No, and you answered your own question.
OK, so Obama is using the Espionage Act of 1917. Under what law was the Bush administration acting when it outed Valerie Plame?
The “relevant legal authority” in this case being the Secretary of State?
What about sending classified email to your AOL account? Is that Ok?
“But Colin Powell did it too!” is not a valid argument.
And doesn’t answer the question. Is it OK to send classified emails to an AOL account under the rules/laws/regs which Spifflog cited?
The “Colin Powell did it too” is a valid arguement as it demonstrates how this is nothing but a partisan, political witch hunt.
Well they just found out about the Powell emails.
Anyway, no one is saying it’s ok. It’s clearly not. The issue to large degree is just how recklessly/knowingly it was done. The fact that a seasoned handler of secret info like Powell could make similar mistakes is an argument against it being about Hillary necessarily being stupid or careless.
I strongly disagree.
What evidence do you have that Hillary Clinton’s actions were worse than Powell’s? Are you willing to support as much congressional inquiry into Powell as has been directed at Clinton?
This is insanely poor defense. Even if what Colin Powell did was wrong, have you possibly considered the magnitude of the difference. Powell has 2 emails that are now considered classified sent to a personal account. Rice’s staff, not her, had 10 emails that are now considered classified. Clinton has 1,200 and counting that were considered classified including top secret classifications.
Further, is there anyone who doesn’t think the reason she did this was to avoid FOIA disclosures?
The sheer numbers and the classification. They’re not even in the same universe. Seriously you think 2 classified emails is equivalent to hundreds of classified and tens of top secret?
I have no doubt that some stuff is over-classified with the information largely being in the public domain already. Having said that, isn’t there a far greater chance that Powell’s 2 classified emails are of this variety than the 1,200+ Clinton emails that we know includes some with top secret classifications?
So do you support a congressional investigative effort toward Powell that is about 1% of that directed toward Clinton?
I could buy that, accepting these numbers for the sake of argument, Clinton had greater opportunity for mishandling, but what’s the evidence that she did more mishandling than Powell?
According to a recent New York Times story, it sounds like the current count of classified Clinton emails is 1,564 with 18 secret, and 22 top secret. They are reviewing 3,700 more, so these counts will probably change. These are emails both received by and sent by Clinton.
Powell has 2 marked confidential and he disputes that they should have that classification.
No, I think the FBI investigation is sufficient and less likely to be a partisan witch hunt. I don’t support a congressional investigation into this issue at all.
I don’t really understand your question. Doesn’t the fact that we’re talking 2 versus 1,500+ count as pretty damn good evidence that there’s more mishandling all on its own?
If that’s your standard of evidence, then I have to ask if you own guns. If you do, then there’s “pretty damn good evidence” that someone has been shot to death in your house, at least compared to my house, since I don’t have any guns.
Personally, I’d want to see some evidence that someone was actually shot, first.
You’ve lost me. You’re asking what evidence is there that Clinton mishandled confidential material more than Powell, right? Any email of confidential material would be an example of mishandling, particularly so if you are the one emailing it, right? So isn’t the fact that she mishandled so many more by sheer count evidence that she did more mishandling? The questions seems self-answering.
Are you asking what evidence there is that he or she mishandled them more disregarding the initial mishandling? Like okay, we already have evidence that confidential information is now in their personal possession, now what matters is what they did with it? If Powell printed it out and left it in a coffee shop that would be evidence that he mishandled it more? I guess my answer who be that the two Powell emails were sent to him by ambassadors (sent to his assistant who then forwarded it to Powell). We have no idea what happened after that. Clinton on the other hand includes instances of her emailing classified stuff to her daughter. I’d say the latter sounds much worse to me.
It’s not so much a defense as a means to learn about the motives of those who pursue this issue.
If their response is “what Colin and Condy did was different, and, anyway, it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as Hillary”, then that strongly implies that the purpose is purely political and should be addressed as such.
If the response is “Top secret emails should never be transmitted by anything but the most secure systems, and the Colin and Condy transgressions demonstrate a shockingly cavalier attitude in the State Dept that may be institutional, beyond Hillary Clinton, and it all needs to be investigated”, that implies a principled stand.
That’s it. Not at all a defense, just an exploration of motives. Given that further reading shows that you are more interested in talking about the scale of the violations viz the three implies heavily as to which side you’re leaning…
Only for the ones that ignore that bit of the constitution, that most Americans and the courts agree with, that ex-post facto punishments or laws are not what we should be about.
And what about the up to 22 million emails lost by the Bush WH, stored on RNC servers, that were deleted during a Congressional investigation in 2007? Are you interested in learning more about them? Or is it just Hillary’s “violations” in which your concerned?
Regardless of whether or not there is a requirement to use a government email account, wouldn’t there always have been a requirement to safeguard confidential information.
Why? Doesn’t it imply that there may be an institutional problem at the State Dept regarding email security, especially at the highest levels?