I think a legitimate public service was served by the release of Podesta and DNC emails. We wouldn't have known about DNC's stacking the decks against Sanders otherwise. I wonder why all the liberal outrage hardly address this point.
But to that I say - so what? Would Democrats have been just as outraged if it was the Republicans having their info leaked, like say Trump's tax returns?
I remember the Democrats were pretty damn gleeful about Romney's "47 percent" comment, which was recorded without his permission and then leaked to the press. Why didn't Democrats cry that "HEY! We should see Obama's secret recordings, too! It's not fair that only Romney's recordings are being leaked."
Nobody did that, and nobody would've done that if it had happened to Trump, because in reality the reaction is extremely partisan, and has nothing or very little to do with the principle of "influencing the election".
Also, the Democrats have been pissed off about Trump not releasing his tax returns because they thought that by hiding that he was essentially manipulating the public.
I completely agree with that, but now let's turn back to Clinton and admit that Clinton hiding the fact that her team, the DNC, and the media colluded to help her win, was also a manipulation of the public. Something the public should have learned about.
Which party gets the most leaks has little to do with anything, and I also see very few people blame the DNC for having such poor security in the first place.
And I don't follow much right-wing media, perhaps they did cover this a lot, but as far as "mainstream media" goes, I remember they were trying very hard not to cover what was in the emails, and instead kept trying to make the conversation about "Russians hacking the DNC and helping Trump".
So I'm not even sure if the emails influenced the election that much. And most of Sanders' supporters who were engaged in the primary were already aware of the collusion between the DNC and Clinton long before any of the leaks, because it was obvious. Why do you think there were so many protests at the DNC (which were also not covered that well in the media) that embarrassed Democrats?
/s
Besides for the illegal action of actually doing the hack, I don't see how this is any different than all the news stories attacking Trump.