Department of Justice Using Fake Emails Cannot be Good for America

by Mark Angelides

There are already so many layers of truth involved in government interactions, that adding to them does nothing for either transparency or trust in the people who ostensibly keep us safe. In a 413 page document handed over to Judicial Watch via a Freedom of Information request, there are included emails from former AG Loretta Lynch using an alias: “Elizabeth Carlisle”.
Apparently this is in no way illegal, and in fact Lynch’s predecessor, Eric Holder, also used an alias; his was “Lew Alcindor,” (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s given name). But if it is not illegal, it is at the very least ethically questionable.
When an FOIR comes in, it covers certain parameters, and all documents that are included within those parameters are handed over. If for example it is about Loretta Lynch, then all documents that are to, from, and about her are gathered and (barring any classified information). But if we get into the realm of aliases and codes, then it becomes quite easy to avoid these requests legally.
According to Fox News, the reason for these fake email accounts are “security concerns and spam to their official email addresses swamping their in-boxes.” But this makes next to no sense whatsoever.
Firstly, if there are security concerns regarding the US Department of Justice servers not being secure enough to use your real name with, then we have a HUGE problem. As we have heard from Hillary Clinton (?), there are special secure servers that are used in government to protect information and people. Should these not be secure enough to warrant using your real email address, then the stories of Russian Hacking are very likely true (and every other country for that matter, including just about every kid who knows how to use a computer).
And then there is the question of Spam. My email has a Spam filter, and so does yours. It works pretty well for what it is…and of course you don’t even have to check it most of the time. Does the United States Government, with its incredible Cyber Defense budget not have a Spam filter that works slightly better than Yahoo?
If AG Lynch was receiving a lot of unsolicited emails in her “work email”, surely it would have been far better to just change the address slightly (perhaps LorettaLynchOMG@tarmacmeeting.DOJ), than making up a whole new alias.
I may be paranoid here, but I can’t shift the feeling that these Alias Emails are just like Russian Nesting Dolls; one inside the other, inside another, and all designed to be as hidden from the public interest as possible. So much for a transparent government.