
Thanks for your thoughtful words