It seems - shockingly - that Republicans don't quite understand the meaning of the word "leak"

[matt819]

No judgment calls here, but Ellsberg, Snowden, Manning, and Winner leaked.

These were classified documents, and they were not authorized to release them publicly. That's a leak.

Comey wrote unclassified memos to the file. There may also have been classified memos to the file. He released his own unclassified documents. Under the Republican definition, if Comey made his grocery shopping list public, that would be a leak.

How do you deal with this sort of sheer obtuseness and stupidity?

[unblock]

1. they know what the word means, the difference where the loyalty is

you're talking about loyalty to the country and the law, in which case "leak" depends on if it's classified.

they're talking about loyalty to their precious dear leader, in which case anything that causes him bad p.r. is a "leak".

[Igel]

2. Dunno.

Where I work, if something was considered confidential even if it wasn't something legally require to be kept secret, those who wanted it kept secret would call it a "leak."

Those who spread confidential information would, of course, be on the side of the people. (Until it was something they wanted to be kept confidential.)

I'd probably call what Comey did a leak. Not every word we use has to be defined by the legislature. Some have multiple meanings, and in many cases how one group of people use a word can be a little different from how the Great Decider of All Definitions views it. In other words, in common use words can be a bit squishy and good will and cooperation is required for communication; where you get scrupulous, exacting, one-true-meaning definitions is often are where there is no cooperation assumed: Contracts, courtrooms, legal situations.

The US used to be the most litigious country on Earth. We've popularized that to nearly every social setting, at least that doesn't involve boundaries. Not good. It makes language into a means of non-communication.