you sure have to hand it to the russians. they understand the power of free-flowing information, how it can upend government and politics. it<u+2019>s why they don<u+2019>t let information flow too freely in their own country. and it<u+2019>s why, if united states intelligence assessments are correct, they have worked so hard to send it roaring through ours. there is a certain kind of brilliance to the way the russians are said to have hacked the email accounts of senior democratic officials and gifted the contents to their bffs at wikileaks. the russians seem to be using the united states<u+2019> free press <u+2014> a great symbol of our democracy <u+2014> against it while setting up an impossible choice for american newsrooms: run with the stolen and in many cases unverified correspondence and potentially assist an audacious russian attempt to disrupt a presidential election, or decline to print it and betray their mission to combat the great political fog machine. declining to cover the emails would play into accusations that the media is censoring news that would be helpful to donald j. trump . in that case, the russians get a nice consolation prize: fodder for their disingenuous argument that if any system is <u+201c>rigged,<u+201d> it<u+2019>s the united states<u+2019>, so judge not lest you be judged. khrushchev would be proud. but the whole thing seems to be backfiring. in this, the year of the leak, the hackers are contributing to a phenomenon <u+2014> raw transparency <u+2014> that should make democracy stronger. taken together, this year<u+2019>s big breaches <u+2014> nefarious and otherwise <u+2014> are bringing a dose of reality to this reality television campaign, exposing what the candidates or their aides say and do when they think no one is looking. and they have pulled back the curtain on the political-celebrity mythmaking that the american media too often abets. exhibit a is a 2006 people magazine article about donald and melania trump. <u+201c>during their first year of marriage, donald and melania trump reveled in being a twosome,<u+201d> people said as it took note of their first anniversary and melania<u+2019>s pregnancy. depends on your definition of <u+201c>revel.<u+201d> as we know, a reporter on the piece, natasha stoynoff, now claims that mr. trump forced his tongue down her throat and proposed having an affair <u+2014> while she was reporting on the trumps<u+2019> love story . and we know about her allegations, which mr. trump denies, only because of the leaked <u+201c>access hollywood<u+201d> tape where he boasted about kissing women uninvited and grabbing their privates. ms. stoynoff said that she went ahead with the original piece about the trump marriage in people because she was ashamed and feared retaliation. jess cagle, people<u+2019>s editor in chief, told me that if higher-ups had known the truth at the time, the article would have been spiked or <u+201c>been about his abusive behavior toward women rather than his alleged domestic bliss.<u+201d> the important message, he said, was that <u+201c>if a staffer is abused in any way<u+201d> he or she will have <u+201c>the full support of senior management.<u+201d> and presumably times have changed enough that a writer would not feel obliged to write an article at odds with his or her own experience. but the entertainment press is not alone in occasionally conveying false or incomplete narratives. the political press can do it too, if often led by the invisible hands of operatives whose job it is to stage-manage reality. the latest warning sign comes from a tricky source, the conservative activist-journalist james o<u+2019>keefe and his project veritas action, which specializes in goading opponents into discussing illegal or unethical schemes while secretly recording them. in a video mr. o<u+2019>keefe released last week, a democratic operative, scott foval, brags about sending troublemakers to mr. trump<u+2019>s rallies, to provoke trump supporters into attacking them. mr. o<u+2019>keefe has a history of selectively editing his videos to create misleading or false impressions. as the new york times and the washington post have noted, it is unclear whether mr. foval accomplished what he boasted about. but the party strategist mr. foval was working for, robert creamer, fired him and then ceased his own work for the democratic national committee. (he disputed mr. foval<u+2019>s claims of inciting violence.) mr. foval<u+2019>s words alone should be enough to remind reporters that there are people who are paid to distort the picture they present. if he did succeed in his plans, and drew headlines that depicted mr. trump<u+2019>s supporters as attacking protesters without provocation, he got one over on the news media as much as he did on mr. trump. which brings me back to the russians. is that what they are doing, playing the media for their own purposes? on thursday, a private internet security firm, dell secureworks, said the russian hackers that the united states officially blamed for breaking into democratic party accounts over the summer were involved in the latest wikileaks email dump , which came from the account of a senior clinton adviser, john podesta. the wikileaks founder, julian assange , has declined to disclose the source of the emails. saying the russians have <u+201c>weaponized<u+201d> wikileaks, the clinton campaign will not readily verify the authenticity of the emails, though it has not issued blanket denials, either. brian fallon, the campaign spokesman, told me he had been warning reporters against taking the emails at face value and reminding them not to lose sight of their provenance. then there is the fact that they are from mr. podesta<u+2019>s private account. all of it has made reporting on the emails incredibly fraught. even glenn greenwald of the intercept, who helped bring to light edward j. snowden<u+2019>s leaks, has expressed qualms about poring over personal emails ( along with skepticism of russia<u+2019>s suspected role in stealing them). <u+201c>even people who are in powerful positions and wield influence continue to retain the right to privacy, and there should never be any publishing of personal matters or things that aren<u+2019>t directly in the public interest,<u+201d> he said in a discussion about the emails with the author naomi klein. but mr. greenwald said there was too much of a public interest at stake to ignore emails that <u+201c>shed light on the person highly likely to be the next president of the united states.<u+201d> most of the mainstream news media has taken the same position. as susan glasser, the politico editor, told me, it<u+2019>s not every day that you get a <u+201c>real-time look<u+201d> at the decision-making of a major presidential campaign. and it<u+2019>s not as if there is much of a choice, anyway, she said, given that <u+201c>we can<u+2019>t unknow things that are in the public space.<u+201d> that is, the emails are out there. it is the job of the mainstream press to use reporting to determine their validity and significance, and put their contents in their proper context. that<u+2019>s especially important when misleading, partisan interpretations can bounce around the internet at the speed of twitter, which serves russia most of all. the emails have shown cynical approaches by hillary clinton and her team to fund-raising; a penchant for secrecy; a coziness with reporters that is too often the case with both parties in washington; and a calculated approach to environmental issues, free trade and banking that is already causing trouble on her left flank, as politico reported . they have not brought a major scandal to the surface, at least not yet, and even won praise from some supporters like the post<u+2019>s editorial page, which said they showed mrs. clinton<u+2019>s <u+201c>sound policy instincts.<u+201d> they<u+2019>ve certainly not blown up the system, as might happen in a more closed, undemocratic form of government. if repressive foreign governments want to make a regular thing of hacking into united states leaders<u+2019> email to undermine the country, and domestic politicians like mr. trump want to keep embracing that kind of <u+201c>help,<u+201d> then the news media may have to rethink how to handle it. but so far, the hacks have only proved that the united states system knows how to process reality and can handle the truth, which should encourage our leaders to offer more of it. so for that much, i guess, thanks, vladimir putin. now, ready to share your emails? a version of this article appears in print on october 24, 2016, on page b1 of the new york edition with the headline: a reality tv campaign gets a dose of reality. order reprints | today's paper | subscribe
wikileaks<u+2019> gift to american democracy
jim rutenberg