The odds of a Hillary Clinton indictment are slim to none. However, that doesn’t mean that this won’t continue to be a source of ongoing controversy going forward. I have suspected for a while that while the chances of an actual indictment are slim, the chances of the appearance of impropriety is high, and with years of emails to dig through and release to the public, I suspect that some of the most embarrassing information is being withheld until October – something like ties between the Clinton Foundation and Al Qaida supporters or the Chinese Communist Party. I doubt that actual ties exist but perhaps something like a fifth or sixth degree of separation.
It will be a source of controversy as long as she remains politically relevant regardless of what the facts are, Asahi.
When you’re talking about ‘5th and 6th degrees of separation’, aren’t you essentially including everybody in the world?
And I love “October surprise” theories, always feared but never materializing. I really think that “October Surprise” theories can be classified as a conspiracy theory. Here’s mine: The reason the judge waited to start the civil trial in November is because of the slight possibility that Trump will win: the trial will give President-elect Trump ample opportunity to break laws regarding judicial tampering, giving Congress immediate grounds for Impeachment for High Crimes and Misdemeanors. Judge Curiel will be the savior of America! 
I really don’t see how it invalidates my point.
Your invalid argument was that since important, sensitive matters crossed her desk,* they must necessarily have been dealt with through her BlackBerry.
In actual fact, Clinton did not conduct all the business of the State Department through her BlackBerry. She conducted business using conversations in person, conversations by telephone, State Department computers and cables, and even physical documents, among other alternatives to using a BlackBerry and nothing else.
Your construction:
—contains the tacit implication that the reason Clinton is Bad and Wrong is that she used her BlackBerry for all that “secret info on negotiations, intelligence [and] policy”–for all that crossed her desk. But for that to be true, we would have to assume that she did her entire job through the BlackBerry. We would have to assume that she did no part of the job through in-person and telephone conversations, through State Department cables, etc.
And that’s plainly ridiculous.
*(see the quoted posts below for the beginning of the discussion)
Your suggestion that I’m trying to use weasel words here is misguided. The imminent drone strikes are mentioned in the article I posted upthread and expressly mentioned in my post citing that article.
You cannot see some room for her to address this issue between ignoring it and programming software to solve it?
My point was not that nothing of importance “crosses her desk”, she was SecState, so, of course, yes, duh! My point was that not everything is important, hence my jocular reference to flower arrangements. I’m sure that she maked decisions about things that require no classification or security at all. Whether that business is conducted by Blackberry or by secret couriers is of no importance.
Protocols were evaded, rules were broken. That should not have happened. But if that is all, then it ain’t much.
I don’t think you appreciate just how likely it is that multiple foreign governments have all of her emails, or the level of sensitivity of the things discussed in them.
It is more likely than not that countries like Russia have all of them, given the vulnerabilities known to exist on her server, Russia’s capabilities, and the likelihood of targeting her. And we know that lots of the emails did contain sensitive matters. Perhaps not things like nuclear launch codes, but quite a bit more sensitive than floral arrangements.
You posted at the very beginning. Am I being offered a homework assignment, to read the article entire and search out your reference and source? Sounds like work. I hate work.
Further, you misunderstand the thrust of my question. Not any suggestion of weasel-think, but wondering why it didn’t occur to you, as it occurred to me, to wonder about the source of such a radioactive factoid. Of course, such drone strikes would necessarily be secret, I imagine past as well as future or current. But who divulged that factoid, which we agree should have been secret? To what end, who authorized such a release of info?
Seems to me that you have a healthy streak of skeptical suspicion, has it failed you?
I can see some room between what she would want to do and what is actually possible. She has no background in such technology. Therefore, she must trust others for the straight truth.
Be that as it may, she is invested with discretion. If in her view, a communication does not merit extra scrutiny for security concerns, it most likely does not. If that breached some protocol, then perhaps a letter or reprimand might be placed in her file, though her career at State might suffer…
And if she were not running for Prez, that’s probably all that would happen.
Damn, a double successive ninja? How you do that?
It was the post the re-bumped this thread, immediately preceding your comments. But here you go, no need to scroll up.
But, instead of trusting the people who knew more, she told them she’d do what they wanted and then ignored them. Among the many better things she could have done would be to raise holy hell about the problem. It is unacceptable that our diplomats communicate using clear channels about sensitive information. The responsible thing to do about that, at a minimum, is complain! And, I suspect, that’s the least she could have done.
Richard Parker, Congratulations! You have seen the light.
Anyone on this board have a security clearance, or know someone who does?
Ask them, regardless of party affiliation, what they think about this.
Anyone who chalks this up as “no big deal” is either deluding themselves or has no idea what security classifications are all about, nor do they understand the rules on handling classified emails.
Here, let me help you.
This is an open letter to Obama, written by a number of intelligence officials.
(And before you Clinton fans start complaining about the website, pick whatever website you wish… This is an open letter and it is posted on a number of different sites, and they all are the same. I linked to the first one that came up in my search).
If what I have read is true, Hillary Clinton should be indicted on espionage charges.
Whether or not she is actually charged has nothing to do with the law, and everything to do with power and politics.
The woman is a flat-out criminal. And she knows that her supporters are not paying attention and/or simply don’t care.
The US has turned into a pathetic reality TV show. I honestly don’t understand how anyone with a brain could vote for this woman. Don’t like Trump? Fine. But for all that is holy, is this the best we can do?
Read the letter carefully… The FBI and the NSA know. If there is any justice left in the United States, she should be going to jail. And this is why Bernie Sanders is staying in the race. He would be crazy to pull out now.
Yes I read the letter, and gave up as soon as I noticed that they had swallowed what the “Guccifer” hacker declared.
Well I have read a lot of letters like that in the past, they usually come from former experts that are not longer involved that usually do take a position at odds of what the ones that are involved in current events or science journals are reporting (many times the odd position they get is based on politics first and then the information is made to match their opinion). Seen them before in cases like IQ and race, climate change denial, tobacco smoke not causing cancer, etc etc.
I have had security clearance. I know the classification system inside and out. I have also worked in IT. And I’m not impressed.
You’ll also notice an interesting regularity…the big names on that list all worked/were appointed under Dubyah’s administration. Funny how that works out. Why would any of those people have any reason to criticize Hillary?
For the umpteenth time…give me a break.
I didnt use the word Blackberry once so I have no idea wtf you’re on about.
I did a search for it and literally every site was derp.
Wouldn’t you just know it, a pay-wall, and my subscription to the Wall Street Journal has lapsed. Again.
Intrepid Google monkey, “Clinton e-mails drone strikes” did the job, gave me a wealth of links to news outlets with essentially the same story. Best I can tell, just skimming, pretty much all of them rely on the same WSJ story. Except one.
From January, discussing the same events of 2011 and 2012
Now, I do not claim to be in a position to offer authoritative discernment about these two diverging narratives, though the latter does seem rather more calm. Perhaps if I just hum a few bars of “It Ain’t Necessarily So”?
Perhaps. Would she have done so publicly, would that have been wise? Or would we be arguing whether or not she damaged national security by drawing our enemies attention to our deficiencies?
Sadly, I’m afraid I haven’t seen the same light you’re looking at. I think it is quite unlikely that Hillary Clinton committed a crime. I think she was probably negligent, but not grossly negligent, much less reckless. Nor do I think it would be an intelligent exercise of prosecutorial discretion to go after her, given that it would be a departure from how such cases have been prosecuted in the past.
I didn’t get a pay-wall, and I have no subscription. Try googling the headline and clicking the link. I’ll quote the relevant part:
You’re obviously free to disbelieve that reporting, but there are no “diverging narratives.” The NBC story is talking about the separate issue of whether any discussion of the drone program violates the classification rules. It does, but I think that’s a clear example of over-classification and do not fault Hillary for it.
You’re suggesting that she did so privately. By all indications–including that she continued to use these same systems, which would have been a pretty huge bit of hypocrisy if she had–she did not.
I was active duty military – now I’m a military civilian. I’ve had a security clearance for many years. Hillary made mistakes and exercised poor judgment in handling email. These are marks against her, but IMO she’d be a far, far better choice than Trump even with a hundred such marks against her. From my understanding, there’s no evidence of criminality. In my experience, mishandling classified information is very common (someone emailing classified stuff on the wrong server; leaving out a classified doc in public; forgetting to mark something classified), and never results in criminal sanctions unless it was done for profit or for treasonous reasons. I’ve seen it dozens of times, and the worst punishment for mishandling classified info by foolishness that I’ve ever seen was a months-long ban from transmitting or carrying classified data along with a retraining period on proper handling procedures.
I endorse every statement in this post, and do not see it to contradict anything I’ve said in this thread.