the consensus by united states intelligence agencies is that the wikil eaks dump of emails from the account of john podesta, hillary clinton<u+2019>s campaign chairman, was the result of a hack by russia in an effort to influence the presidential election. the leaks are continuing, so it<u+2019>s impossible to say whether anything truly damaging to mrs. clinton will emerge. some of the purloined exchanges consist of routine and often boring campaign planning, while others seem embarrassing or cynical, as when clinton aides debate accepting campaign cash from foreign government lobbyists, and one writes: <u+201c>take the money!!<u+201d> none of the emails, at least so far, seem particularly harmful to mrs. clinton, although some suggest that her closest aides have the same concerns that weigh on many americans <u+2014> that she can be thin-skinned and secretive. as neera tanden, one of mrs. clinton<u+2019>s closest advisers, put it in the emails , <u+201c>she always sees herself bending to <u+2018>their<u+2019> will when she hands over information.<u+201d> this is partly because of the endless investigations the clintons<u+2019> political enemies have pursued over the years. but that sort of scrutiny will surely intensify if she becomes president. mrs. clinton will only stir up her republican critics by appearing secretive; she has a much better chance of shutting them down, as she did in her benghazi hearing, with a dogged determination to show she has nothing to hide. fuller disclosure would clearly have helped her when it came to her lucrative speeches to wall street, a matter that has dogged her throughout this campaign. while she has released a full list of her speeches and fees, mrs. clinton has consistently refused to release the transcripts. from the snippets seen in the emails, one wonders why. one speech has been politically problematic <u+2014> a 2013 presentation to brazil<u+2019>s banco ita<u+00fa> in which she said, <u+201c>my dream is a hemispheric common market, with open trade and open borders, some time in the future.<u+201d> mr. trump pounced on this as evidence that mrs. clinton favored unfettered immigration <u+2014> which seemed misleading given her long support for strong border security. over all, the excerpts from wikileaks suggest that mrs. clinton<u+2019>s speeches were what one would expect for audiences interested in global investment: talk about incentivizing growth and spurring entrepreneurship. imagine if months ago, mrs. clinton had done her own giant information release, including hundreds of pages of speeches to goldman sachs and citi, to salesforce.com, the united fresh produce association and the cardiovascular research foundation. journalists and the public could have waded through them, discussed them, written about them <u+2014> and by now, everyone would have long since moved on. follow the new york times opinion section on facebook and twitter (@nytopinion) , and sign up for the opinion today newsletter . a version of this editorial appears in print on october 22, 2016, on page a22 of the new york edition with the headline: a wikileaks lesson for mrs. clinton. today's paper | subscribe
a wikileaks lesson for mrs. clinton
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