The-Ave.US

Would you  like to read my email?

That is very easy to do.  Just go to this link and agree to pay a couple of bucks for a DVD.  The the UW  will send you ALL of my emails.  The officer who makes the ultimate decision is actually the UW head of public relations, Norm Arkans.  The senders or recipients of the emails are not given an opportunity to review what is sent out unless, presumably, the content is relevant to a UW R issue.

In fact, my brother in law William Quick used this in an effort to find some dirt about me (his website about me was called steveshits).  Almost nothing was redacted.  I was never given the opportunity to vett the decisions made by the Public Records Office.  The material released  included sensitive clinical data about me, conversations about a student, and quite personal conversation with  colleagues.  As a result I now avoid as much as possible using my .edu accounts.

Of course I am not the Secretary of State and the UW is not the US Department of State.  However, I can  imaging that the line between asking Mr. Putin how his (now ex) wife is doing and a more formal discussion of Syria might be a thin one.  I wonder how free Vladimir would be to tell Hillary about his wife if he realized that he was chatting with her over an open email thread?

Perhaps those who feel so strongly that Mrs. Clinton was wrong to break a state Department rule might  also support the same policy for all telephone calls.  The data packets used to send video and email are the same.  If email should be recorded and  made public, maybe all telephone should be, too?  

That would leave one last bastion for privacy in diplomacy .. the personal chat.