Everyone says that WikiLeaks contains reams and reams of information, and I’m sure it does, but the majority of it isn’t scandalous, it’s pure bureaucratic drivel.
As a lark, I googled my former employer Iron Mountain and was surprised at what came up. 3,592 e-mails. Oh the irony, a data protection company splattered across WikiLeaks over 3,500 times. I couldn’t wait to see the shenanigans between I.M. and the U.S. Government.
The third e-mail down, Merry Christmas from Iron Mountain (do not reply). I went through about 20 more and was bored. Transparency is boring.
Let me tell you a more interesting personal story. Back at Iron Mountain, must have been around 2014, our branch got a new customer, an unnamed Federal Government Branch office. In order to service the customer, the employees had to fill out an additional 6-8 page background check, in addition to the backgrounds checks required by I.M. annually. Also we had to get interviewed by a federal agent. I objected but our ever compassionate manager “Steve” said “if you don’t do it, you don’t have a job.” So I begrudgingly relented, as did my co-workers. No one had anything to hide.
Within 6 months of getting the information, the U.S. Government promptly lost the information. Somewhere in China I suppose, Iron Mountain was less than generous with the details. The first contact came from the government in late 2015, I believe, with little postcards briefing us of the situations. Day by day discord spread across the branch with each employee getting their postcards on different days, the tension ratcheting up like the dripping water in a Chinese Water Torture. Eventually all employees confronted Steve and asked him over and over, “what is Iron Mountain going to do?” He repeated, over and over, “listen, you get free credit monitoring, get back to work.”
Finally the unrest became so loud Steve contacted the IM Corporate Lawyer who, and I’m paraphrasing, said “(the employees) voluntarily signed information releases in the government packet. At the end of the day, technically Iron Mountain didn’t lose the information, the U.S. Gov’t did. Case Closed.”
Steve, fearing further escalation of the situation, refused to speak of the predicament in any capacity. If we wanted to contact the corporate lawyer, we would have to do it on our own time. That story, in a nutshell, is one of the many reasons I feel so strongly about my webcast Beacon of Speech.”
So back at WikiLeaks, I’m already done looking at Iron Mountain info. Everytime I try to find something interesting, I find garbage. So I try a new technique. Instead of being serious, I start to look up other holidays besides Christmas. Looked up Easter, 7,120 results. Second one down, Hillary Clinton celebrates Easter. Well, that’s nice.
Let’s try Ramadan. First search is from 1978, Carter’s off the hook, let’s go to the second one: Whereabouts of American JAMIL RAMADAN JADALLAH. I don’t care about Jamil. Maybe I spelled Ramadan incorrectly. No, I just googled it, I spelled it right. Let’s try another holiday. That may or may not have terrorists named after it.
Black Friday. Again first one from 1978, skip to the second. Here we go, someone from Amazon is giving the U.S. Hacking team a head’s up on Black Friday Deals. Very helpful for Antonella Capaldo on the hacking team.
Yom Kippur? Betchya lots of e-mails there. 1,881 to be exact. First one from Carter administration, again, second one: Yom Kippur Guide for the Perplexed. An online tutorage of the Jewish Holiday created in 2008. Very helpful, I’m sure you can’t find the details about Yom Kippur anywhere on the internet.
How ‘bout Clowns? Clowns are a real problem here in America. First e-mail from 2010: Angry Clowns Protest Over Criminal Impostors in El Salvador. Oh, this is an interesting one, apparently the angry clown in the woods craze started in El Salvador in 2010. That’s good to know.
How ‘bout Batman? Holy cow, nearly 3,000 entries. Here’s the first: HOLY TRADEMARK INFRINGEMENT! IT'S BATMAN VS. BATMAN. I guess in 2008 the city of Batman, Turkey wanted to sue Warner Brothers for Trademark Infringement. I can’t make this crap up, that’s why I took the screen shot.
Oh my goodness. If you already read this, this is the most insane e-mail of them all. I searched the inane term Shoelaces and came up with this story. I don’t think I can top it. It is called Kong Balls in Your Face and I don’t even know how to describe it. I am going to try to take many screen shots here: (WARNING: LANGUAGE GETS A LITTLE DICEY HERE!)
