If Jeb Bush wants to distinguish himself from his idiot brother, he’s going to have to show that he’s not completely incompetent. He’ll also have to break with Dubya on some substantive policy issues. Giving a shit about people’s privacy would be a good place to start. But this isn’t getting it done on either score:
Only Tuesday morning, likely Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush launched a website containing all of his emails from the eight years he spent as Florida’s governor. Unfortunately, as the Verge first noted, this effort at transparency was too transparent: No one bothered to remove all of the full names, addresses, phone numbers, social security numbers, and other personal information included in Bush’s communications with the people of Florida. Additionally, the Verge found several emails in which Bush’s interlocutors gave highly detailed descriptions of their employment and medical situations.
What’s ironic here is that Jeb was trying to distinguish himself by showing that he’s a) hard-working enough to answer constituent email, and b) that he’s really transparent about government business. These are nice thoughts, but the execution was lacking.
Just dumping people’s Social Security numbers, home addresses, and sensitive medical conditions on the internet for everyone to see is the kind of thing a total dick does on purpose, not what a careful politician does to prove his worthiness for the highest office in the land.
Their excuse is pretty funny, actually, because all it does is explain how they made such a boneheaded move:
When asked about the apparent screw-up, a Bush spokesperson pointed out that the emails are an “exact replica” of those at Florida’s State Department, which are “available at anyone’s request under Chapter 119 sunshine laws.” Of course, such requests are generally a little more specific than every single available document, to be published online for everyone to see.
In other words, they thought that the records were public already, which they (very) technically were, and so they couldn’t possibly contain any information that would damage people if plastered on the ex-governor’s website. But, of course, no one was going to read these documents unless they specifically requested them.
It’s the equivalent of saying that no one could have predicted that New Orleans’ levees would fail after pretty much the entire world had been discussing that possibility in print and on television for more than a week. If you’re paying attention at all, you know that it’s a bad idea to just start dumping people’s sensitive information on the internet and inviting people to look at it.
Relatedly, Jeb hired a Chief Technology Officer who likes to Tweet about sluts and thinks he can belch away the gay.
These are the equivalents of giving Jeff Gannon/James Dale Guckert a White House press pass and hiring the Judges and Stewards Commissioner for the International Arabian Horse Association to head the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
If Jeb is going to be politically successful, he cannot afford to remind people of what an asshole his brother was, but that’s off to a very bad start.
