I have two questions about the email controversy

[ContinentalOp]

Last edited Mon May 2, 2016, 06:04 PM - Edit history (1)

First, we've been told that the emails were only classified after the fact. Is there any evidence that any of the emails were marked classified at the time they were sent?

Secondly, does the SOS not have the power to declassify documents? Newsweek says "both Powell and Rice had the authority, granted by President George W. Bush through executive order, to classify and declassify any document created by the State Department. So if either of them had received an email from another agency containing information that had not gone through a SCIF, he or she could have independently declared that it did not need to be secret and sent it along to anyone they chose."
http://www.newsweek.com/colin-powell-emails-hillary-clinton-424187

[NWCorona]

1. I'll go

1. Yes. The declassify date codes indicate that several were born classified.

2. Hillary can't declassify anything outside of the state department.

[Jackie Wilson Said]

7. So she purposely and knowingly used a server that wasnt safe, right?

Otherwise the worst you have is bad judgement in an area where she was not alone, adapting to new technology etc

This garbage should NEVER be on alleged liberal message boards.

[NWCorona]

13. I can't answer that other than to say that one talking point was

that not much thought was given to the setup of the server. Besides the issue isn't the server as much as what flowed through the server.

[Jackie Wilson Said]

14. No, the issue is destroy Hillary, at any and all costs. Even if that means world war three

with someone like Trump.

[NWCorona]

16. I just don't see it like that.

This is Obama's FBI and DOJ. We are only talking about the facts stemming from this story.

[Jackie Wilson Said]

18. Oh my god...

[NWCorona]

22. Throwing a tantrum I see.

What is so funny?

[Jackie Wilson Said]

26. Your response was funny. Destroying Hillary is what matters, I know.

[NWCorona]

28. For some obviously but that doesn't mean that the isses

Being discussed aren't true or relevant.

[Hortensis]

74. Good step forward, NWCorona. Now,

encouraged by that lack of extremist hate revealed by that simple comment I'll ask you -- what are you doing with these people?

[LP2K12]

86. Just curious?

Last edited Mon May 2, 2016, 07:15 PM - Edit history (1)

Have you ever held a top level, security clearance?

Some of us have. It matters to us. For me it's not about destroying anyone. It's about admitting to mistakes made and moving forward.

Should she be disqualify from office? Of course not.

Should she apologize, of course.

Like many issues, it may not matter to you, but to some it does.

That being said, if anyone fails to vote for her because of this, they're wrong. It's a non-reason to risk a Republican winning.

[Jackie Wilson Said]

89. Oh boy....

[brush]

58. Yes, and Obama's FBI and DOJ are not going to destroy the Dem party and its . . .

November chances by indicting its leading candidate on a repug-driven alleged scandal and leave all the next three SCOTUS appointments to Trump of Cruz?

Get real! Obama is one smart cookie. He's not going to let that happen so all the people praying for it can forget it.

And if by some miracle, Sanders gets the nomination, the repug opposition research that they've been keeping quiet about will kick into gear with 24/7 ads of Sanders' Nicaragua/Sandinista/Cuba/Castro/Moscow honeymoon/socialist — I mean real "means of production should belong to the people" type socialism ties, not European Democratic Socialism, and he will lose spectacularly.

He has not been vetted. Most of his supporters have no idea what would be in store for him, and the huge defeat the Dem party will suffer if he is the candidate.

[CentralCoaster]

19. She may have allowed passage of sensitive material that wasn't marked. Marking is not the measure.

It's a red herring to discuss whether or not things were marked "classified".

State personnel with security clearances are expected to know sensitive material when they see it, and to treat it with an abundance of caution.

Clinton screwed up seventeen ways to Sunday on this entire deal.

Home server, personal computer equipment at home in your basement doing the business of the country? Are you fucking kidding me????

[Jackie Wilson Said]

27. Remarkable, and it sounds real and sincere. The goal to make sure the Democrat does not occupy

the WH is clear around here.

[CentralCoaster]

32. She ran the business of this country on personally owned equipment in the basement of her home.

How is that not a huge problem?

[peace13]

51. And she said that Kissinger and others had done the same thing.

This has been found to be untrue.

[anigbrowl]

66. Do you think cabinet members should be allowed to use briefcases?

You're saying that all official information has be treated with the security equivalent of the bubble (absolutely no documents leave the facility). Now you're entitled to that opinion (although I think it's way over the top) but I want to know just how rigidly you are defining this. Are you saying that if a member of the cabinet was given a classified document at work (in paper form) they should never ever pop in the briefcase to read at home in bed?

What perplexes me a bit about emailgate is that people are demanding cabinet members basically follow the exact same security procedures as the most junior staffers, notwithstanding the considerable authority cabinet members are invested with as the most senior officers in the administration after the President and VP.

I don't mean to be dismissive of all your criticisms, and I think Clinton's decision to run a separate email server at home was somewhat questionable. But a lot of these threads read as if she also failed to ask for the relevant pass before helping herself to some post-its from the stationery cupboard.

[dchill]

36. It's the blind ignorance of privilege...

that destroyed Hillary Clinton. Why are you so invested in it?

[unc70]

29. And used Blackberry she was warned was unsafe

She continued to carry and use her Blackberry (and later an iPad) after she was emphatically warned that it was not secure. She was not allowed to have or use her BB in her personal office because the office was secure; she had to leave it outside. But she still took it and used it around the world for personal and official use. To know what a risk that was, watch the recent 60 Minutes on hacking.

She showed bad judgement, but it worse than that. She and her staff re-edited several emails before they were printed and delivered to the State Department. More than just bad judgement.

A pattern of behavior. And don't get me started on security. I have well over 40 years experience in the area, and this stinks.

[Jackie Wilson Said]

30. Trump is better, I know...

[unc70]

46. Quit changing the subject! I never mentioned Trump.

I have said for a year that although I preferred Sanders I expected Clinton would be the eventual nominee and that I would certainly be voting for our nominee.

None of that excuses Clinton's behavior on security or other issues. She traveled the world with her Blackberry and iPad, each vulnerable to directed attacks using SS7 flaw, IP spoofing, spear fishing and the like. She used the same systems and email for everything, including general browsing and shopping.

[leveymg]

59. If you want Trump, nominate Hillary. nt

[Jackie Wilson Said]

60. I know you must really want Drumpf if you continually, repeatedly post stuff about how

Hillary is a criminal and liar and so on.

I RARELY see ANY post or thread here about what disgusting people Drumpf and Cruz are.

RARE

[leveymg]

65. Don't make stupid insinuations.

Whether Hillary is or isn't a criminal will probably never be known because the most likely outcome of this is the FBI will find she violated the terms of her classified information oath, but the AG is unlikely to actually convene and release any Grand Jury indictment. In the end, she will probably be pardoned, if history is precedent. That is precisely what Bill Clinton did on his last day in office with ex-CIA Director John Deutch after he connected classified laptops to his home internet. But, that doesn't mean that Hillary will ever sleep in the White House again. Not likely after she defied the NSA warnings not to use her Blackberry and instead hooked it up to an uncertified server, and proceeded to trade classified information, and, to top it off, withheld classified materials after she left office.

Please read the security oath she signed. It is conveniently posted in this thread for your edification. It starts off in Paragraph one by stating that "classified information is marked or unmarked classified information." Someone has been lying to you about all this, big time, and it wasn't the Sanders campaign or his supporters. Go ahead and read the agreement and the statute she violated. It's all there for you to learn before you make any more ill-informed comments on the subject.

[Jackie Wilson Said]

67. Calling me stupid wont change the fact there are people here who will work against

Democratic party in the election.

[louis-t]

35. And the world ended horribly, all the suffering, the screaming,

the children dying in the street crying for their mothers, all the money was stolen from the US Treasury, the computers were all hacked and all of our secrets stolen, millions of people starved to death....oh wait.

[HooptieWagon]

39. Security never examined the server to determine if it was secure.

Some documents are considered 'classified at birth', as the very origin and information within is assumed to be classified even before its reviewed. Clinton received instruction on handling such information when she became SoS, yet apparently did send and received such information....including from Blumenthall who did not have a security clearance.
In one particular email exchange, a staffer was having difficulty in sending a document, and she instructed the staffer to 'strip the headings'. Details haven't been made clear, but it appears likely (from the importance FBI has given it) that those headings were 'top secret' type labels.
Laws and regulations require preserving all emails, and relinquishing them upon leaving govt. Clinton did not turn over the emails when she left, despite signing a document stating she did so, and stalled turning them over for 2 years. She deleted 30,000 emails when finally forced to turn over her emails, claiming they were personal. However, some were determined to be work-related, including several containing classified information.
When she left the State Dept, she deactivated the server and had it stored in a facility in NJ. IDK the security of the facility... however, it doesn't appear that anyone at the facility had any security clearance at all. And one internal memo from the security facility, an employee expresses concern about the contents of the server and the instructions to wipe them.

[apnu]

48. "purposely and knowingly" probably not

Likely the SoS email system was archaic and so filled with security protocols that it was inconvenient to use. Maybe it was her state provided laptop or tablet or phone (if such things are given out), whatever it was she probably found her server more convenient to use. she probably didn't think much on it.

I work with a lot of computer security, and there's always a tipping point where the security becomes so thick it interferes with the end-user's perception of usability and then the end-user will go around the security so they can "get work done"

Its not like they're evil masterminds twirling mustaches and cackling to themselves. Its more of a "ew, this is annoying, hey I have a mail server over here that works on my iPhone! Hey Mr. General-of-the-Armies guy, catch me over here!" and then Mr. General-of-the-Armies guy says "OK" and there we are in a breach of protocol.

While everybody is beating up Hillary and Hillary alone over this, nobody is wondering why all the other DoD and spy agencies who were talking to her on an obviously open channel didn't stop and say "Hey, Mrs. SoS, I can't email you at that address, I will send an email to your SoS address."

Nobody seems to have done that but we all yell at Hillary for it, and forget all of these different agencies and departments continued to chat it up with Hillary from the computer at her home under her desk (or wherever it was).

And its at that point this whole thing smells like a witch hunt. Nobody's demanding heads roll at the CIA or the Pentagon, its all Hillary all the time. And its rank political opportunism.

Any chance of doing good here, of finding problems like this and filling security holes is now out the window. Nobody cares so long as Hillary gets torn down. And when she's torn down, nobody will care about the issue anymore. This is about drawing blood on Hillary, not actual crimes, violations and so forth.

[TM99]

85. I am sorry but I am calling bullshit

on any experience you may claim to have on computer security.

Under no circumstances is it ok for someone to bypass security protocols because, well, they are just fed up and want to get work done.

People who do that lose their jobs even in the corporate world let alone the governmental and military ones, where they often face legal problems for said activity.

She ran a private home-baked server out of her home. She hired an IT person with no connections to the SD to administer it. She transferred classified and non-classified emails between the SD domain, across the internet, to her home domain.

Jesus, y'all are such zombies willing to rationalize anything to win and to protect Clinton.

[apnu]

92. Users do bypass security all the time in many ways

You cleary don know the industry and presume to tell me my job?

[TM99]

93. And when they do they are punished

by losing access and losing their jobs.

So yes, I do know the industry and presume to call you out on your bullshit rationalizations of Clinton's behavior.

[lumberjack_jeff]

73. No, "the worst" that you describe is less bad than the actual facts on the ground.

Her NDA requires (present tense) her to safeguard sensitive information. She failed to do that. She actively failed to do that.

[BootinUp]

24. link to a reputable source on your claim #1?

[NWCorona]

25. If you understand the codes you can see it for yourself.

All you have to do is look at the declassify by date and corresponding letter code on any of the released emails.

[BootinUp]

37. I didn't think you could provide that. nt

[NWCorona]

40. Lol! Just because you are oblivious and fail to even do a rudimentary search doesn't make you right.

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKCN0QQ0C420150821

[truedelphi]

101. Two key peragraphhs from the Reuters' article:

"Current and former White House officials with responsibility for the government's classified information regime interviewed by Reuters were puzzled at how the declassification dates aligned with the State Department's public assertions.

"The State Department's blowing smoke here," J. William Leonard, a former director of the U.S. government's Information Security Oversight Office (ISOO), said in a telephone interview. "It's clear from the declassification date — that's their tacit acknowledgement this stuff was classified from day one."

[NWCorona]

102. Yup! Some people don't understand the minutia of this stuff.

The declassify line codes are a huge problem for Hillary's defense.

[2cannan]

81. Here's something on his #1

snip

August 21, 2015: In many cases, information in Clinton's emails were "born classified." That means they were classified from their creation. A Reuters analysis concludes, "In the small fraction of emails made public so far, Reuters has found at least 30 email threads from 2009, representing scores of individual emails, that include what the State Department's own 'classified' stamps now identify as so-called 'foreign government information.' The US government defines this as any information, written or spoken, provided in confidence to US officials by their foreign counterparts." Although unmarked, Reuters' analysis suggests that these emails "were classified from the start." J. William Leonard, a former director of the NARA Information Security Oversight Office, said that such information is "born classified" and that "If a foreign minister just told the secretary of state something in confidence, by US rules that is classified at the moment it's in US channels and US possession." According to Reuters, the standard US government nondisclosure agreement "warns people authorized to handle classified information that it may not be marked that way and that it may come in oral form." The State Department disputes Reuters' analysis but does not elaborate or explain why. (Reuters, 8/21/2015)

http://thompsontimeline.com/The_Clinton_Email_Scandal_-_Long_Version_-_Part_5

[leveymg]

56. Answer: she violated her security agreement that says classified is "marked or unmarked" classified

There are really only two things you have to read to understand what laws Hillary broke and why the excuses being offered by her lawyers and campaign are utter bullshit. One is the standard Classified Information Nondisclose Agreement she signed the day she took office. The other is the federal felony statute that is most frequently cited in that document as the penalty for mishandling classified information, 18 USC Sec. 793, most particularly subsections (e) and (f).

Hillary Clinton's use of a private, uncertified server for official business and to transmit and store classified information was never approved. In fact, the NSA warned her that her Blackberry was unsecure and she shouldn't use it. When that Agency refused to clone a half dozen duplicates of Obama's secure smart phone for her to email her staff, her reaction was to set up and use her own private email server for all private and official business. Defiance isn't the word for this. It was a willful and criminal violation of her security oath.

Her violation of both her signed classified information agreement and federal felony law is clear if you actually read her security agreement and the statute, below:

Here is Hillary's Security Oath and the statute it references, 18 USC Sec. 793. Go ahead and read it.

1) Hillary signed this document on 01/22/09:

?w=500&h=262

UNCLASSIFIED U.S. Department of State Case No. F-2015-05069 Doc No. C05833708 Date: 11/05/2015
! I RELEASE IN PART I
B7(C),B6
---------------------------------1REVIEW AUTHORITY:
CLASSIFIED INFORMATION NONDISCLOSURE AGREEMENT Barbara Nielsen, Senior
Reviewer
AN AGREEMENT BETWEEN Hillary Rodham Clinton AND THE UNITED STATES
1. lntending to be legally bound. I hereby accept the obligations contained In this Agreement In consideration of my being granted access to classified information. As used in this Agreement, classified Information is marked or unmarked classified Information, including oral communications, that is classified under the standards or Executive Order 12958, or under any other Executive order or statute that prohibits unauthorized disclosure of lnformation in the Interest of national security; and unclassified Information that meets the standards for classification and is in the process of a classification determination as provided In Section 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 and 1A(e) of Executive Order 12958 or under any other Executive order or statute that requires protection for such information in the of national security. I understand and accept that by being granted access to classified lnformation special confidence and trust have been placed in me by the United States Government .
2. I hereby acknowledge that I have received a security lndoctrination concerning the nature and protection of classified information, including the procedures to be followed in ascertaining whether other persons to whom I contemplate disclosing this Information have been approved for access to it, and that I understand these procedures.
3. I have been advised that the unauthorized disclosure, unauthorized retention, or negligent handling of classified Information by me could cause damage or irreparable injury to the United States or could be used to advantage by a foreign nation. I hereby agree that I will not divulge classified information to anyone unless: (a) I have officially verified that the recipient has been properly authorized by the United States Government to receive it, or (b) I have been given prior written notice of authorization from the United States Government Department or Agency (hereinafter Department or Agency) 1'9SJ) responsible for the classification of information or last granting me a security clearance that such disclosure is permitted. I understand that lf I am uncertain about the classification status of Information, I am required to confirm from an authorized official that the Information is unclassified before I may disclose It, except to a person as provided in (a) or (b), above. I further understand that I am obligated to comply with laws and regulations that prohibit the unauthorized disclosure of classified lnformation.
4. I have been advised that any breach of this may result In the termination of any security clearances I hold; removal from any position of special confidence and trust requiring such clearances; or termination of my employment or other relationships with the Departments or Agencies that granted my security clearance or clearances. In addition, I have been advised that any unauthorized disclosure of classified lnformation by me may constitute a violation, or violations. of Untied States criminal laws, including the provisions of Sections 641. 793, 794, 798, *952 and 1924, Title 18, United States Code, and the provisions of Section 783(b), Title 50,
United Slates code. and the provisions of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982. I recognize that nothing In the Agreement constitutes a waiver by the United States of the right to prosecute me for any statutory violation..
5. I hereby assign to the United States Government all royalties, remunerations. and emoluments that have resulted, wiII result or may result from any disclosure, publication or revelation of classified Information not consistent with the terms of this Agreement
6. I understand that the United States Government may seek any remedy available to it to enforce this Agreement Including, but not but not limited to application for a court order prohibiting disclosure of Information In breach of this Agreement.
1. I understand that all classlfled information to which I have access or may obtain access by signing this Agreement will remain the property of, or under the control of the United States Government unless and until otherwise determined by an authorized official or final ruling of a court of law. I agree that I shall return all classffled materials which have or may come into my possession or for which I am responsible because of such access: (a) upon demand by an authorized representative of the United States Government; (b) upon the conclusion of employment or other relationship with the Department or Agency that last granted me a security clearance or- that provided me access ID classifled Information; or (c) upon the conclusion of my employment or other relationship that requires access to classified information. If I do not return such materials upon request, I understand that this may be a violation of Sections 793 and/or 1924, § 18, United States Code, a United States criminal law.
8. Unless and until I am released In writing by an authorized representative or the United States Government.. I understand that all conditions and obligations imposed upon me by this Agreement apply during the time I am granted access to classified lnformation, and at all times thereafter.
9. Each provision of this Agreement is severable. If a court should find provision of this Agreement to be unenforceable, all other provisions of this Agreement shall remain In full force and effect.

Sec 793 (e) and (f) linked here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251552653

Here's some of the language of the statute that was violated. She did it despite and in spite of being told by ranking NSA security officers not to use her Blackberry in the very first days of her tenure as Secretary of State. When the NSA refused to clone a half dozen of the President's secure phones for herself and her staff, she literally did a runaround. Literally, within days, and without authorization or she had linked her unsecure Blackberry with an uncertified private email system, and continued to use both devices exclusively for all official business until she left office four years later. By then, her server held at least 1,100 classified messages, 104 from her, and 22 that were Top Secret/SAP. Then she refused to turn over these classified materials, again in violation of her security oath, and proceeded to wipe half the messages on the harddrive.

Here's how she specifically violated 793 (f)(2). Note that both (e) and (f) do not require a showing of specific intent to harm the national security or actual harm. Just mishandling of classified materials or failure to report that of others is enough to be convicted of a felony with a potential sentence of 10 years in federal prison.

When in 2011 Secretary Clinton received a series of emails containing obviously classified information from Sid Blumenthal, her response was "keep 'em coming." This classified information turned out to have originated with the NSA, and had been taken off a classified system just hours earlier. If one reads her Classified Information Agreement, posted above, it makes repeated reference to Sec 793 of Title 18 US Code. That's a felony statute for violation of the oath. Keep her response to Blumenthal in mind -- and the fact that she didn't report the breach, and expressly encouraged more of the same -- as you read subsection (f)(2) of that section,

(e) Whoever having unauthorized possession of, access to, or control over any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, or note relating to the national defense, or information relating to the national defense which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates, delivers, transmits or causes to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted, or attempts to communicate, deliver, transmit or cause to be communicated, delivered, or transmitted the same to any person not entitled to receive it, or willfully retains the same and fails to deliver it to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it; or

(f) Whoever, being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, note, or information, relating to the national defense, (1) through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust, or to be lost, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, or (2) having knowledge that the same has been illegally removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of its trust, or lost, or stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, and fails to make prompt report of such loss, theft, abstraction, or destruction to his superior officer—

Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.


https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/793#e

How do we know that she's liable to found culpable for violating her nondisclose agreement and Sec 793 (e) and/or (f)? Because US Attorney General Loretta Lynch was recently asked about this by prominent Washington journalist, Al Hunt. Her answers point to the same basis for investigation and potential prosecution. Here is their dialogue:

Al Hunt Show on Hulu - http://www.hulu.com/watch/936368 15:00 minute mark

Lynch: It has to be treated like any other case, people have to have confidence...

We owe it to them to do a full thorough and independent review of everything that comes to our attention

Hunt: In trying to get her to say what the standard would be, intent, or gross negligence, etc..... She replied

Lynch: Well yeah, I think that what's been reported, is that we received an inquiry into the handling of classified information particularly by people who are no longer in government as to whether or not it had been improperly handled or properly handled,and that is a security review that we get in a number of situations, and that was the genesis of this matter. And so beyond that I can't comment on the specifics of it.. except to say that we do look at the issues presented, but as I said before we look at them thoroughly.

[paulthompson]

91. Interesting

Mark,
You found something very interesting that I don't have in the timeline yet - Attorney General Lynch's comments here:

Lynch: Well yeah, I think that what's been reported, is that we received an inquiry into the handling of classified information particularly by people who are no longer in government as to whether or not it had been improperly handled or properly handled, and that is a security review that we get in a number of situations, and that was the genesis of this matter. And so beyond that I can't comment on the specifics of it.. except to say that we do look at the issues presented, but as I said before we look at them thoroughly.

That bolded bit is what really strikes me. Who could that be referring to? Two names come to mind: Sid Blumenthal and Tyler Drumheller, since both of them had been in government but were private citizens by the time Clinton became secretary of state. That suggests to me that the FBI investigation could be focusing on the information pipeline leading from Drumheller to Blumenthal to Clinton. Agree or disagree? Or could Lynch just be referring to the fact that Clinton and her aides are no longer in government?

[leveymg]

96. I found that interesting for exactly the same reason.

As these things so often go, the case ends precisely where it started: Guccifer's hack of Sid's email to Hillary.

The legal side of it is really simple, too. Hillary didn't turn in Sid and cooked her own goose by playing footsy with him in order to exploit pay for play in Libya. This was picked up on by the Russians who got an inside look at regime change for fun and profit. A lot of really powerful people lost a lot of money in Libya because of these games. The NSA and alphabet agencies are hanging her out to dry just like they did Shrub and Cheney for similar games of state in Iraq. It's fascinating to watch this one unwind.

[HereSince1628]

104. Seems she conspired to spy on the CIA using the Clinton Foundation as a front to cover Blumenthal

and pay him for being the conduit.

It's not clear how many moles he turned to HRC but it seems at least one.

I'd think conspiring to spy on the CIA is covered by some part of the US Code.

[leveymg]

106. What she did was allowed her server to be a conduit for unauthorized swapping of classified info

by people, such as Sid Blumenthal and Tyler Drumheller, who weren't authorized to have access to it. She knew it was classified because on numerous instances Blumenthal referenced it as such, and her response was "keep it coming". Under the federal felony statute 18 USC 793(f)(2) she was duty bound to report that to the security office. But, she didn't. That makes her just as guilty as they are under that same statute. The potential penalty is 10 years in federal prison.

[HereSince1628]

111. It seems she conspired to get him -paid- for doing that. That's beyond simply unauthorized swapping

of information between employees of different agencies who think another agency should be in the know.

Saying it as you have is probably technically correct, but you have to boil it down to make people the street understand. I think the way I said it did that and it's not terribly far from the substance of the truth.

The Clintons apparently conspired to run an espionage agent outside of government, with no authorized clearance or access, to collect classified information from unauthorized source inside of government.

If the Obama administration was consistent some people would already be riding steel toilet seats.

[leveymg]

112. I'm just describing the charges most likely to be cited in the upcoming FBI report

I agree. There is a much bigger picture to be drawn about what HRC and her pay for play confederates were actually doing with their own private communications channel in newly-created war zones around the world. It's a lot like a continuation of the Bush-Cheney Administration and no-bid, unlimited contracts continuing to go to Halliburton and Blackwater.

[HereSince1628]

113. Yes, and I'm trying to say what happened in a way avg people get it.

She ran a spying operation against the CIA using the Clinton Foundation to cover her agent who collected & transmitted information to her.

When you can say it in a single sentence and the sentence is close to the truth, you've got a simple message that penetrates the obfuscation.

[2cannan]

114. About Blumenthal's time at the Clinton Foundation

Early 2009 - March 2015: Sid Blumenthal takes a job at The Clinton Foundation, advises the secretary of state frequently, and promotes the interests of two government contractors. Sid Blumenthal is paid about $120,000 a year as a full-time employee of The Clinton Foundation. He gets the job in early 2009 as the behest of former President Bill Clinton, who employed him in the White House in the 1990s. He keeps the job until March 2015, the same month that the Clinton email scandal first becomes news. Blumenthal appears to have been a private citizen without a security clearance since the 1990s. Yet for the duration of Clinton's time as secretary of state, and while he is being paid by The Clinton Foundation, he frequently emails her with intelligence information and advice. His foundation job doesn't seem to have anything to do with any of the foundation's charitable works. According to Politico, "While Blumenthal's foundation job focused on highlighting the legacy of [Bill] Clinton's presidency, some officials at the charity questioned his value and grumbled that his hiring was a favor from the Clintons, according to people familiar with the foundation." After March 2015, Blumenthal will be a paid consultant to American Bridge and Media Matters, two groups supporting Clinton's presidential campaign that are run by David Brock, an ally of both Clinton and Blumenthal. (Politico, 5/28/2015)

[HereSince1628]

116. Yep. A nice warm office in which collect and communicate information from CIA leaks.

Thompson's timeline suggests Blumenthal transmitted information in almost real time, suggesting email to Clinton was only hours behind events in Africa.

[paulthompson]

115. statute

Mark,

Could you quote the exact relevant felony statute 18 USC 793(f)(2), with a link? If you did elsewhere, I missed it.

Also, you mentioned elsewhere that Clinton should have had complete access to all the info the CIA and NSA had anyway. Can you elaborate on that? When I did my 9/11 research, stovepiping was a really big problem. I'm not sure how much interagency cooperation has improved since then.

If Clinton could get access to all classified info, then it seems strange to be risking get that from Blunenthal. Unless it's a matter of having someone helping her separate the wheat from the chaff. Clearly, she was super busy and wouldn't have had the time to closely analyze what other departments were doing, so she'd want someone to do that for her. But why not have some expert inside the State Department do that?

I find it puzzling, unless the various departments weren't good at sharing. Then one can see a better motive.

[Bill USA]

90. declassify date codes indicate that several were born classified...you forgot the links

[CompanyFirstSergeant]

2. No authority

to declassify information not from her own department.

[VulgarPoet]

4. Seconded.

[TCJ70]

3. Didn't she tell a staffer to remove certain headers...

...from some email so it could be sent over insecure channels as well?

[NWCorona]

6. More than once nt

[VulgarPoet]

8. Yep.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/01/hillary-clinton-must-read-emails-217498

Clinton directed staffers to send talking points via nonsecure email, according to a June 2011 email chain, in which her top adviser Jake Sullivan said that staffers were experiencing difficulty sending secure fax messages.

The conversation is partially redacted, so further context is unclear based on the emails themselves, including whether the talking points themselves included any classified information.

Sullivan wrote Clinton to inform her that she would receive the documents later on the evening of June 16. The following morning, Clinton followed up to say that she had not yet received them.

"?!!! Checking," Sullivan responded.

Minutes later, he wrote, "They say they've had issues sending secure fax. They're working on it."

"If they can't, turn into nonpaper w no identifying heading and send nonsecure," Clinton wrote.

[CompanyFirstSergeant]

9. Let's take the license plates off the car and go do...

...some stupid shit.

Whether or not you end up doing stupid shit does not matter anymore.

Taking the plates off your car and driving around is illegal.

[Scuba]

5. "Emailghazi truthers" is one lame attempt at a smear.

The FBI is investigating Hillary's email/server issue, not the RNC.

If you're not aware, the FBI works for the Justice Department, under the Attorney General, who works for President Obama.

Is he one of your 'emailghazi truthers'?

[CoffeeCat]

17. These phones baloney attempts to smear us

are part of the obfuscate and dodge talking points.

They're not interested in rational or intelligent discussion.

It's all about shaming anyone who dares to question their candidate and the year-long FBI investigation into her email server.

We're supposed to remain as ignorant and oblivious as they are.

[ContinentalOp]

42. If the shoe fits.

I say emailghazi because it's important to remember that this current witch hunt is a direct extension of investigations that started with Benghazi, just as the Lewinski stuff was the result of a long, expensive, open-ended fishing expedition that began with Whitewater. Even if there's something there, it wasn't uncovered because there was any real damage done to the country, but simply due to a concerted right wing effort to dig up any possible dirt by any means necessary.

I say "truthers" because the timeline posted here today appears to have been written by a 9/11 truther.

[Scuba]

45. This investigation is not a "direct extension" of anything.

Get your head out of the sand; you just might learn something.

[ContinentalOp]

52. Emailgate originated from the Benghazi hearings

Sorry that you don't know the basic facts about it
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillary_Clinton_email_controversy#House_Select_Committee_on_Benghazi

[Scuba]

54. wiki? C'mon, man.

[ContinentalOp]

57. Really?

You're disputing the fact that the email controversy emerged from the House Select Committee on Benghazi?

[Scuba]

61. Wiki is not a reliable source. Do you have another?

[ContinentalOp]

63. omg, this stuff is common knowledge to anybody who has been following the issue at all.

And you know, you could just follow the citations on the wiki page, but here, I'll do it for you.

http://benghazi.house.gov/news/press-releases/select-committee-adds-to-secretary-clinton-s-public-email-record

That shows that the Blumenthal emails emerged as a result of the Benghazi hearings.

[Scuba]

69. You made the leap...

"... direct extension of investigations that started with Benghazi."

You may be aware that the FBI doesn't initiate criminal investigations based on unfounded rumors. Or perhaps not.

But regardless of the beginnings of this investigation, it appears Hillary did break some laws and clearly violated the trust of the President and the people. You may want to excuse her for that, and that's your prerogative.

Me, I place it well down a long list of reasons to reject her as our candidate.

[Buzz cook]

77. She.

The Attorney General is a woman.
https://www.justice.gov/ag

Try to keep up.

[Scuba]

80. "He"

referred to President Obama.

[VulgarPoet]

15. Caveat Emptor.

Such a nice person...

[CompanyFirstSergeant]

21. Really, really (did I say really???)

classy.

[vintx]

23. "holding her to different standards than every other SOS"

Damn those blinders sure do work.

[VulgarPoet]

33. Eh. They've graduated from blinders.

No, this whole situation looks to be spiraling towards Jonestown really quickly.

[CoffeeCat]

31. Wow, total ignorance on display

and also a lack of class.

I could refute every statement you made. What good would it do? You are the rest of the peanut gallery seem to enjoy blissful ignorance.

If I were you, I would do some basic research. I'm talking real elementary stuff.

No other Secretary of State had a private email server. Not Condi. Not Colin Powell. What HRC did is unprecedented. Also, no other Secretary of State has sent private emails that were later classified as "Top Secret/Special Access Programs"--the highest level of classification.

Basic research. Even a fifth grader could do it.

[bettyellen]

41. Well said, Pri! Well fucking said.

[Joob]

11. Think about that sentence "Well they were marked classified after the fact" Kind of redundant AGH

That's the whole point of Classified, To not be able to be breached like that, especially Potentially classified shit. Holy shit.

You think it's okay to have such a security risk of Potentially Classified shit?

"No, no. It's okay, because they weren't classified then."


Great, good thing we got them classified now, that's why no one knows about it at all

[ContinentalOp]

44. If you truly care about transparency, then I don't know why you want to defend secrecy so badly

As for classifying documents after the fact, here's the relevant quote from the article I linked in the OP "The rules regarding the handling of classified information apply to communications designated as secret at that time . If documents that aren’t deemed classified, and aren’t handled through a SCIF when they are created or initially transmitted, are later, in retrospect, deemed secret, the classification is new—and however the record was handled in the past is irrelevant."

Are you saying that isn't accurate?

[2cannan]

12. Regarding your classified question

From the timeline:
http://thompsontimeline.com/The_Clinton_Email_Scandal_-_Medium_Version_-_Part_1

snip

January 21, 2009 - February 1, 2013: In her time as secretary of state, Clinton uses only her private email account on her private server for all her work and personal emails. There are 62,320 emails sent to or from her [e-mail] address, which is an average of 296 a week, or nearly 1,300 a month. Clinton will later claim that roughly half of these (31,830) were private in nature and she will delete them before investigators can look at them. The Washington Post will later explain, "Most of her emails were routine, including those sent to friends. Some involved the coordination of efforts to bring aid to Haiti by the State Department and her husband's New York-based Clinton Foundation - notes that mixed government and family business, the emails show. Others involved classified matters. State Department and Intelligence Community officials have determined that 2,093 email chains contained classified information. Most of the classified emails have been labeled as 'confidential,' the lowest level of classification. Clinton herself authored 104 emails that contained classified material, a Post analysis later found." (The Washington Post, 3/27/2016) Twenty-two of her emails will later be determined to be classified "top secret" or even higher than top secret in some cases, due to the mention of highly secretive SAP, or secret access programs. (The New York Times, 1/29/2016)

[Orsino]

20. "Classified" isn't actually the relevant standard.

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/793

"Defense information" as described in sec. 793 is the issue, we presume. Not quite so simple.

[Attorney in Texas]

34. Neither of your questions gets at the fact that Hillary blatantly and intentionally violated FOIA

[JudyM]

68. Plus the "was it classified at the time" argument is legally irrelevant, particularly since all her

correspondence was apparently going through the server... meaning that she wasn't even managing classified docs differently, from everything I've seen about this.

BTW, did you notice section G addresses conspiracy? Wondering now if FBI is in fact building a conspiracy case that's going to pull in Bill. DOJ informed the FOIA court a few days ago that a referral was in the works --- dealing with HRC's use of the private server... and then today Bernie affirmed that the convention is going to a contested one... Maybe related, don't you think?

[Samantha]

95. Yep -- to which the State Department responded we have no records

In court, when asked why the State Department had no records, the respondent said the documents were on The Secretary's private server. The Judge said he was not aware the Secretary had a private server, and that is when the lid blew off (as far as I know).

Sam

PS There was actually more than one FOIA that received a "We have no records" response....

[Attorney in Texas]

97. There are over three dozen lawsuits where State is going to get hugely fined because of Hillary's

intentional violation of FOIA.

This shit is hitting the fan regardless of what the DoJ decides to do with the FBI recommendation.

[Samantha]

98. I knew there were several but not 3 dozen -- it is not surprising though

People just do not realize how serious that alone is. But there are other things listed in the leaked emails that are jaw dropping. I believe there are at least 3 items which are serious crimes, felonies to say the least. And that doesn't include any of the investigation on the Clinton Foundation and potential pay-to-play charges.

If I were a Hillary Clinton supporter, I would be staying up at night religiously reading everything I could get my hands on in an attempt to measure the depth of these problems. Yet some feel it is better to keep a distance and hope it goes away.

Sam

[Attorney in Texas]

99. It is unclear what the evidence will show in the criminal cases, but the evidence is clear Hillary

led the State Department to numerous deliberate FOIA violations punishable by fines, fees, and penalties.

[ieoeja]

38. The "classified" side of the story is what will save Hillary.

That issue is grey enough that, added to all the long list of scandals proven to be fake over the years, makes this go away.

The FOIA violation is fairly straight forward on the other hand. It is not a big deal legally as it merely constitutes contempt of court. So pay a $50 fine.

It should be politically damaging among Democrats (Republicans hate the very existence of the FOIA). But since it is attached to the "classified" non-issue, it will disappear.

Like the disenfranchisement of 80,000 mostly African-American voters in Florida 2000 as focus was diverted to silly stuff like hanging chads and butterfly ballots that impacted a much smaller precentage of the vote.

[IdaBriggs]

43. You've probably already seen some of this.

1) Yes. A letter sent on Jan. 14 from Intelligence Community Inspector General I. Charles McCullough III to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Foreign Relations Comittee: https://m.box.com/shared_item/https%3A%2F%2Ffnn.box.com%2Fs%2F48oj2j79cp73l66p6afj73rkthwlpt5j

“To date, I have received two sworn declarations from one element. These declarations cover several dozen emails containing classified information determined by the IC (Intelligence Community) element to be at the CONFIDENTIAL, SECRET, and TOP SECRET/SAP levels. According to the declarant, these documents contain information derived from classified IC element sources.”

It is unlikely he suborned perjury or didn't validate his sources.

There have also been issues with the emails going back and forth with Sidney Blumenthal containing classified information he shouldn't have been able to see, particularly one about Sudanese rebels, while another had the name of an asset that had to be redacted. Plus the Korean nuclear stuff and the Libyan Civil War stuff -- and she wrote over a hundred that shouldn't have left the State Department for years/decades.

2) As others have stated AND YOU SPECIFY ("created by the State Department&quot she can only "declassify" the stuff her department created, so for example, dropping the names of CIA assets when copying their classified reports word for word = Very Bad. Having them on email (when they aren't supposed to leave the building) = Very Bad. Having them hacked and plastered all over the Internet because you were chatting with a guy with no clearance = Unbelievablely Very Bad. And doing all of that while using an insecure computer with inadequate security backup and a easily hacked smart phone = Totally Stupidly Very Bad.

Welcome to the "conspiracy" or as we like to call it, "reality". This isn't "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" -- this is just Someone Being Really Stupid (about national security).

[ContinentalOp]

47. Thanks

But for #1, were those documents classified at the time the emails were sent? Or after the fact? Nothing in the text you quoted mentions when the documents were classified. I can't find a straight answer on the Blumenthal emails either.

As for #2, so is there evidence that this happened? Were there emails that were classified at the time they were sent and contained information from outside the State Department that she didn't have the power to declassify?

[IdaBriggs]

50. I keep coming back to Yes, but I've been reading about this for

a while now. It has been stated that the clearance level for the Inspector General had to be changed just so he could read the emails, and that 22 of the original dump were highest level national security where-are-the-nukes stuff. Names of assets are ALWAYS classified, so there is that.

If I find a better link spelling it out (instead of just "opinions" from the top retired brass) I'll come back, but honestly, I think you will have to wait for the FBI referral for the "final truth" (and even then the wiggle room will be "innocent until proven guilty in a court" and realistically, she may simply negotiate/plea to lesser charges).

Good luck!

[JudyM]

72. Classification level is not, as is often mistakenly stated here, based on marking, but on content.

[paulthompson]

75. response

If you're truly interested in learning, try reading the timeline.

Here's a relevant entry:

July 24, 2015: Many of Clinton's emails contained classified information when they were sent, not just retroactively. Intelligence Community Inspector General Charles McCullough and State Department Inspector General Steve Linick issue a joint statement about their inquiry into Clinton's emails. The statement says that out of a random sample of 40 of Clinton's emails, Linick found four emails containing information that should have been classified at the time they were sent. "These emails were not retroactively classified by the State Department; rather these emails contained classified information when they were generated and, according to [Intelligence Community] classification officials, that information remains classified today. This classified information should never have been transmitted via an unclassified personal system." (US Department of State, 7/24/2015)

Note that quote from the inspector general of Clinton's own department. Note that both inspectors general were appointed by Obama.

This whole notion of classified information needing to be marked with the word "classified" at the time it is sent is a red herring. As I said elsewhere, certain information is obviously classified by its very nature. For instance, as secretary of state, Clinton was the US's chief diplomat. Surely she knew that any communication with foreign diplomats was classified, no matter what the content was. That's why people talk about some information being "born classified." It's so obviously classified that to mark it such or not is irrelevant.

Most of Clinton's 2,000 classified emails were like that, because they generally were talking about foreign diplomacy and that is classified by its very nature. There are existing executive orders that clearly spell these rules out.

Let's say Clinton called up the head of NATO to talk about the war in Libya. Nobody should have to tell Clinton that the contents of that call is classified. She should obviously know that, and that's what the rules specify. Yet she talked about that phone call in an email. If you look at that email about the NATO call now, all but a few words of it is redacted at the "secret" level, which is the level below "top secret." (I'm using that because it's a real example.) Again, nobody should have needed to tell her that info was classified. As former Attorney General Mukasey has said, it should have been obvious even to a "low-grade moron."

[leftofcool]

49. Still waiting on the indictment fairy I see

[FlatBaroque]

53. Shame on anyone who spends 5 seconds replying to this garbage.

[paulthompson]

55. Your two questions

First,

Let's imagine that you're Secretary Clinton and you get this email from Sid Blumenthal, who is a private citizen with no security clearance at the time, but it obviously getting real classified information from somewhere, based on the hundreds of emails he sends to Clinton:

In July 2012, he sent Clinton an email about Egypt he said was "CONFIDENTIAL," which is the third level of classified information according to US government regulations. Then he gave this warning: "SOURCE: Sources with access to the highest levels of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, and Western Intelligence and security services. THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION COMES FROM AN EXTREMELY SENSITIVE SOURCE AND SHOULD BE HANDLED WITH CARE."

Now, is that not ample warning, at the time, that that email contains classified information? (And by the way, the all caps are in the original email.)

Regardless, the whole issue of classified information being marked or not is a red herring. Clinton signed a pledge the day she became secretary of state saying it was her responsibility to determine what was classified or not, regardless of if it was marked as such. Also, rules mean that all correspondance about communications with foreign diplomats is deemed classified by its very nature. All correpondance dealing with secret sources (such as the above) are deemed classified by its very nature. All correspondance dealing with certain secret programs are deemed classified by its very nature. And so on.

And, as other people have pointed out, Clinton had the right to determine what was or was not classified for information originating from the State Department. But she didn't have that right for information originating elsewhere, such as the email from Blumenthal above.

And that's not some one off email I used as an example. She got hundreds of emails with similar warnings from Blumenthal alone. And she emailed classified information back to him, despite knowing he had no security clearance.

[leveymg]

64. You are right. But she also had a legal duty to report this breach of security, and failed to do so

As I pointed out above, the language of 18 USC Sec 793 (f)(2) mandates that anyone who holds a security clearance and observes a violation by others MUST UNDER PENALTY OF LAW report that violation. She didn't, and instead her response to Blumenthal was "keep 'em coming."

That's what Al Hunt was getting at when he asked the Attorney General the other day about what is the legal standard that's being applied, "intent" or "negligence". He was trying to get Lynch to say which section of 793 was going to be applied in potential prosecution. Her her own part, the AG specified something interesting that the investigation originally was a probe into a group of ex-officials who had "mishandled" classified information. Again, mishandling is 793.

[paulthompson]

70. response

The post I was responding to just got deleted before I could finish a reply. Here's my reply anyway:

If you'd read my timeline, or even just my intro essay, you'd know more:

http://thompsontimeline.com/IS_CLINTON'S_EMAIL_SCANDAL_FOR_REAL%3F

Clearly, something strange was going on with Blumenthal. He had worked in the White House ten years earlier, during Bill Cliinton's time, so presumably he knew what was classified or not from then. But now that he was a private citizen with no security clearance, he shouldn't have had information like that in the first place. Again, if you read the timeline, it becomes clear he had active and retired sources in the CIA and NSA at least that were passing classified information to him and then he'd forward that on to Clinton. Presumably he could tell from the sources how classified that info was.

The proper protocol Clinton should have followed was that when she received an email from him like that, she should have flagged it to security personnel, who would have then taken steps to secure it by scrubbing it from nonsecure channels and moving it to secure channels, as well as investigating how Blumethal had that in the first place.

But she didn't do that, despite hundreds of emails from Blumenthal like that. The logical reason is that different government departments are often bad at shariing information with each other - it's a problem called stovepiping. Through Blumenthal, she had a secret window into what the CIA and NSA were up to, and she wanted to keep that information pipeline going because she found it useful. But that meant a lot of classified information was being passed along through nonsecure means, which is one reason she's being investigated now.

[ContinentalOp]

79. Yeah, sorry

I did some googling and found answers to my questions so I deleted.

This seems to have little to nothing to do with the private email server, does it? Even if those emails had gone through a .gov account it would still be considered mishandling of classified information wouldn't it?

[paulthompson]

87. answer

That amplifies the problem. It was bad enough that she got these emails from Blumenthal at all, but the fact that she got through through an unsecure email account makes it worse.

Consider that Blumenthal's email account was hacked by a Romanian named "Guccifer" in March 2013. He got the contents to all of the emails between Clinton and Blumenthal, including the email mentioned above, and posted screenshots on the Internet of some of them. Now, he hacked into Blumenthal's email account (by guessing his password) but he just as easily could have hacked into Clinton's. Many people, including former heads of the CIA, NSA, DIA, Defense Department, etc, have said it's a given that Clinton's emails were intercepted by hostile foreign goverments, since her email security was so bad (much worse than if she'd just been using something like Gmail or Yahoo Mail).

So yeah, it's a complicated scandal and there are interrelated parts. That makes it harder for the general public to understand. But the FBI isn't going to cut her slack just because things are complicated. If you think about most any criminal or financial legal case, it's rare to have one overwhelming "smoking gun" that makes it an open and shut case. Instead, lots of pieces of evidence need to be put together, sometimes thousands of pieces. That's what we have here.

[leveymg]

83. I doubt she needed Blumenthal to access materials on the interagency classified system.

Clinton and a couple of her top aides had a security clearance that allowed them to read any classified materials that the State Dept. had involvement at any level with. That includes military-political, counterterrorism, psychological warfare operations.

Blumenthal and the Clintons go back at least 20 years. Sid worked on and off with Drumheller since 2005, when Tyler went free lance after leaving the Agency. They had been feeding her political intelligence out of channels since at least her 2008 campaign. In Libya, he was doing business as part the Osprey group which was competing with Blackwater/Xe seeking State Dept. contracts. An associate of Drumheller is reported to have been the source of the TS/SAP NSA materials. It will be interesting to learn if he was, indeed, deposed before he died last August, and what he told investigators.

There were other occasions when her aides were instructed by her to strip off classification headers and send "unsecure." That wasn't one of Blumenthal's messages. It appears that she simply too lazy to go to the secure portal and sit down and look things up. This sometimes slowed things down for her when she had to rely on aides to print things out for her. She was highly impatient with declassification protocols and tended to want things right now, even materials that originated with other agencies.

Sid may have been more useful as a fixer on the commercial side of her affairs. Tyler was valuable as someone who understood the politics of intelligence and how to steer information to the right people at the top for effect.

[lumberjack_jeff]

71. In order:

1) some communications are born classified. Emails between the SoS and Commander of United States Central Command, unless they are about cocktail recipes, fall into that category.

2) most of the confidential information she recieved was from Sidney Blumenthal, who had no security clearance whatsoever. Her duty as SoS was to plug that security leak, not cultivate it.

Are you suggesting that her act of backing those emails up to the cloud is de-facto declassification?

[pnwmom]

103. And there is no evidence that she used her server to communicate with the Commander of USCC.

However, U Michigan law Professor Richard Lembert, whose experience is noted below, explains that the regulations do not say that any information is so sensitive it must be classified, or, in your words, is “born classified.”


http://prospect.org/article/why-hillary-wont-be-indicted-and-shouldnt-be-objective-legal-analysis

What follows reflects the knowledge and experience I have gained from working at the Department of Homeland Security from 2008 until 2011. While there, I took the lead in drafting a security classification manual for one of the divisions of the DHS science and technology directorate. In this discussion, I offer answers to questions about the former secretary of state’s email that have not been frequently asked, but should be.

SNIP

These standards make it difficult to conclude that Clinton violated any law regarding the disclosure of classified information. As indicated by the word “may,” which I italicized, the regulations do not require that any information, no matter how sensitive, be classified. They also indicate that when in doubt information should not be classified or should be classified at the lowest level consistent with national security. Not only was Secretary Clinton the ultimate authority within the State Department to determine whether State Department information should be classified, but she was also the ultimate authority in determining whether classified information should be declassified. Moreover, declassification when done at the highest level appears to require no formal procedure. Indeed, we have a history of high-level officials engaging in “instant declassification,” most notably by leaking classified information to the press for political or strategic advantage. Since the leakers are typically speaking off the record or on deep background, some disclosures may have been made by people lacking the authority to declassify information, instantly or otherwise. No such leaker has been criminally prosecuted, and so long as the authorization to reveal classified information was approved at the cabinet level, it is unlikely that anyone could be.

[lumberjack_jeff]

107. Evidence? The emails themselves don't count?

The Justice Department found the mails from January and February 2009 when they were supplied during the investigation of Gen Petraeus.

The problem?
a) Clinton said she supplied all of her emails... which she clearly hadn't.
b) Clinton explained the lack of emails from early in her tenure as because she didn't start using her personal email server until March 2009... when she clearly did.

Both claims are now known to be lies.

https://news.vice.com/article/government-finds-emails-with-david-petraeus-that-hillary-clinton-didnt-hand-over

[pnwmom]

108. Did you read Prof. Lempert's article? n/t

[lumberjack_jeff]

109. In what way does the article disprove the fact that Petraeus and Clinton corresponded insecurely?

Worse, when Clinton lied about the correspondence?

[pnwmom]

110. So you are not going to read it. Your mind is made up so further discussion is pointless. n/t

[merrily]

76. With tens of thousands of emails, it seems as though you should have more than 2 questions.

However, you say you can't be bothered to read a long document that already exists, so you expect people other people to break it down for you? And, in the course of making that unreasonable request, you insult those you are asking to do more work because you can't be bothered to do any, you insult them by calling them truthers to boot? Wow, talk about a sense of entitlement!

Given all that, I have no idea why anyone arsed himself or herself to try to accommodate you.

[ContinentalOp]

82. I feel bad about the "truther" thing,

especially since the guy it was aimed at has politely answered my questions in this thread. Still, I think it's strange that people seem so certain that there's criminal wrongdoing yet aren't able to explain it in a concise way. I guess it's an inherently complex topic, but the complexity and the gray areas won't necessarily help convince people that there was clear intentional wrongdoing. I think it's natural for Democrats to be skeptical when there's such a long pattern of these types of investigations against the Clintons where one thing doesn't pan out but it leads to another thing which also doesn't pan out but finally after a long open-ended investigation, they dig up something minor that other government officials are guilty of and ultimately isn't that important to the public.

[merrily]

84. That was a very nice reply.

Because you are a Hillary supporter and I am not, I think we may have very different views of past investigations of the Clintons, how evidence and witnesses were handled, how witnesses behaved, and what "doesn't pan out" means. Even with all that, I think it's clear that the Paula Jones lawsuit was not frivolous, that a sitting President perjured himself before a grand jury that Susan McDougal accepted a sentence of 18 months in prison rather than answer just 3 questions about Bill Clinton, that the testimony of Jim McDougal was suspect at best, and that Hillary Clinton has now TWICE sorted through evidence for two or more years before turning it over, once as First Lady after receiving a subpoena of law firm billing records (so no excuse about her daughter's wedding or her mother's funeral there--law firm records are not personal--and once as former Secretary of state. If witnesses, including a President, don't tell the truth and evidence is so carefully sifted through before being turned over, guess what? A prosecutor is going to have a very tough time coming up with enough evidence to prosecute. That does not mean no wrongdoing occurred.

[paulthompson]

88. "truther"

I am annoyed at labels like that. I think the fact that my book was used in a Harvard class taught by Richard Clarke, counterterrorism tsar at the time of 9/11 and under Bill Clinton too, speaks for itself. There are a lot of unanswered questions about 9/11 that are still unanswered. Look at how the "28 pages" about possible Saudi involvement in the attack are about to be finally released in the next few weeks as just one example. I think it's sad that people like me who wanted to find out the truth about what happened with such a pivotal event are derided.

Anyway, I'm glad that you at least seem open to having a rational discussion instead of mocking people like me as "dreaming of the indictment fairy" or the like. I hope more Clinton supporters will be open to discussion about this topic.

I'm trying to promote the idea that we need to see what the real facts of this scandal are and deal with them instead of burying our heads in the sand and pretending the scandal doesn't exist. That latter approach will guarantee that Democrats will be blindsided by Trump regarding this if Clinton and Trump face off in the general election.

[Thinkingabout]

78. Have you kept up with any of the proceedings?

No there are not any emails which were marked classified at the time they were sent. This marking classified process after the emails were sent was also questioned by Powell. Perhaps Bush's EO did not continue after Bush left office.

[paulthompson]

94. Yes there were

Look at post #55 and the following discussion, for starters. Here's a bit to get you started:

Let's imagine that you're Secretary Clinton and you get this email from Sid Blumenthal, who is a private citizen with no security clearance at the time, but it obviously getting real classified information from somewhere, based on the hundreds of emails he sends to Clinton:

In July 2012, he sent Clinton an email about Egypt he said was "CONFIDENTIAL," which is the third level of classified information according to US government regulations. Then he gave this warning: "SOURCE: Sources with access to the highest levels of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, The Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, and Western Intelligence and security services. THE FOLLOWING INFORMATION COMES FROM AN EXTREMELY SENSITIVE SOURCE AND SHOULD BE HANDLED WITH CARE."

Now, is that not ample warning, at the time, that that email contains classified information? (And by the way, the all caps are in the original email.)

As far as Powell goes, he was upset that two emails sent to him were deemed classified (at the lowest level) years later. But the official report on that stated those emails contained no intelligence information whatsoever and were classified for other, unknown reasons. Whereas Clinton had over 2,000 emails deemed classified, many of them sent by her. A totally different situation.

[Bob41213]

100. You sound like Hillary's spokesperson

https://oig.state.gov/system/files/statement_of_the_icig_and_oig_regarding_review_of_clintons_emails_july_24_2015.pdf

These emails were not retroactively classified by the State
Department; rather these em ails contained classified information when they were generated
and, according to IC classification officials, that information remains classified today. This
classified information should never have been transmitted via an unclassified personal system.


Now, obviously these could not be MARKED CLASSIFIED because Hillary refused to use the classified system. The only ones that were MARKED CLASSIFIED were the ones Sid sent her that he got from his CIA leak.

So regardless of if you want to use the retroactive excuse, there was stuff that was classified (NOT RETROACTIVE) but not marked and there was stuff that Sid marked classified that was classified. Take your pick.

[HereSince1628]

105. This -ISN'T- going to end as a matter of HRC's outgoing email

Hillary got Sid Blumenthal a job at the Clinton Foundation when Obama refused to allow him to be hired as a special adviser.

In his -civilian role- as an employee of the Clinton Foundation he acted as a conduit of leaked information from a mole in the CIA.

1). She had an obligation underlaw to report her knowledge of a leak. She didn't report the leak.

instead

2) She encouraged the continued leaking of information from America's premier intelligence agency


In short Clinton conspired to operate a spying operation against the CIA, using Sid Blumenthal to identify and exploit at least one and possibly more moles in the CIA, transfering the information in real time using the Clinton Foundation as a cover.