From the New York Times:
As a candidate for president, Donald J. Trump embraced the hackers who had leaked Hillary Clinton’s emails to the press, declaring at a rally in Pennsylvania, “I love WikiLeaks!”
To the cheering throngs that night, Mr. Trump marveled that “nothing is secret today when you talk about the internet.” The leakers, he said, had performed a public service by revealing what he called a scandal with no rival in United States history.
Now, after less than four weeks in the Oval Office, President Trump has changed his mind.
At a news conference on Wednesday and in a series of Twitter postings earlier in the day, Mr. Trump angrily accused intelligence agencies of illegally leaking information about Michael T. Flynn, his former national security adviser, who resigned after reports that he had lied about conversations with the Russian ambassador.
“It’s a criminal action, criminal act,” Mr. Trump fumed at the White House. In a Twitter message, he asserted that “the real scandal here is that classified information is illegally given out by ‘intelligence’ like candy. Very un-American!”
Most of the time, leaks are about power and controlling it. Either the leakers are trying to undermine those who have it, or they’re trying to alert the public to nefarious goings-on. It would be naive to think that all leakers have the nation’s best interest at heart — a lot of them are about sabotage, intrigue, and revenge — but in the case of Trump, we’re getting leaks from everywhere because a lot of people, including career politicians and people who may have supported Trump in the first place are seeing what’s going on now and are truly concerned about the fate of the country. This is their way of putting the brakes on this careening train wreck.
Of course Trump is upset with leaks now. And of course he’s raising a stink about them. It’s called deflection: “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!” To top it all off, this weekend he’s holding a campaign-style rally in Florida because that’s a lot more fun that being president.
And when he’s at Mar-a-Lago he’s filling beds, serving meals, and adding to the pile of money he already charges us for security in New York and the secret service in Florida. He’s no dope. He’ll come out of this gig with his pockets jingling.