Snowden: Clinton's Private Email Server Is a 'Problem'

An anonymous reader points out comments from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden in a new interview with Al Jazeera about Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server while she was the U.S. Secretary of State. Snowden said, "Anyone who has the clearances that the Secretary of State has or the director of any top level agency has knows how classified information should be handled. When the unclassified systems of the United States government — which has a full time information security staff — regularly get hacked, the idea that someone keeping a private server ... is completely ridiculous." While Snowden didn't feel he had enough information to say Clinton's actions were a threat to national security, he did say that less prominent government employees would have probably been prosecuted for doing the same thing. For her part, Clinton said she used the private server out of convenience: "I was not thinking a lot when I got in. There was so much work to be done. We had so many problems around the world. I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be."

Comments

total bullshit?

[mveloso]

Clinton: "I was so busy dealing with the world's problems that instead of using my work email that I get for free I got some guy I knew to build a server for me, my associates, and my husband's foundation."

Does anyone actually believe this line of bullshit?

Re:total bullshit?

[ganjadude]

no but this gem, i believe

I was not thinking a lot

Re:total bullshit?

[shrikel]

Apparently 46.1% of Democrats do. Though that's down from as high as 75% in July

Re:total bullshit?

[fustakrakich]

Does anyone actually believe this line of bullshit?

Unfortunately, yes... It should be obvious. Lots of people are going to vote for her regardless... There's not a lot that be done. Maybe, if we can wake up the non-voting block, it might be possible to defeat democrats and republicans. Even together they are a minority block of less than 40%.

Re:total bullshit?

[rmdingler]

no but this gem, i believe

I was not thinking a lot

We hold some truths to be self-evident.

I mean, FFS, the Clintons have been in positions of power for what? 36 years... (since the 1st term began as Governor of Arkansas.)

It's clear she should have an inkling how to act in office, and yet, like so many of the political ilk, she uses her skills for evil instead of good.

Re:total bullshit?

[TWX]

Does anyone actually believe this line of bullshit?

Honestly, if she was using the e-mail address associated with that SMTP server before she become Secretary of State, yes.

Most people don't like to use several e-mail accounts. It's a pain in the butt. If she was used to using that one and used it as she communicated with the officials that became her superiors and subordinates before becoming Secretary of State while planning the transition, then they were used to contacting here there and she was used to contacting them from there.

Should she have switched to a government-provided e-mail account? Probably. I don't say, "absolutely," specifically because of the high profile leaks that we've seen over the last decade, such that the mail might actually have been safer on that server that no one thought to compromise than on a government one.

As an aside, Governor Palin used private e-mail for government functions too, actually registering addresses with public mail servers (yahoo if I remember right) after becoming Governor of Alaska, and specifically citing her newly-found position as the account name. There was no prosecution over that either.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes.
While she may have been busy and not given it any thought, she should have surrounded herself with people who could think, and could make sensible decisions and implemented them. The fact that she didn't do this is pretty damning.

Re:total bullshit?

[rmdingler]

Palin panders to that minority of the right wing that buys the Obama 'birther' and Muslim arguments; apparently the same crowd that initially encouraged Trump.

Hillary cannot hide behind the retarded defense as believably as Sarah.

It's much more likely she saw an advantage to being able to delete her own emails

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, I do. Which is scary because it makes her look simply incompetent and otherwise ill-prepared for responsibility. I almost wish there was some nefarious scheme to hide her communications from prying eyes, or to have done it after realizing how poorly secured the official servers are. Something. This whole "I didn't realize it was going to be a problem" excuse just scares me.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

How a person thinks about a presidential candidate's ability to be president is not synonymous with their believing every. single. thing. that. candidate. said.

Does that mean all those Trump supporters believe he has never lied? I doubt it.

Re:total bullshit?

[The Grim Reefer]

no but this gem, i believe

I was not thinking a lot

I like this one:

"I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be."

Isn't this why they have a staff to make these decisions and procedures in place as to how the "email system" should be?

Clinton said she used the private server out of convenience

Oh, so we should all be able to make these kinds of decisions for our own convenience. Obviously that's the most important consideration.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. She thought she wasn't leaving a paper trail which could lalter be used against her if she said or did something she might later regret.

Re:total bullshit?

[BoRegardless]

You can tell when she is lying. Her lips move!

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, if you're not willing to prosecute Bush for not thinking, why the zealism to get Hillary prosecuted?..

Re:total bullshit?

[davester666]

I'm sure it was more like "The rules only apply the schlubs, they don't apply to me."

Re:total bullshit?

[Obfuscant]

Should she have switched to a government-provided e-mail account? Probably. I don't say, "absolutely," specifically because of the high profile leaks ...

Leaks or not, the law says she was supposed to use her secure government-provided email for work. She ignored that law.

As an aside, Governor Palin used private e-mail for government functions too,

Sarah Palin was not in a position to deal with classified material on a regular basis, and therefore the only laws she violated were public records laws. Clinton violated those laws as well as security regulations.

Re:total bullshit?

[roccomaglio]

Way to muddy the waters. Palin used her official state email. She also used a yahoo email. It is illegal to use official email for campaigning tasks. So you have to have both. Someone hacked her yahoo account and release all her emails. She did not get to decide what was released. All of her emails were released she did not get to pick which ones were released. Hillary not only picked the emails that were released she carefully wiped the server with multiple writes to prevent anyone from being able to recover emails. If she had used yahoo the FBI which is investigating her emails activity (classified TS/SCI information) could have received a copy of all her emails.

Re:total bullshit?

[guises]

Sure, I do. If I were taking over as Secretary of State the particular email server which I was using would not be the first thing on my mind. I know a lot of Slashdotters think of the tech stuff first and the other stuff never, but that isn't the job she was doing. I think that's completely plausible.

Now at some point this probably should have occurred to her IT staff, but since there was no rule against what she was doing and there had been no scandals about this previously maybe they decided it didn't matter. Remember how Palin was using private email for public stuff and nobody really cared? Or, since we're talking about security, maybe they were just so cocksure that they felt they could handle it. Which, to be fair, they seem to have done. I find that plausible as well.

Re:total bullshit?

[sphealey]

Strangely this was not a problem for the hard Radical Right when Karl Rove created the same setup for the Bush Administration (probably a violation of the Federal Records Act for a President and his White House advisors) and then ordered the backup tapes destroyed when it was discovered (definitely a violation of multiple federal laws and regulations). IOKIYAR.

sPh

Re:total bullshit?

[LetterRip]

Leaks or not, the law says she was supposed to use her secure government-provided email for work. She ignored that law.

No it didn't say that till two years after she left office. Also the government email isn't secure and can only be used for non secure communication. Secure communications require usage of an internal distribution server that is secure and is not actually email.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's 'zealotry,' fool.

Re:total bullshit?

[ganjadude]

bush isnt in power and isnt seeking power. i hated bush (my post history shows as much) but move on

hillary can do damage still, bush cant

Re:total bullshit?

[Dutch Gun]

but since there was no rule against what she was doing

No, that's the problem. There were not only rules, but there were laws against what she was doing. Had you or I broken those laws, then ignored a federal order to turn over those e-mails and wiped our e-mail server instead, we'd be sitting in an iron cage right now.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

While I think Palin is a moron who was gonna arrest her? Herself? She was head of her State's executive branch and already a joke.

Re:total bullshit?

[sphealey]

= = = No it didn't say that till two years after she left office.= = =

Factual and correct.

Re:total bullshit?

[towermac]

No, I don't remember Palin using her Yahoo account for government business.

I remember that it is a felony to use the government email for campaigning and other non-government uses.
I also remember scores of times in her hacked and published Yahoo mail where she said, "...this is government business, please reply to my .gov account..."

But no, I don't remember her executing gubernatorial duties through her Yahoo account. I'm pretty sure the Democrats would have seized on such a thing, but if you have something they missed, please, share it.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Defending Secrertary of State Hillary's behaviour by asserting Governor Palin did something similar? Wow, you must be desperate...

Why don't you just cite the Scott Gration situation? Oh, yeah, because he got fired for it (among other reasons)...

Re:total bullshit?

[slew]

Now at some point this probably should have occurred to her IT staff, but since there was no rule against what she was doing and there had been no scandals about this previously maybe they decided it didn't matter.

But apparently there was a scandal about using non-official email: Scott Gration (former Ambassador to Kenya). As I recall, Hillary actually ended up firing him after the office of inspector general report came out about him (I think technically he tendered his resignation right before the report came out, but that's equivalent to firing in the world of government). It's just that not using official email wasn't the only thing he was fired for, so people don't remember it too well (it was buried in the other stuff in the report about him being a loose cannon and generally getting no respect from his staff).

Maybe Hillary's staff didn't read that report too carefully either. Kinda makes you wonder if her insiders/staffers are competent enough to run the US government if she was elected... We all know politicians don't really that kind of stuff, so they (and by transitivity, we) are relying on these insider/staffers of candidates to be somewhat competent, no?

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Should she have?? Yes, there are govt. regulations and policies in place that would normally require her to do so. It's becoming fairly obvious that the Clintons were selling secrets to the highest bidders.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe it. Her work email system fucking sucks. That's why private email servers were used almost exclusively until they put a stop to it and said you have to use the work email.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Her lips *don't* move. That's why Bubba-Bill Clinton went to an intern for "assistance".

Re:total bullshit?

[slew]

but since there was no rule against what she was doing

No, that's the problem. There were not only rules, but there were laws against what she was doing. Had you or I broken those laws, then ignored a federal order to turn over those e-mails and wiped our e-mail server instead, we'd be sitting in an iron cage right now.

With the advance of technology since the 70's, 18 1/2 minutes of tape is equivalent to about 100 servers now, so just wiping 1 server is only like a 10 seconds or so, not much to get worked up about, it could have accidentally happened when people were transcribing the emails, right? Maybe her chief of staff should blame this whole thing on a "sinister force" ;^)

Re:total bullshit?

[LetterRip]

No, that's the problem. There were not only rules, but there were laws against what she was doing. Had you or I broken those laws, then ignored a federal order to turn over those e-mails and wiped our e-mail server instead, we'd be sitting in an iron cage right now.

According to the State Department she violated neither policies nor laws.

The retention laws only required that copies of relevent emails be saved but it didn't specify how - one of the ways that was accepted was printing out the emails, another was to CC a government email address that would retain the email.

There have been new laws, that were enacted two years after she left office that would now require usage of a government email address for correspondence or a copy of the correspondence to be on a government server within 15 days.

Re:total bullshit?

[Culture20]

Hillary not only picked the emails that were released she carefully wiped the server with multiple writes

According to her, she used a cloth.

Re:total bullshit?

[Known Nutter]

Isn't this why they have a staff to make these decisions and procedures in place as to how the "email system" should be?

Yes, there are IT staff responsible for this. So, what role did those folks have in allowing classified e-mail to leave (and re-enter) the network? Or are we supposed to believe that she just appended her signature block to hillary@mysever.com and nobody noticed when Bashar al-Assad asked Clinton for her biscuit recipe? Did Clinton just use an auto-forwarder configured in an Outlook client?

Can someone clue me in on the technical background of this? FFS, I can't send a single e-mail from my corporate network without the legal bullshit automatically appended.

Re:total bullshit?

[ganjadude]

i know right? next you are gonna tell me "but washington was for freedom of speech? we cant stop her!"

bush isnt in office, and isnt running for office. bush can no longer harm us anymore

hillary can

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

You do know that Hillary Clinton was the first birther, right? Seriously.... look it up.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Except your talking point ignores that federal law (appropriately) prohibits the use of govt email for political campaigning. Hence, almost every sitting politician has two accounts. However, most of them have figured out that following the law is better than blatantly hiding records by using only their personal email.

Re:total bullshit?

[jmac_the_man]

As an aside, Governor Palin used private e-mail for government functions too, actually registering addresses with public mail servers (yahoo if I remember right) after becoming Governor of Alaska, and specifically citing her newly-found position as the account name. There was no prosecution over that either.

There was prosecution over that. The son-of-a-Democrat-state-Congressman who hacked her email was convicted and IIRC, he did jail time. But there was no official business in Palin's emails. Remember, the emails at one point were in the custody of the son of an elected official from the Democratic Party. If there was anything incriminating in that email, you'd think the kid, or his father, or his father's party, would have publicized it better.

Re:total bullshit?

[jmac_the_man]

Also the government email isn't secure and can only be used for non secure communication. Secure communications require usage of an internal distribution server that is secure and is not actually email..

???

Secret email is email. It's on a segregated, airgapped network, but it's still POP3 or IMAP and SMTP. Everyone who works for the government has a regular email address that you can't use for classified communications, and then if you have access to be on a classified network, you have an additional email address on the classified side.

Re:total bullshit?

[Dutch Gun]

According to the State Department, the former head of the State Department violated neither policies nor laws.

Well, case closed then!

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Leaks or not, the law says she was supposed to use her secure government-provided email for work. She ignored that law.

No it didn't say that till two years after she left office. Also the government email isn't secure and can only be used for non secure communication.

Nice cherry-pick, but her home email server is not considered secure communications either. I'll address the "two years after she left office" below.

Secure communications require usage of an internal distribution server that is secure and is not actually email.

What in the fuck are you talking about? Secure communications are carried out using the same fucking tools as unclassified communications on networks that appear *nearly* the fucking the same to end-users. In this context, ZOMFG, Hillary is an end-user. One that is a headache for admins, but an end-fucking-user nonetheless.

There is literally nothing Hillary could do better on her home server than she could do on the state department's servers, except violate the Federal Records Act; unless of course your argument is that the functional portion of 44 U.S. Code 3101 (June 30, 1949, ch. 288, title V, 506(a), as added Sept. 5, 1950, ch. 849, 6(d),64 Stat. 58) was not in effect when Hillary left office in Feb 2013 (hint: she was just shy of 3 when the law went into effect). For fuck's sake, the law was modified halfway through her term, by Obama's executive order and she still fucked that up (regardless of your feelings about EOrders and their impact on Federal agencies, agency heads are expected to salute the flagpole or GTFO).

I find it really hard to believe neither of the lawyers in that family could see that was a bad idea. I picture the dumber of the two saying something to the effect of "Um, hon, running an email server out of the house for SECSTATE business is dumber than me sticking a cigar up Monica's hoo-hoo and then cumming on her dress."

Look! I'd really, really like to embrace Hillary as a candidate, but I find her history of sneaky, slimy, dishonesty fairly well established.

I also hate every Republican candidate, for varying reasons. I hope I'm not put into a position of choosing between one of them and her in the ballot booth.

Quit trying to defend her. Stop siding with THEM. I gives a fuck - one side or the other PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING, FLOAT A CANDIDATE THAT IS SOMETHING OTHER THAN A FUNCTIONAL RETARD SLURPING ON THE GENITALS OF MULTIPLE 501(c)(3) PACs.

Let us all stop being sheep, please.

Re:total bullshit?

[multimediavt]

bush isnt in power and isnt seeking power. i hated bush (my post history shows as much) but move on hillary can do damage still, bush cant

Yes, let's move on for a war criminal wanted for crimes against humanity and focus on a mail server that was receiving non-classified email as much as a state state.gov address would have received the same emails as a non-classified email server. Clinton's "crimes" are a tempest in a teapot compared to what Bush & Co. are charged with. I have no love for Hillary and she will NEVER receive a vote from me EVER, but Snowden was a contract sysadmin NOT a security analyst for the CIA! There are more competent and experienced people that have already said that the worst thing that could happen to Clinton is a reprimand, not prosecution, and no, I'm not doing your homework for you, you can go look it up your damn self. Y'all watch too much Fox "News" and the rest of the propaganda channels.

Re:total bullshit?

[penguinoid]

"I'm stupid, not malicious."

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

If she had used yahoo the FBI which is investigating her emails activity (classified TS/SCI information) could have received a copy of all her emails.

Even Hillary wasn't dropping SCI on her home server. That's insane paranoia. Seriously, get a grip. She's dishonest, but she's informed enough not to fuck that up.

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

1) that was then this is now.
2) when the republicans used the GOP server and deleted the emails why is that different.
3) it was not againts any rule ay rule time.
4) that is why it is not done any more. It's proven to be a dumb idea.
5) if the email was on government servers then snowden would have stolen them and broadcast them.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Name a single "war crime" Bush committed. Please, go ahead.

I'm waiting...

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, you do know that Hillary is responsible for the Obama birther claims, right?

It was her campaign the pushed the idea during the 2008 primaries.

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Presidents can modify laws with an executive order?
Any law?
Or just regulations?

I was speeding the other day.
I broke the law. Am I bar from running for office?
What is the prescribed penilty for her infraction? Is it a capital crime?

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Things are either classified or they are not. The government unclassified system she should of used did not have some in between classification that made it somehow superior for classified information storage. If anything the shared server would be more of a mess to clean up, since it would bring down countless people's work email to do so. If it was contaminated they would likely yank the cord and pull the machine into an appropriate secure area, along with every machine that received the email or had the potential to cache it. Of course they might have an official plan for cleaning up spills on the official server, given that it is almost certainly going to happen from time to time. This is especially true if they are, as it appears, classifying things after the fact. Heck they might even have a procedure where they don't have to yank, fully clean, and reimage the server if it happens often enough. After all, it is probably easier to get the government to agree to the security plan the government wants.

Of course no one is saying that Hillary created any emails that were obviously classified at the time they were created, just that they found something that they classified after the fact. Had she deliberately, knowingly, and in a matter that could be proved sent classified information on an unclassified network, then her clearance would be pulled and she could easily face jail time, but again no one is accusing her of that. She is more or less guilty of creating her own email server, likely as a defence against her email being randomly subpoenaed by right wing politicians. It was obviously a mistake, as was probably ever sending a single email herself, given the political climate. Of course, avoiding email entirely is very difficult, but with enough help, it might be possible. She did refuse to turn it over to the right wing witch hunt committee, which I can understand, but once the justice department asked, she promptly complied, as she was legally required to do so. I'm guessing this private email server was a decision that fell out of the past Clinton witch hunts.

Still, no doubt politicians will learn. They may not be able to avoid email, but I bet they could send all government related emails on the provided classified systems. That should help them avoid the pesky FOIA requests, witch hunts, etc. After all, I don't think anyone has ever been seriously punished for over classification. Sure they might have to eventually go through each email, one at a time and determine which were truly classified and which were not, but by then said politician may easily be done with elected office. I wonder, if that happened would there be a witch hunt for inappropriate use of a classified email system? Given the nature of her work, it almost seems better just to treat it all as classified, or better yet, have all of her emails read by someone familiar with the security classification guide, then appropriately marked before treating them appropriately (sending, moving to unclassified email system, consulting experts, etc..)

In fact, by creating a position to handle proper classified data marking, a politician could have a built in target for any issues...

.

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

So you are saying the server was wiped properly?
Was she supposed to just leave the data on it?

Re:total bullshit?

[JWW]

Why the hell else is the IT guy who set this all up for her taking the fifth??

If he actually explains to anyone how he set up that private server and then connected it to the state department servers he is going to be going to jail for a looong time.

Re:total bullshit?

[guises]

This is an interesting point. If we assume that cronyism is ubiquitous then we need to consider the cronies just as much as the candidate.

In this case the cronies missed, or didn't care, that using a private server would look bad. So that's either a sign of incompetent cronies, or a sign of cronies who care more about doing their jobs than they do about playing at adversarial politics...

Re:total bullshit?

[Sarius64]

Because obviously people should be able to commit federal felonies because you dislike what a previous administration did. You're a moron.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't the NSA just print out a record of all her emails?

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ya'll must really enjoy sucking on that Right Wing elephant d*ck...

https://www.google.com/search?...

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Rules for thee, not for me."

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Honestly, if she was using the e-mail address associated with that SMTP server before she become Secretary of State, yes.

Absolutely she got that email address before she became secretary of state. She got it on the day of her confirmation hearing.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/03/02/hacked-emails-indicate-that-hillary-clinton-used-a-domain-registered-the-day-of-her-senate-hearings/

Re:total bullshit?

[Sarius64]

Then you're a moron, because all government employees and officials are required to sign NDAs and lifetime binding agreements not to disclose classified information. AFAIK, only the President and Vice President do not have to sign those agreements as a condition of employment. But please continue with your sophist bullshit as to why a sitting Cabinet member is above the law that existed since the 50's.

Re:total bullshit?

[Sarius64]

Last time I checked, the State department isn't a law enforcement agency. I'm sure the FBI gives a crap about State's input.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Torture.

Stupid fuck.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not for us, the plebe, to "believe" or not. It's expected of us that we obey and follow our Leaders without question. Ms Hillary Rodham Clinton is worth more than one hundred millions of plebeians. She is a part of the Ruling Elite. To question her judgment is treason.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Who is charged with what exactly? What court has this been filed in? You sound exactly like one of the propaganda idiots you rail against.

Re:total bullshit?

[CaptQuark]

Most people don't like to use several e-mail accounts. It's a pain in the butt. If she was used to using that one and used it as she communicated with the officials that became her superiors and subordinates before becoming Secretary of State while planning the transition, then they were used to contacting here there and she was used to contacting them from there.

"Pain in the butt" is not a justification of using a personal email account for official government business.

Should she have switched to a government-provided e-mail account? Probably. I don't say, "absolutely," specifically because of the high profile leaks that we've seen over the last decade, such that the mail might actually have been safer on that server that no one thought to compromise than on a government one.

The answer should obviously be "absolutely". The law states all official correspondence must be on a government secured system. This assures all email is kept, archived, and secured. She used a personal email system specifically to get around these safeguards, going so far as to warn her people not to use their government accounts to contact her. She knew exactly what she was doing -- keeping her comments and communications out of the government archived system.

Nixon erased 18 minutes of tape - Hillary erased 50% of her emails. Both were trying to hide things.

--

Re:total bullshit?

[hidflect]

Ah, yes... the old "Straw Man Logical Fallacy". Why, it's been days since I've seen this argument trotted out..

Re:total bullshit?

[SuricouRaven]

Almost no official business. A couple of very casual discussions along the lines or 'we should talk about this elsewhere.' She used it to send her response to a petition about the alaska.gov website. Some informal discussion of tax policies. Very trivial stuff, though. Technically some of it was probably illegal, but only according to the strictest reading of the law, and none of it appeared to be a deliberate attempt to skirt public record. Like everyone else, she just liked the convenience and informality of her own email address.

Re:total bullshit?

[Nehmo]

It's a good thing for my conscience that my felony convictions prohibit me from voting (here in the US). I don't even have one vote to offer. At least I don't have to choose between some nut-Republican and some crook-Democrat (or visa versa; whatever). I'll leave it to the clueless masses (that's you guys) to sort out.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, let's move on for a war criminal wanted for crimes against humanity. . .

You're a ditz.

Re:total bullshit?

[guises]

I'm not sure what topic you're replying to, but this was about Hillary Clinton using an independent email server. The story summary was talking about how that could be a security risk, and the person to whom I replied had stated that they believed that she knew that this would be controversial and did it anyway. I said that it seemed plausible to me that she wouldn't have given something like that much consideration.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't matter if someone agrees with your or not, you're only raising that as a distraction because everyone knows that Hillary lied and the only possible purpose of this mailserver is nefarious... or she wouldn't need to hide her dealings.

Some of us don't want another Bush or Clinton, y'know. We don't really care about the relative merits of a punch in the face vs. a turd sandwich. If you want it, you can eat the damn thing yourself.

Re:total bullshit?

[CurryCamel]

Can someone clue me in on the technical background of this?

No. This is not how /. works. Injecting opinion-less facts into the discussion only might make us feel bad during our two-minute daily hate.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

" non-classified email as much as a state state.gov address"

How do you know that? I certainly don't, I'm sure you don't either.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Does anyone actually believe this line of bullshit?

Unfortunately, yes... It should be obvious. Lots of people are going to vote for her regardless... There's not a lot that be done. Maybe, if we can wake up the non-voting block, it might be possible to defeat democrats and republicans. Even together they are a minority block of less than 40%.

http://www.factcheck.org/2008/03/presidents-winning-without-popular-vote/

http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/calculator.html

http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/electoral-college/about.html

Each candidate running for President in your state has his or her own group of electors. The electors are generally chosen by the candidate’s political party, but state laws vary on how the electors are selected and what their responsibilities are. Read more about the qualifications of the Electors and restrictions on who the Electors may vote for.

http://www.270towin.com/2016-polls/2016-general-election-matchups/#

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Cronyism.. That word doesn't mean what you think it means.

Re:total bullshit?

[cold fjord]

Yes, let's move on for a war criminal wanted for crimes against humanity and focus on a mail server that was receiving non-classified email as much as a state state.gov address would ....

Neither President Obama nor Bush is "wanted" for any "crimes against humanity" by the ICC, INTERPOL, or any government. The emails that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton turned over from her server have been found to include at least two emails with Top Secret information, and that information was always Top Secret, as well as hundreds more with classified information. The FBI is investigating this matter, has seized the server, and the emails held by her attorney. It seems pretty clear that one or more people were reckless with handling classified information, and may have passed it on to people without security clearances and an official need to know. There is a genuine possibility someone will be prosecuted for this.

Clinton emails contained spy satellite data on North Korean nukes
New Clinton Violations In Use Of Thumb Drives For Emails

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope. Nothing the US did constituted torture under US law at the time.

You also got the use of "stupid" wrong.

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed, its be. But, never heard of a honey hole? Never heard of a disinformation campaign issue? And, what would you seed it with? It would have to had some real stuff in it. But would you really trust the info to be actionable? Really?

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

The U.S. has also said it and its citizens can't be prosecuted by the world court. Guess the bully saying he can do whatever he wants in the school yard is good enough to keep him out of trouble.

Re:total bullshit?

[phantomfive]

She fired someone else in part because of having an insecure mail server.

Re:total bullshit?

[pipingguy]

How many of her government gigs were *not* because she's Bill's wife? Zero. Yuuuuge entitlement, almost royalty-like.

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not a question of the US being a bully, it is a question of politically motivated prosecution justified by extremist views. And it isn't "the world court," it is the ICC.

I think you're a fine example of why it would be insane for the US to submit itself to the ICC.

Re:total bullshit?

[pipingguy]

"Neither President Obama nor Bush is "wanted" for any "crimes against humanity" by the ICC, INTERPOL, or any government."

There you go again, patriarchically imposing objective reality upon (and oppressing) those who wish to live in their own fabricated world. Couldn't you have posted a trigger warning in advance for this microaggression?

Re:total bullshit?

[sphealey]

The damage that the Bush/Cheney Administration did to the United States will continue giving for at least the next 50 years, which is why many voters will choose any non-Radical-Right candidate no matter how flawed over the return of the Cheney/Rumsfeld/Yoo/Addington/Bolton set.

sPh

Re:total bullshit?

[amiga3D]

Get ready for Queen Hillary. On your knees, knave!

Re:total bullshit?

[Rick Zeman]

no but this gem, i believe

I was not thinking a lot

We hold some truths to be self-evident.

I mean, FFS, the Clintons have been in positions of power for what? 36 years... (since the 1st term began as Governor of Arkansas.)

It's clear she should have an inkling how to act in office, and yet, like so many of the political ilk, she uses her skills for evil instead of good.

Moreso than that, didn't she get her start as a young lawyer working on Watergate?

Re:total bullshit?

[Rick Zeman]

Nope. Nothing the US did constituted torture under US law at the time.

You also got the use of "stupid" wrong.

And the Holocaust wasn't illegal under German law at the time. When AT&T allowed NSA to tap their lines that was illegal at the time, and Congress then passed an ex-post-facto law exonerating them.

Please explain how both of those fall into your simplistic picture, preferably without your head exploding from the contradictions.

Re:total bullshit?

[rmdingler]

Indeed.

There is a story that surfaces once in a while regarding her being fired from that House Judiciary Committee;

FWIW, Snopes claims it never happened.

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice lemonade you are drinking, except she did violate the Federal Records Act; unless of course your argument is that the functional portion of 44 U.S. Code 3101 (June 30, 1949, ch. 288, title V, 506(a), as added Sept. 5, 1950, ch. 849, 6(d),64 Stat. 58) was not in effect when Hillary left office in Feb 2013

Re:total bullshit?

[lsatenstein]

YES

Re:total bullshit?

[lsatenstein]

Yes, let's move on for a war criminal wanted for crimes against humanity and focus on a mail server that was receiving non-classified email as much as a state state.gov address would ....

Neither President Obama nor Bush is "wanted" for any "crimes against humanity" by the ICC, INTERPOL, or any government. The emails that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton turned over from her server have been found to include at least two emails with Top Secret information, and that information was always Top Secret, as well as hundreds more with classified information. The FBI is investigating this matter, has seized the server, and the emails held by her attorney. It seems pretty clear that one or more people were reckless with handling classified information, and may have passed it on to people without security clearances and an official need to know. There is a genuine possibility someone will be prosecuted for this.

Clinton emails contained spy satellite data on North Korean nukes
New Clinton Violations In Use Of Thumb Drives For Emails

Do you think you could do better? Just look at the hours and travelling she worked, from Israel to USA to the Arab countries etc. etc. How about 16 hours per day, and then, collect the fatigue. Yes, she may have had a fatigue caused error, but what the hell!!!"

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no room for a third block in a political system like the US. It is all or nothing. There is only one winner. It doesn't even matter if a president has won with only 50,0000001% of the votes. He is still the president of a large group of people who did not vote for him (or her of course).

What I am most interested about is how many of those 49,9999999% that didn't vote for the president really hated to see him in office? Maybe 90% of those votes didn't want the winner as president, while 90% of those who voted for the president wouldn't mind if the other became a president.

Our democracy doesn't really tell use anything about how the voters feel about a president or about the results. Maybe there should be two votes. One vote for the person you want as president and another vote for who you really don't want as president. The one who has the most (pro minus anti) votes becomes president. Maybe in such a system a third candidate has a larger chance to win, or has less chance to disrupt a candidate of a particular party (for example that Trump guy who might take several percentage of the votes away from the official republican party).

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently 46.1% of Democrats do. Though that's down from as high as 75% in July

Hillary could eat dead babies she bought at Planned Parenthood on live TV and still get the 90% of the progressive vote.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

Or more like, "For thousands of years the rules applied differently to men and women, and given everything a person has written in email in their life, with six lines I can..."

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

This would definitely by TS/SCI, not Secret.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/sep/1/hillary-clinton-emails-contained-spy-satellite-dat/

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

So if someone is prosecuted, it's ok if Obama commutes their sentence like W did for his buddy? Right?

Of course, that particular bit of treason wasn't actually committed by Scooter Libby, but the person who did do it was never prosecuted.

Remember that, Republicans?

Re:total bullshit?

[fuzzy2k]

No, but when you speak with a press that can't understand simple things, would you expect her to explain how encryption and security work? Didn't she live with a highly placed government official? Is it unreasonable to expect that personalized security as provided to a POTUS might be better than government provided security? Of course her talking points with the press are complete and total bullshit. That's how it works. You give them amusing anecdotes, and they put you on TV. This helps couch potatoes from Ann Arbor to Anaheim decide if they like your taste in clothes, or the really smart ones to see if they think you have a sense of humor or a decent stylist.

Re:total bullshit?

[KGIII]

You can vote in a presidential election. Only a few states still restrict voting in State elections (or local elections) due to felony convictions but you're able to vote for the president. Look into your local voting laws. For the most part the whole being unable to vote due to a felony conviction is a myth and one is still able to vote for the president in all states as far as I know. I'm not a researcher of the subject nor an expert but I do have a vested interest in election laws and have actually paid someone to answer a variety of questions for me and to advise me on campaigning.

If you're unable to answer the questions you may have on your own then, if you wish, you can provide me with the name of the state that you live in and your residency status (you must be a citizen and a resident of the state, of course, for me to get information). As I already will be paying for the time then it is trivial to ask them an additional question and I can get more information to you.

As it currently stands, restricting votes based on using felony status for entitlement is probably legal. It is my opinion, and not necessarily a popular opinion, that felons should be allowed to vote. I am not a fan of restricting rights due to past actions when we've already had the chance to restrict their freedoms.

Another opportunity may be to petition the State (typically a single well-worded letter to the governor of your state is all that is required) stating your desires, years since convictions, changes you've made, and maybe including some letters from members of the community to vouch for your current behaviors is adequate. They may, or may not, return your right to vote. This is most often seen with firearms but it is *likely* to be applicable to vote restrictions as well.

Again, I'm already paying someone an hourly wage to answer and advise me. For them to review the applicable laws and opine on them would be trivial and a minimal expense that I'm more than willing to pay on your behalf. If you're willing to share the information required then I'm more than happy to get them to opine on your situation.

You see it as a good thing, an easier thing, and such. That's fine too. However, if you wish to change this you may be able to, almost certainly can in most states, and you may not even be restricted at all but may have been subjected to misinformation.

Re:total bullshit?

[ganjadude]

the thing is bush is closer to clinton than bush is to anyone running right now in reality

Re: total bullshit?

[KGIII]

Umm... I think they have records laws that insist she do just that - leave the data on it IF they were official. From what I've read there have been some instances of classified information in the recovered emails. If true then she's likely violated the laws regarding the handling of secure information. Even FOUO data has handling requirements. To me the issue isn't the email server -that's a distraction and the laws covering it may not have been in place until a couple of years after she left office. The issue is the improper handling of classified data which was certainly covered as well as the data retention laws IF applicable. I'm not sure if we'll ever see anything come of this but I will not be voting for her. I have ample other reasons to not vote for her but I'll stick to the topic at hand.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

and what about the secret service agents we were told were overseeing the private email server? They go to jail too?

Re:total bullshit?

[KGIII]

If that is true then wasn't her job, quite specifically, to delegate authority and have that email system changed via official means? Ignore the side show that is the whole email server thing and concentrate on the mishandling of classified information (which has been indicated as true per the on-going FBI investigation according to a variety of news sources) and on the failing to retain data properly is required by the Federal Records Act. Either way, it was her responsibility to have the system fixed and her obligation to not work around it.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

this is cold fjord. s/he was raised on rectal feeding. It explains the lack of nutrition to their brain.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

So the Holocaust and NSA wire tapping fall into the same category or crime for you? The Holocaust, the systematic killing of millions of people, was not technically legal under German law but anyone who even thought of raising the question in debate got a bullet to the head or sent off to one of the camps so they could personally investigate the legality of the situation never to heard of again. I have yet to hear of people being rounded up and disappeared in the US over the NSA related activities. I have yet to hear even one person claim and be able to prove they have suffered any punitive harm from any of the NSA related programs. Argue all you like about the NSA but using ridiculous and over hyped hyperbole weakens your complaint and puts you into the category of mindless idiots who have learned to read the words but not understand the sentences.

Re:total bullshit?

[laird]

Well, from what I can tell, what she did was consistent with every previous Secretary of State with email, who used outside email systems for non-classified emails. And none of the emails on the server were classified while she was using the email server - the entire debate around "classified emails" is simply the government retroactively classifying some of the emails before giving them out in response to an FOIA request, which is the kind of review process that they do around any FOIA request for sensitive information.

I'm not saying that running government business through a private server is a good idea. But if you're going to be outraged over Clinton doing it when it was routine and consistent with previous people with the same job, your problem isn't about email security, it's about Clinton. You sure didn't hear the same people complaining when Bush/Cheney (illegally) shut down the white house's email archiving system (required by law) and purged all emails for the white house on the way out of office, to make sure that they couldn't be subject to an FOIA request or subpoena. Compared to that, what Clinton might have been bad, but it was legal and routine.

Re:total bullshit?

[laird]

Correction: none of the emails were classified, or contained information that was classified. The process going on now is that the FBI is reviewing and retroactively classifying some previously unclassified information in order to make sure that what they deliver in responsive to an FOIA request is "clean" - a process that is routine with broad FOIA requests of sensitive information.

As for Bush, etc., not being wanted by any government, read http://www.esquire.com/news-po... . Admittedly a bit obscure, but it was a real trial, by a real government.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

bush/w will still be seeking the power to cover up and escape justice for his war crimes (torture, rectal feeding, collateral murder, et al) for the rest of his life. Each day he escapes justice, new damage is done. But of course the vast majority of the power centered in the democratic and republican parties tends to utilize what I would characterize as "Cosby Logic" when it comes to this...

Re:total bullshit?

[jittles]

Does anyone actually believe this line of bullshit?

Honestly, if she was using the e-mail address associated with that SMTP server before she become Secretary of State, yes. Most people don't like to use several e-mail accounts. It's a pain in the butt. If she was used to using that one and used it as she communicated with the officials that became her superiors and subordinates before becoming Secretary of State while planning the transition, then they were used to contacting here there and she was used to contacting them from there.

And yet millions of people throughout the world manage to do this just fine. Many of them preferring to keep their non-work related projects separate from work related issues. After all, how many people go and work at a random company without having some friend there to help get their foot in the door? People use networking to get jobs. It's not unreasonable or unexpected for you to use your official method of communication to talk to friends at your place of employment. That's normal and natural. You're just trying to find an excuse for her poor practices. And we all know the reason for these practices was to protect the emails from FOIA requests, not because it was convenient to only use one email address. I'm sorry that her royal highness isn't smart enough to use two or more email addresses just like the rest of us.

Should she have switched to a government-provided e-mail account? Probably. I don't say, "absolutely," specifically because of the high profile leaks that we've seen over the last decade, such that the mail might actually have been safer on that server that no one thought to compromise than on a government one.

Again you're making excuses for her. The answer is ABSOLUTELY. Why? Because every single thing she does at work is subject to FOIA requests and that information must be available in case, by some unfortunate accident, the Clintons were to die in a fiery plane crash. They were communicating about important issues that affect not only our nation, but how we interact with the entire world. This data must be properly accounted for and properly secured, even if it is not classified. While you may cite the security standards of the Department of State and indicate that they have poor security grades - that is irrelevant to this matter. If Ms. Clinton has an issue with the security policies at the Department of State, she should have ADDRESSED THEM! She was the boss. It was the perfect time for someone to go in there and fix the problem.

As an aside, Governor Palin used private e-mail for government functions too, actually registering addresses with public mail servers (yahoo if I remember right) after becoming Governor of Alaska, and specifically citing her newly-found position as the account name. There was no prosecution over that either.

And how much of that information was classified by the federal government? Probably none. And Palin was still violating the law of Alaska. Should she have gotten in trouble for it? Absolutely. If she was not properly punished then, assuming the statute of limitations has not run out, the people of Alaska should seek prosecution. One person getting away with it is NOT justification for a second person to not be punished when they get caught. Do you believe that OJ Simpson murdered his ex-wife? If so, he got away with it. Does that mean it's okay for me to go out and murder an ex-wife because OJ didn't get in trouble for it? That's just asinine.

Re:total bullshit?

[Nehmo]

You can vote in a presidential election. Only a few states still restrict voting in State elections (or local elections) due to felony convictions but you're able to vote for the president. Look into ...

I haven't researched voting restrictions for felons in many years. I'm relying on the general folk wisdom and my own years-ago research. When I did research it, at a time before the internet, I did so using appellant law records, and I found all legal attempts to get voting rights for felons failed. Most recent (at that time) decisions simply copied wording from previous (even non-controlling) decisions.

Since the time of my research, I've read an article or two on the subject when I happened to see one. I did notice during the 2000 presidential election, felons were not allowed to vote in Florida. From that, I assumed nothing had changed. It didn't occur to me that the rules could vary by state.

I know if a felon gets their "rights restored" (meaning getting the conviction expunged), then voting is included in those restored rights. Some states automatically "offer" to restore rights after a *first* felony conviction. Arizona is the example I know of. But in reality no one that I know has ever successfully had their rights restored. I suspect this the overall situation. That is, it is rare for a felon to get their rights restored in Arizona - even if it is their first conviction.

Looking briefly on the internet now, I see that voting rights for felons depend on the state of residence. It seems this is true even for presidential elections. Although I don't understand how the states can legislate rules for presidential elections, I don't find anything that differentiates between presidential voting rights and state voting rights when it comes to felons. Can a Convicted Felon Vote in the Presidential Election? states that Kansas, my state of residence, allows voting after the case is completely over.

If you have a lawyer researching this issue, I'll be pleased to hear their opinion. My particular situation may be complicated though. I have convictions (which because of their nature, I am not at all ashamed of, btw) in 3 states: Arizona, Oregon and Florida. I believe all the "tails" of my cases have been dispensed with. I have not petitioned for rights restoral anywhere. I currently live in Kansas City, Kansas, USA.

Incidentally, the primary message of my older post was to say I was dissatisfied with offerings from both parties. The Republicans fail on numerous issues for me, and the Democrats are offering Hillary, who takes bribes disguised as speaking fees and donations to charity.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

"I also hate every Republican candidate, for varying reasons. I hope I'm not put into a position of choosing between one of them and her in the ballot booth."

This actually happens to be what I view Hillary as the guiltiest over. Or perhaps she will gracefully bow out of the race, and immediately we'll see Oprah and Gwen Ifil(sp?) get into the race. I'm still waiting to hear a journalist ask Bernie Sanders why he thinks he should be president at the cost of everyone having to wait till at least 2020 for the first non male POTUS...

Re:total bullshit?

[Sarius64]

Well now you've convinced me that she should have her finger on the nukes. I mean what profound logic that the Secretary of State shouldn't give a damn about national security. Good one there@!

Re:total bullshit?

[KGIII]

I'll have them take a look. I've bookmarked this page so that I can return to it. Unfortunately, I will not be able to act on this until Tuesday. My campaign manager (I'm running for State Senate) is a lawyer but does not work as a trial lawyer or anything similar. I'm already paying them so this is a trivial matter and I'm happy to get their advice. Remember, if you will, that it will be an advisement and not actually anything more than that. They can tell you how they interpret the law and show case history but that is it.

I am, by no means, an expert in the field. I have a working knowledge for my state and my state only. I do enjoy education for education's sake so will be more than happy to have this information as it may be valuable in the future. My awareness of the subject was raised while contemplating running for office and talking to people who may vote for me. Several mentioned that they were unable to vote because of their status as felons. Looking into this turned up that there are absolutely zero restrictions on voting as a felon. In fact, prisoners often file for absentee ballots while still incarcerated. My understanding is that the state now educates and facilitates inmates but this is a fairly recent change in policy.

If this thread is archived or whatnot then I may be forced to email you the results.

Re:total bullshit?

[Nehmo]

So the Holocaust and NSA wire tapping fall into the same category or crime for you? ....

(I'm not the poster who made the holocaust reference, but I'll answer anyway.)

Equating the evil of holocaust with that of warrantless searches was not the intent of the comparison. However, there is a similarity in terms of this discussion. That is, the act was considered legal by the culprit government at the time of the act. Numerous other acts by many governments follow this pattern. Indeed, a government (whether controlled by a dictator or not) seldom declares in advance its own acts to be illegal.

Re:total bullshit?

[radarskiy]

'Neither President Obama nor Bush is "wanted" for any "crimes against humanity" by the ICC, INTERPOL, or any government.'

http://www.foreignpolicyjourna...

Re:total bullshit?

[iliketrash]

Honestly, if she was using the e-mail address associated with that SMTP server before she become Secretary of State, yes.

Geez, do your homework. Here, I'll do it for you.

whois clintonemail.com turns up Creation Date: 13-jan-2009.

On the first screen for Hillary Clinton at Wikipedia: "In office January 21, 2009 – February 1, 2013"

So, yea, [sarcasm] she did use it before becoming Secretary of State.

Re:total bullshit?

[rtb61]

The connection would be from a computer in Clinton's office specifically set up to run independent of the network servers and only use the internet access server. So the network administrators would have noticed a non-networked computer, no hooking up to the internal network and just making use of the internet access provided by the network. So two computers on the desk, one to access the network and one specifically to hide it's activities from the network and that was allowed. Why do it, only one reason fully planning to have secret communications with conspiratorial and likely criminal intent.

So the question is, in how many government locations are non-networked just using internet access computers are hooked in and hiding their communications (proper networking means they are checked at log and no applications are allowed to run in configurations not set up for approval by network administrators).

Re:total bullshit?

[cold fjord]

My statement stands. The organization your link refers to is not a government entity. You can get more direct information at these two links:

Bush, Cheney Face Torture and War Crimes ‘Charges’ in Mock Trial
Guess who finds Israel guilty of genocide?

In case you are like me and have never heard of the “Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission (KLWCC)” and its “tribunal,” a quick check at Wikepedia tells us that this is “a Malaysian organisation established in 2007 by Mahathir Mohamad to investigate war crimes...as an alternative to the International Criminal Court in The Hague, which Mahathir accused of bias in its selection of cases.” Among those tried and duly convicted by the “tribunal” are of course George W. Bush and Tony Blair

Mahathir Mohamad, the founder of this kangaroo court, was Prime Minister of Malaysia from 1981 to 2003. In October 2003, shortly before he stepped down as prime minister, he attracted international attention with a speech at a summit for the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), where he told his audience that while Muslims “have the biggest oil reserve in the world,” “have great wealth” and “control 57 out of the 180 countries in the world,” they “will forever be oppressed and dominated by the Europeans and the Jews.” Indeed, according to Mahathir, “today the Jews rule the world by proxy.”

Re:total bullshit?

[cold fjord]

I'm afraid you're batting 0 for 2. The "tribunal" your link refers to isn't a government entity. You can find more info at the two links below. The founder has some troubling views.

Bush, Cheney Face Torture and War Crimes ‘Charges’ in Mock Trial
Guess who finds Israel guilty of genocide?

Mahathir Mohamad, the founder of this kangaroo court, was Prime Minister of Malaysia from 1981 to 2003. In October 2003, shortly before he stepped down as prime minister, he attracted international attention with a speech at a summit for the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), where he told his audience that while Muslims “have the biggest oil reserve in the world,” “have great wealth” and “control 57 out of the 180 countries in the world,” they “will forever be oppressed and dominated by the Europeans and the Jews.” Indeed, according to Mahathir, “today the Jews rule the world by proxy.”

I'll correct your correction - hundreds of those emails contained classified information, and it was classified at the time, including the two with Top Secret information. You can't just repeat information in a Top Secret message on an unclassified system and render that information "unclassified."

An arsenal of smoking guns in Clinton email scandal

... Most people can be forgiven for not understanding the difference between classified documents and classified information. A classified document is marked “Top Secret” or some such. But people who work in government understand that lots of information is classified simply by virtue of the kind of information it is.

My National Review colleague Andrew McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor, has been setting his head on fire trying to get the mainstream media to take note of this fact. He points out that according to an executive order issued by President Barack Obama, all “foreign government information is presumed to cause damage to the national security” and is therefore presumed classified. Clinton routinely ignored this rule. That’s not just my opinion. A study by Reuters found that “Clinton and her senior staff routinely” ignored these rules.

“Here’s my personal email,” Clinton told Middle East envoy George Mitchell, who then proceeded to convey numerous private conversations he had with foreign leaders.

The Washington Times reports that Clinton’s unsecured emails contained spy satellite information about North Korea’s movement of its nuclear assets. This sort of information is universally recognized as top secret and is normally subjected to draconian safeguards. There is no way Clinton didn’t know this.

Re:total bullshit?

[cold fjord]

Bush and Cheney weren't "Radical-Right." If you actually believe that you're essentially stating you're either bordering on or on the fringe Left.

Speaking of "damage," what do you think of the Democrats blocking reform of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the result of that? We'll be living with that for a long time.

How the Democrats Created the Financial Crisis

The Bush administration tried to get reforms through, but the Democrats blocked it.

Are you a big fan of Obama's policies and foreign policy?

Re:total bullshit?

[lucien86]

How about aiding terrorists? Bush and Obama together first invaded and destroyed Iraq militarily and then abandoned it to whatever came along. Bushes actions aided and protected Al Qaida, and Obama seeded the way for ISIS. ISIS are bigger, stronger, more dangerous, and worse than Al Qaida, and a far bigger threat to the world.
And all that is not even mentioning the shear incompetence blundering and criminality of everything the US did in Iraq. In case you've forgotten US troops acting as prison guards did use torture on Iraqi prisoners, its only plausible deniability and corruption that stopped the charges going to the top..

Re: total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

So you want someone unconnected with Hillary's crimes to be pardoned, sort of like your example? Done!

Obama's clemency grant largest since the 1960s

With that out of the way we can get on with the investigation of Hillary.

By the way, you should look into the penalty Libby was left with. Not exactly "light."

Re:total bullshit?

[jmac_the_man]

The government unclassified system she should of used did not have some in between classification that made it somehow superior for classified information storage. If anything the shared server would be more of a mess to clean up, since it would bring down countless people's work email to do so. If it was contaminated they would likely yank the cord and pull the machine into an appropriate secure area, along with every machine that received the email or had the potential to cache it. Of course they might have an official plan for cleaning up spills on the official server, given that it is almost certainly going to happen from time to time. This is especially true if they are, as it appears, classifying things after the fact. Heck they might even have a procedure where they don't have to yank, fully clean, and reimage the server if it happens often enough. After all, it is probably easier to get the government to agree to the security plan the government wants.

Every single sentence in this quote is false. Everyone who works for the government and has a computer has a non-secure computer. If you have need to know for classified information, you get an additional computer for every classified network you need to be on.

Of course no one is saying that Hillary created any emails that were obviously classified at the time they were created, just that they found something that they classified after the fact. Had she deliberately, knowingly, and in a matter that could be proved sent classified information on an unclassified network, then her clearance would be pulled and she could easily face jail time, but again no one is accusing her of that.

This is false. Things told to the Secretary of State in confidence by other world leaders are at a minimum, either Classified or Secret, depending on the country the other world leader is from. We already know that she sent (and thus created) emails like this over her Clinton Email server.

She is more or less guilty of creating her own email server, likely as a defence against her email being randomly subpoenaed by right wing politicians.

They're not HER emails. They belong to the American people, who have the right to request and inspect them via the Freedom of Information Act. (Obviously, unless they include classified information... but then if she was emailing classified information, she should have been using the Secret servers.)

She did refuse to turn it over to the right wing witch hunt committee, which I can understand, but once the justice department asked, she promptly complied, as she was legally required to do so.

This, too, is a lie. She wiped the server in order to prevent anyone, including the Justice Department, from finding the emails she didn't turn over. Luckily for the American people, she screwed that up and now We The People get to find out the shady stuff the government has been doing behind our backs. I wish Lois Lerner had been this careless with hiding the email trail that shows her malfeasance.

(Also, the "right wing witch hunt committee" has the same subpoena power that the FBI has. She's legally obligated to turn the emails over to them too.)

Re:total bullshit?

[Rick Zeman]

"So the Holocaust and NSA wire tapping fall into the same category or crime for you?"

If I had such inept reading comprehension and analytical skills I'd post as an AC, too.

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

"While it’s true that some of her ardent supporters pushed the theory, there is no evidence that Clinton or her campaign had anything to do with it."

Re:total bullshit?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm still waiting to hear a journalist ask Bernie Sanders why he thinks he should be president at the cost of everyone having to wait till at least 2020 for the first non male POTUS...

Err... what the fuck?

Shut up peasant!

[Anonymous Coward]

The new aristocracy is in the house. We don't trifle with such concepts as "the law."

Other employees did the same thing

[LetterRip]

Except we know that other State Department employees did the same thing (used private email and email servers for government business) and weren't prosecuted. So his claim is BS.

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Rob Y.]

How is this any different from Colin Powell's email - whose private server did he use? Is it only different because he's not running for President - and there's no bogus Benghazi commission looking for stuff to embarrass him with. Or is there really something particularly dangerous or sinister here (and I don't mean 'potetntially sinister' - there will always be conspiracy theories around the Clintons).

Anti-Clinton people always talk about Petreus's prosecution for sharing secret info - except that he actually shared it. That's not parallel at all. There's not even any allegation of criminal behavior that I'm aware of.

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Who? Did they handle classified information using their private email server?

Re: Other employees did the same thing

[kiphat]

Besides, anyone placing classified information on ANY email server is an idiot . Unless, of course, it's encrypted of course. But do you really think they'd do that?

Re: Other employees did the same thing

[sphealey]

It is becoming increasingly clear that there is no such thing as a secure computer. Even if it is never connected to the Internet, but certainly if it is. Government computer/network, corporate, private, personal; they are all penetrated or will be if someone cares to do so. And someone certainly cares to do so for every high level government official in the US, UK, Russia, China, etc.

sPh

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[T-ice]

Read the summary, it's not that long. "less prominent government employees would have probably been prosecuted for doing the same thing." I can tell you that that sentence is true. But we can argue about Colin Powell and Bush Jr all day, but the fact remains that she broke the law. And many other people who aren't in prominent positions also broke the law, and were prosecuted for it. Just because other prominent people were above the law in the past, doesn't mean we can't enforce it now, and maintain that expectation for future officials. Doing otherwise is a great way to maintain the situation we currently find ourselves in.

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Sarius64]

Please cite anything classified via Colin Powell's e-mail? Hmm? I'm sure Secretary Clinton only received e-mails and never shared any of that information with anyone. Especially not the people paying her husband millions of dollars for 15 minute speeches.

Re: Other employees did the same thing

[Sarius64]

You place classified information on a computer, encrypt it, and then call and report yourself to the FBI. We'll see if they care about your methodology.

Re: Other employees did the same thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Anything from an employee of the state department, anything from an old army buddy, any business contact, any press releases, any government official, any state (as in Michigan, or new York) , country or county, or city, yadda, yadda, any communication, addressed to sec of state, or from any government server, are all classified. So your argument is still Clinton bad Republican good?

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Rob Y.]

I'm sure if they went retrospectively over Powell's email, they'd find plenty to classify after the fact. That's my point. They aren't going through his email, because there's no political witch hunt after him.

As fare as your sarcastic 'I'm sure' conspiracy theory, I'm sure that would exist (as a conspiracy theory) whether she had her own email server or not. Just because you think there's something inherently sinister about anything the Clintons do doesn't make it rise to the level of fact. That's my point to. You're justifying an unprecedented combing through Clinton's emails (both work and private - since I'm sure you don't think she had the right to delete her private stuff either) based on an assumption that there must be something evil (or at least politically embarassing) there. So again, I ask, what's the substantive difference between HRC and Colin Powell's use of personal email.

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Anonymous Coward]

That is it. There is nothing really there, but if she just released them all, the GOP would have found something else to use against her.

I have a clearance, maybe they should release the later classified e-mails to the 1 million people who have clearances and see if there is anything really critical there. If it is just ambassador travel schedules and security measures that are classified, does it really matter if Russia or China hack into her server and see them? Would they risk getting caught for what info they would gain from doing that?

Grilling the OPM for not securing the names of people with clearances is a much bigger deal.

Re: Other employees did the same thing

[Anonymous Coward]

It isn't different than Colin Powell. That should jave been investigated as well. This isn't about Republican or Democrat, it is about right and wrong.

Re: Other employees did the same thing

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/sep/1/hillary-clinton-emails-contained-spy-satellite-dat/

That is a little more than travel schedules

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[laird]

Colin Powell used a personal email system. The the difference is that he wiped it all and didn't retain anything, so he can ignore any FOIA requests or subpoena's. The mistake Clinton made was in retaining emails and turning them over to the government as required by law. If she'd wiped them, like Powell, Bush, Cheney, Rove, etc., it would have been illegal, but apparently not made the news.

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Sarius64]

Seriously, are you fucking insane? The Secretary of State goes off the rails with her own private network where classified information has been found and you're bitching because she was caught. As far as I'm concerned, if you have any criminal investigation warranted towards Powell go for it! No one should be above the law; in particular those charged with upholding it. Who the hell is Hillary Clinton or Colin Powell to get any privilege?

Re: Other employees did the same thing

[Sarius64]

Everything in government e-mail traffic isn't classified. Government couldn't handle that albatross. So I guess your argument is that Hillary is a saint or something like that. Well saints can sit in prison. too.

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Sarius64]

Well you should have spoke up if you cared so much! Now you just want to excuse felonies with plausible similar instances. She made a few other mistakes, too. This one is another felony that government workers are explicitly told is violation of federal code: http://www.washingtonpost.com/...

Re:Other employees did the same thing

[Rob Y.]

You're implying some nefarious intent to send classified info over insecure email - when all evidence shows that Clinton made every effort to not do that, and that all the classifications were after the fact. Plus none of it leaked. There's no criminal investigation - there's only an investigation to see if any classified stuff was leaked. And there was no law at the time about using personal email for non-classified stuff. So you're a little off the rails if you ask me. Sure, it's always possible that some crime was committed - but barring any evidence, you seem to be assuming one was. The Powell example is just to point out that an investigation of Clinton's email is every bit as unwarranted as one of Powell's would be. The only reason we're discussing Clinton's emails at all is that the insane Benghazi commission (the 2nd or 3rd such commission to be set up) has abused its powers to subpoena anything and everything it possibly can in an attempt to hunt for embarrassing stuff to cherry pick.

Idiots being granted access to computers.

[Anonymous Coward]

Computers may be toys, that's what windows 'operating system' is all about.
But they can also be tools. And if you want to work with tools, you must know how to use them.

And she wants to be President!

[Anonymous Coward]

She doesn't understand why this is a big deal, and says "I was not thinking a lot when I got in. There was so much work to be done. We had so many problems around the world. I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be." - really? She's the Secretary of State and doesn't think of security? Why would anyone want to see her as President?

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Anonymous Coward]

We had so many problems around the world. I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be.

And she wants to have her finger on The Button (tm). Doesn't anyone else find this disturbing?

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't we do an experiment? Elect Clinton and see how many wars are started. This constant smear campaign story submissions about trivial flaws is tiresome since her rivals are likely an order of magnitude worse.

Considering she instigated the whole Libya civil war, I'd say we can expect to see a lot.

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Whatsmynickname]

Also, she is applying for the top security job in the US!

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Antique Geekmeister]

And Libya was an icon of peaceful commerce and US support _before_ she did anything as Secretary of State?

Moammar Ghadaffi had 42 years of corrupt leadership of Libya to instigate a civil war, and to alienate other nations, and he did a very thorough task of it. The amazing thing is that the war took so _long_ to start. Hillary Clinton could not have added much to trigger the war, except to help send in US troops, which she did not do.

Re:And she wants to be President!

[ganjadude]

how can we believe that when she had it installed???

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Tablizer]

And she wants to have her finger on The Button

At least it's ONE button, and not two.

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Anonymous Coward]

It sure as hell was more peaceful then than it is now. Same with Syria. I'm not for dictatorships, but what the hell, I'm not for anarchy either.

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Anonymous Coward]

She doesn't understand why this is a big deal

Of course she understands. She is saying this to convince you that it was an innocent act, which is obviously was not.
The amazing thing here, is that anyone would believe her.

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Sarius64]

Yes, well she was acting in the framework of other classic neocons; just hiding behind her big D.

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Anonymous Coward]

Senator Hillary Clinton voted in favor of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Re:And she wants to be President!

[Anonymous Coward]

What? Fuck no that's not disturbing. I expect her to give zero fucks whatsoever about the email server configuration. I expect her not to be hacking sendmail config files. I expect her not to give a flying fuck about how her email floats through the intertubes.

What would be disturbing would be "Oh yeah, I went down to Best Buy and picked up the coolest box that they had, and then I wiped it, put Linux on it, and I decided to go with Qmail and some procmail filters, so it took me a few hours to configure that, and then I had to make sure the ssh server was available, but it needed some reconfiguration to tighten it down. Then I sent a reverse tunnel to my laptop so it would get out of the firewall and give the laptop access. What there's a problem in the Middle East that needs my attention? Wait, let me check Google Maps."

No. It would be much more disturbing to me if she DID stop to think about that, because then she's not doing her job, she's doing her IT managers job. My expectation is that until the day Fox News latched onto this, no politician anywhere gave a fuck about their eeeeeeemails. Now, they may scramble to bring their lawyer together with their IT head to try and figure out if they could be the next target.

This is political horseshit and pwnies show. How come none of the people who sent her these classified email are being prosecuted for it? Because this is a political bullshit fuck cock dickhead suck tits mother fucking Barbra Streisand. That's why.

Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[rmdingler]

Since Edward himself proved the secure government data itself was rather not.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

My thought, too. Hillary's e-mail server could have been much more secure than the State Department's system. We know government systems suck across the board. Without knowing her particular setup, we can't say much. Otherwise we're just buying into the equivalent of "you can't go wrong with Microsoft"--you can't be penalized for doing what you're told, even if it's less secure.

The only substantive issue is the public record. While I don't believe any of the conspiracies about the Clintons, a person in a leadership position has a responsibility to maintain the integrity of the public record. The irony is that maintenance of a permanent public record is in most respects in opposition to security and secrecy.

We could go on and on about her poor judgment in this case, but I'll take Hillary's poor judgment over any of the other candidates, Democratic or Republican. The security issue is just pointless whining. And unlike most candidates, Hillary has a very long history of public service. There's no need to use this incident as a proxy to gauge her policy positions or leadership capabilities, because that's already well established. I can't see how this incident could be used to possibly change your opinion of her suitability to the presidency--has anybody actually changed their mind about Hillary because of this?

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[raftpeople]

I think Snowden is just mad that Hillary outsmarted him. He thought HCTOPSECRETSERVER01 couldn't possibly be for real.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[towermac]

What is this history of public service? She had a Senate seat that was given to her, simply as preparation to be President. As if she's from New York, or anywhere near it...

Well, she did make a 10,000% profit in commodities in six months, and giant profits on Arkansas land deals while her husband was Governor. I'll grant those feats are pretty impressive. Not as impressive as a 'charity' foundation that rakes in many millions from overseas billionaires while she is simultaneously Secretary of State. What public service, exactly, has that charity funded by the way?

That's what I see in the 'public record' AC. What do you see?

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[ganjadude]

she was horrible as our senator no less

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[multimediavt]

Uhh, the Bushes ain't from Texas, nor Florida neither, so what's your point? Yje Bushes and Cheney's made ridiculous profit off their war in Iraq while committing war crimes. But please, keep playing your false equivalency games.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

What profits did Bush or Cheney make off the Iraq War? Please, give examples. We have specific examples, to the exact dollar amount, of the corruption from Hillary. I'm sure you will be able to point out exactly who funded Bush and Cheney, and when, and how much.

Remember, neither ran a 'charity' foundation that would take gifts from foreign companies and politicians while simultaneously making legal decisions regarding those foreigners.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[Sarius64]

But, but... the Koch brothers shot people at Selma!

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[SuricouRaven]

The Bushes are not from Texas - but they really, really want people to think they are. Bush II was governor of Texas, so they do have a fairly solid claim to the state even if he wasn't born or educated there.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[towermac]

Bush the Younger lived and worked in Texas as a young man. I believe he is retired there even now.

Hillary, on the other hand, had to quickly buy a house in NY as she got on the ballot. There was some question at the time as to whether she was actually a resident.

But I didn't attempt to draw an equivalence between the two families in the first place.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[phantomfive]

You just pointed out why a whole lot of people want neither a Bush nor a Clinton in the Whitehouse.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[paazin]

What public service, exactly, has that charity funded by the way?

Wait, really? Is this a serious question?

They've been heavily involved in relief and development in Africa, post-earthquake relief in Haiti, working on retrofitting buildings to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the US, help promote womens rights and allowing minorties access to better education. Sure there's a question about the transparency of the organization but they do a good deal of public service.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

i see someone who is intelligent and doing their best to right the course of history that has led to 43 straight presidents of the united states sharing a single gender. That is what I see.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[_Sharp'r_]

Hillary's e-mail server could have been much more secure than the State Department's system.

We do have a few details on it.... for example, the server was located in the bathroom "server rack" in a NYC townhouse of a very-small ISP.

Pretty sure with that kind of physical security, anyone who really wanted to could walk in and grab a copy of her emails. The real crime is that none of her political opponents realized in time how easy it would have been...

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Cheney moved his residency to wisconsin (as I recall) just so that he could be selected as VP, because the rules say president and VP can't come from the same state.

So this bullshit is pretty ingrained on both sides.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[towermac]

It was. Sorry I got distracted over the weekend, I realize this is a bit late.

I remember a school in Africa. And they weren't even all in; it was a partnership they were facilitating and financing. Financing means somebody pays it back. Still, a sort of jumpstarter thing is still something. But that was a while ago, and I've seen ads since then about development and wireless and water and such. I haven't seen finished success stories on any of those things, and I would think the media would be all over them if they were there. They do love him.

Bill did go down to Haiti, and carried some money with him. I also remember some Haitian accusing him of being more about fluff and photo ops than actual cash. Just that, so maybe the right-wing nutters have infiltrated Haiti too.

Retrofitting buildings? That is news to me, and I said I was seriously asking. I can see that being easily lost in the AGW noise lately. In the US? Sounds like lucrative contracting work. Do they get carbon credits for doing that? That's probably just my skeptic talking, so I'll let that one go and take your correction.

Women's rights. I've seen those ads. Sounds a lot like trashing Republicans, but promoting; okay.

Allowing minorities access to better education. Allowing? Were they repressing them before? I kid. Yes, they fund a few little scholarships for minorities. Not any kind of full boat rides to good schools, but additional funds that might make the difference between one going of not. It is something.

That is the bulk of the charity they provide, and the entirety of it for quite a while now. Partial scholarships.

What is the 'Foundation' worth now? Well over half a billion? That we explicitly know of. Actually, you and I both know it's billions. A real charity spends a good portion of it's funds of the poor; what percentage do they lay out on a yearly basis?

Dude, it's a scam. It's a brilliant, perfect money making scheme. Of course, you have to be an ex-President to start it up, and a popular one at that. And it doesn't hurt to be a sitting Secretary of State, to really cash in on the big time.

They do just enough charity to get by.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[Lost Race]

the rules say president and VP can't come from the same state.

False.

Re:Not to overplay the "ironic" label, but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah, social justice. We must elect a minority to check that old white male privilege.

With all the security failures at...

[Anonymous Coward]

With all the security failures at the state department...

Her server was NOT listed as one of those that got hacked...

So perhaps, she did better than the entire department. Her emails only got revealed by Congress.

The departments mail got revealed by anyone that wanted to.

Clintons Lie About Everything, Are Above Rules

[Anonymous Coward]

"I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be" you got an email system with State, you had to think about what you were going to use instead of that. Something that just happened to be subpoena and FOIA proof if a requester didn't already know about that. You've been involved in government since your university days, you have handled classified material since then, there is no conceivablw way you could not know what the rules on classification are. You just thought you were above the rules and could always dump the blame in case of a fuckup on a subordinate, as you are currently doing right now. Fuck you.

3...2....1 time for a presidential pardon

[Anonymous Coward]

3...2....1 time for a presidential pardon.

Better to do that than treat democrats like regular people. After all, that wouldn't be "progressive."

O RLY

[Anonymous Coward]

"I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be."

However, I am quite sure that there is someone employed at the State Department whose job it is to stop and think about what sort of email system there would be. Someone who knows that the Secretary of State will just as a matter of course handle classified information, and that there are standards in place for the proper care of this information. Someone who, naturally, would have brought this up, and who would have had to have been overruled in order for things to proceed as they did. So she, or someone in her senior staff, did indeed stop to think about the email system, and decided that personal convenience trumps national security.

The alternative is no better. Maybe there WAS no such person at the State Department. If true, then the organization was run so poorly - with no one in charge of information security even though classified and sensitive information was at stake, or if someone was there, that they were such a toady that they were unwilling to object even knowing that this important information would be mishandled - then that, itself, is the scandal.

Left with bad choices

[Anonymous Coward]

I keep asking myself if in about a year I was presented with a ballot that had the two names Clinton and Trump on it, what would I do. Then I down another shot.

Re:Left with bad choices

[mister_playboy]

Write in vote for Sanders.

Re:Left with bad choices

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, because: Socialism

Re:Left with bad choices

[ganjadude]

or rand paul

Re:Left with bad choices

[I'm New Around Here]

Since when does the ballot limit itself to 2 candidates?

Re:Left with bad choices

[mister_playboy]

I could see mentioning Ron Paul in the same breath as Sanders, but not Rand.

Rand has been flip-flopping all over the place trying to pander to the mainstream Republican vote. That has not worked, and it has alienated those of us who saw his father as the sort of principled stateman that works towards something bigger than just self-aggrandizement.

Signing on to the idiotic anti-Iran deal letter is just the biggest example of his apparent non-seriousness.

Re:Left with bad choices

[Anonymous Coward]

It's functionally a two candidate, one party system in most states. Most people have a hard time figuring out who is the republicrat and who is the democan, so they have to vote based on the letter by the name.

There aren't enough people who would rather vote for a third party and not get their free "I voted for Stalin!" or "I voted for Hitler!" bumper sticker.

While most people would agree that grumpy cat would be a better president than either of the candidates, not enough people would cast their vote for a mascot.

Re:Left with bad choices

[ganjadude]

i was a big fan of ron paul, but i see how he was treated.

I simply see rand trying to play the game. i see your points but thats how i justify it. hes not perfect, but hes better than the alternatives

New Campaign Slogan

[Anonymous Coward]

"I was not thinking a lot when I got in"

Lies upon lies

[Tailhook]

"I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be"

Clinton thought hard about the kind of email system there would be. It was the kind under her exclusive control; to be wiped at will. As usual, the Clinton's statements are 100% out of phase with the truth.

Someone should have been perp walked by now.

Gowdy is starting to subpoena people; Pagliano — one of Clinton's henchmen from the State Department — may have to publically take the 5th as soon as next Thursday. Democrats need to get use to the idea of months and years of ugly, damning headlines, just like the 90's. But don't worry; eventually Clinton will get back on the "rich+corporations pay their fair share" message and our hate filled sheeple will put her in office, because that's who we are.

Re:Lies upon lies

[Anonymous Coward]

Politicians (regardless of party affiliation) *only* tell the truth when, by coincidence, the truth aligns well with their agenda.

There are no exceptions.

It is my hope that someday people will realize that politicians are a necessary evil (that is to say, every single one of them is evil), and will use their numbers to force higher levels of transparency and public accountability and keep these dogs on appropriately short leashes.

As it stands now, we let them bite us an awful lot.

Re:Lies upon lies

[Anonymous Coward]

you might be right, I suppose. Personally I think it's more likely the world will be so drunk on the novelty of the first non-male president of the united states that only the most sexist will see the kind of future you describe.

Snowden is the best reason for private email

[bit trollent]

Edward Snowden devastated U.S national security interests by releasing tons of classified emails.

But you know who's emails Snowden didn't release? Hillary's...

I think Hillary's private email server was a truly bad idea even if just politically.

That said she kept her emails safe from Edward Snowden.

Re:Snowden is the best reason for private email

[Anonymous Coward]

Edward Snowden devastated U.S national security interests by releasing tons of classified emails.

But you know who's emails Snowden didn't release? Hillary's...

I think Hillary's private email server was a truly bad idea even if just politically.

That said she kept her emails safe from Edward Snowden.

You know who else's emails he didn't release? Palin's, Jeb Bush's, Trump's, .... Just because the guy in division X doesn't have access to the resources in division Y, doesn't mean division Y is safe or doing it right.

Trying to be dismissive

[93 Escort Wagon]

We had so many problems around the world. I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be.

It's obvious she's trying to imply that there were lots of important issues to deal with, and she didn't want to waste time on trivialities. But she's wrong.

The role of Secretary of State often deals with sensitive information from both our own government, governments of other nations, and opposition groups living under repressive regimes. Safeguarding that information is paramount. Being dismissive regarding the security aspects of an important communications tool that was routinely used for classified comminications is troubling because, no matter which way you try to spin it, she comes off either as ignorant or supremely arrogant (or perhaps both). Yes, there was unrest all over, Hillary - and you don't see how mishandling sensitive information about that unrest was problematic?

I'm not looking forward to this next election. Whether you look to the left or to the right, it's clowns all the way down.

Re:Trying to be dismissive

[Anonymous Coward]

And not just a little dismissive, either. Heard on the radio her non-apology: "At the end of the day I am sorry that this has been confusing to people [...]". Yes, that's it, we're all just so confused!

Re:Trying to be dismissive

[towermac]

Lots? How is it that most everything she would put in an email would not be classified at least confidential, if not secret?

I mean, I would think that most every message the Secretary of State writes would be eyes-only to the people it is intended for. There's going to be a handful of "Congratulations on the birth of your Prime Minister's daughter", but most things she sends dealing with government business are going to be sensitive.

Why hasn't anyone asked...

[Anonymous Coward]

How she sent/received confidential documents if she only had an unsecure, personal email server? Did she not think that the Secretary of State of the United States wasn't going to have to deal with top secret emails?

Re:She did not...

[Anonymous Coward]

So... you're saying that Hillary Clinton was lying when she admitted to using only her personal, unsecure email server?

It's not really a problem

[fustakrakich]

The Hillary voters are going to still vote for her. It doesn't matter what she does. For those of us who will vote for somebody else, eh, no big deal... Just don't give her the job, and forget about her. And besides, the gig she is after is Kissinger's spot. He's ready to buy the farm any second now. There's much more, longer lasting power there, and she won't have to answer to anybody.

Revenge

[Anonymous Coward]

Can't have a private secure server? Come join the rest of us you hypocritical spy serving bitch.

Re:She did not...

[Anonymous Coward]

[She did not ]Have her own server. That has not been proven. That is just a ridiculous Republican lie.

You keep telling yourself that. Soon, you may actually believe it.

Re: She did not...

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm confident she doesn't know so therefore she is by definition telling the truth. Logic dictates that she is innocent.

Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

But they have to pretend she wan't because they know they'll end up holding their nose and voting for her anyway.

Because it's their graft, dishonesty and corruption, and Republicans can never be allowed to win, ever, for any reason.

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL! Did you just make a sweeping generalization about Democrats that involved them making sweeping generalizations? Wow, partisanship and stupidity sure go hand in hand.

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

Nobody ever wants to man up and be the big boy and put an end to the bullshit.

Besides, he wants the Republicans to use the IRS against liberal organizations,

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, that would be fair.

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

you say it as if Republicans aren't exactly the same thing. Do you think a lot of them thought Bush would be a great President?

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

I think a typical Republican thinks so many blacks get caught by police because proportionally they do more bad things.

While I do not agree with the above, here is food for thought: perhaps more conservative organizations were questioned by IRS because proportionally THEY do more bad things?

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[jmac_the_man]

here is food for thought: perhaps more conservative organizations were questioned by IRS because proportionally THEY do more bad things?

I think most conservatives would want to fire a police chief who told his deputies to go out and find some N-------- who weren't doing anything and harass them. From what we've seen leak out of Lerner's emails, that's what the IRS was doing.

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Sarius64]

Too bad evidence shows that typical cover-ups from this administration continue and the persons performing illegal activities are government officials.

IRS permanently destroyed up to 24,000 Lerner emails after subpoena

HEARING BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM U.S. HOUSE OF RESPRESENTATIVES IRS E-mails: Part II

Re: Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

News flash: liberal organizations were also rejected in the it's "scandal"

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[amiga3D]

They were just protecting good people from persecution by those lying Republicans who want to enslave the people.

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[Anonymous Coward]

true enuf

Re:Oh, Democrats know she's lying too

[KGIII]

Something something something. It's the way of their kind... *nods*

Total Innocence

[JimSadler]

The information that Mrs. Clinton handled was not classified . Some of it became classified long after she handled it. No crime existed at all nor does any of the investigative staff claim that any crime was committed. The nature of military intelligence is such that a person may never have a clue as to the secrecy of a sentence or paragraph. For example the famous incident in which General Patton supposedly slapped a soldier with battle fatigue never happened. The story was a plant intended to misdirect the German forces as to the whereabouts of General Patton which enabled him to mount a surprise attack. His true location would have been a huge secret at the time yet normal people would think nothing of remarking about where they saw the general. Intelligence not only involves secrecy but also involves deliberate leaking of misleading information. The point being that Mrs. Clinton would have no way in the world to know what materials might be considered sensitive at a later date.

Re:Total Innocence

[Snotnose]

Doesn't matter. First, she should have known that as SoS classified information would be flowing through that server. Second, she was ordered by a court to turn over all her emails. She stonewalled as long as she could, then printed out some of the email (the ones she deemed 'important'), then wiped the server and claimed there were no backups.

You or I would be sitting in a jail cell awaiting trial for either of these. She's not only running for president, she's got a large majority of idiots willing to vote for her. I don't give a squat about her positions on any issues. She is corrupt, slippery, slimey, and elitist.

I sincerely hope Biden runs. Not because I think he'll win, but hopefully that will be the final straw that brings other, better democrats out of the woodwork to run for president. As things go now it's looking the the repubs are going to win the White House next year.

Re:Total Innocence

[BoRegardless]

"She is corrupt, slippery, slimey, and elitist." These are the qualities needed to attract Bill.

Re:Total Innocence

[LetterRip]

Doesn't matter. First, she should have known that as SoS classified information would be flowing through that server.

It is illegal to send classifed information via email, whether via her private email or via her government email address.

Second, she was ordered by a court to turn over all her emails. She stonewalled as long as she could, then printed out some of the email (the ones she deemed 'important'), then wiped the server and claimed there were no backups

No she was not ordered to turn over all of her emails and a judge would not have the authority to make such an order. There was an FOIA regarding Bengazi, that the court issued an order regarding emails pertinent to Bengazi. FOIA though is only relevant for emails in possession of the State Department.

Re:Total Innocence

[sphealey]

Oh man that's amusing.

Re:Total Innocence

[Anonymous Coward]

Bull. No one who has ever worked with classified information would agree that it was classified after the fact, on a scale li I'ke that.

One or two emails might be a rare exception that could pass , muster, but "oh, they were ALL classified after the fact" is apologist thinking.

Marked or not, information can be classified. This is both codified in laws and regulations, practiced by various agencies that enforce a pre-publication review, and plain common sense. Authors who have had access to classified information are often rquired to vet their writings before release. Remember the No Easy Day author? Even he admits, "oops, my bad." ( http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/11/02/no-easy-time-for-seal-author-from-seal-team-6-year-old.html )

So I don't buy "oh, it wasn't classified then because it wasn't marked." It was classified. Someone just didn't mark it as such, and at that level, its BS to say you didn't recongize it when you saw it. SecState is literally one of the first depairtment heads specifically named to be an Original Classification Authority by various Executive Orders on the topic, which requires special training as well.

Re:Total Innocence

[Anonymous Coward]

"She is corrupt, slippery, slimey, and elitist." These are the qualities needed to attract Bill.

Umm, no.

Seems like BOOBS! attract Bill.

Not sure why he's still with Hillary! If he kicked her to the curb like she deserves he's still be Bill Clinton and she'd still be the nothing that she really is. Only guess is that Hillary! can set up some great threesomes that Bill loves.

Re:Total Innocence

[Anonymous Coward]

It is illegal to send classifed information via email, whether via her private email or via her government email address.

No, it isn't. The government's classified networks use email, a lot. There are, literally, BILLIONS of classified emails produced every year. As Secretary of State, she was guaranteed to have an email account associated with her classified network accounts.

Re:Total Innocence

[Camel Pilot]

Joe Biden against Trump? I would bet Biden would win. Hillary is tainted per the reasons you mentioned. I would never vote for her (not that my votes counts living in a ruby red state)

Re:Total Innocence

[Sarius64]

Because destroying government evidence compelled by Congress is clearly the right of ex-official gleaning millions of dollars in slush money into her charity which took in more than $140 million in grants and pledges in 2013 but spent just $9 million on direct aid. Pretty good gig, huh? http://nypost.com/2015/04/26/c...

Re:Total Innocence

[Sarius64]

My your are ignorant. Classified e-mails go through a classified network, not the Internet.

Re:Total Innocence

[Sarius64]

Yes, let's elect another known person that freely admits their lack of morals. https://www.plagiarismtoday.co...

Re:Total Innocence

[Anonymous Coward]

The ONLY reason Biden would run is if he (or the Democratic party) think this scandal will unravel her campaign. If he runs you can take it to the bank that there is something really seedy up with this and Clinton. If the Party thinks she can weather this, you won't see Biden run.

Re:Total Innocence

[Anonymous Coward]

Yet it happens ALL the time. Usually the person sending it doesn't realize it is classified at the time of transmission.

While I worked for the government the mail server was taken down roughly once every two or three months because somebody accidentally included sensitive information - and then reported it.

Re:Total Innocence

[laird]

Really? Powell also used private email when he was SoS, which he wiped. The only difference is that he didn't retain or turn over ANY emails. As far as I can tell, Clinton's mistake was in not straight-out wiping everything and ignoring the record retention laws, the way Powell, Bush, Cheney, Rove, etc., did.

Re:Total Innocence

[cold fjord]

The critical issue you are overlooking is the prohibition on conducting partisan political activity using government resources. The more honest politicians do their government work on government computers, and the political work on non-government computers. Hillary Clinton did both on her personal computer thereby commingling her official business with personal matters and other non-government public work. That is a bad thing, and that is before you even get to the question of mishandled classified material.

Re:Total Innocence

[cold fjord]

The post you replied to is BS, plain and simple.

Re:Total Innocence

[Sarius64]

Yes, because we all know the admitted plagiarist has only been wrong on every major international event since he's been in office. I guess that's a qualification to his party.

Re: She did not...

[Anonymous Coward]

Are your initials H.C.? Or are you connected in any way to her campaign? It's OK, if you say "no" we'll know you're lying.

I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[steveha]

Hillary Clinton is not stupid, and she's a lawyer. Before anyone is given access to classified information, my understanding is that they have to take a class in how to manage classified information and they have to sign an agreement saying they will abide by the rules governing classified information.

Now Hillary Clinton is saying that she doesn't really understand all this confusing stuff. "Wipe the server.. you mean with a cloth?" Oh sure, Mrs. Clinton.

About a week before the news broke about her private server, Hillary Clinton was on a talk show and she said: "So I have an iPad, a mini iPad, an iPhone and a Blackberry." Then she said that the reason she set up a private server was so she could carry a single device. Now she's saying she was so busy saving the world that she didn't have time to think about what kind of server to use... which is why she didn't just use the server provided for her to use, but took steps to set up her own server and get everyone to use it?

I'm not buying it. The obvious reason why someone in her position would set up her own server, under her control, is to make sure that she would have control over which of her emails could be unearthed (e.g. by a Freedom of Information Act request). Notice that when she was finally forced to turn over emails, she picked and chose which emails to turn over, and then wiped the server to make sure nobody could ever get anything else.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3209380/Former-attorney-general-says-classified-email-scandal-disqualifies-Hillary-Clinton-serving-president-s-prosecuted-breaking-federal-law.html

Also, we can't be sure that her private server wasn't compromised. If her admins didn't get every security patch applied fast enough, someone could have 0wned it over the Internet; and if it wasn't guarded 24/7 someone could have gained physical access to the server in the middle of the night. Secretary of State is a high-profile job with access to a whole bunch of secrets; I think China and Russia probably both have copies of all her emails from her time as Secretary of State. (Whereas the USA only has the ones she turned over, printed on paper.)

And we just found out about a really bad smoking gun. Hillary Clinton has claimed that no classified emails were on her server, but we have evidence that she had one or more people systematically copying messages from a secured system and sending them to Hillary's server. Details here. The key quote:

The subject line of the February 10, 2010, e-mail exchange is "Insulza." The exchange is about a speech, apparently by a foreign official. Perhaps the subject line refers to Jose Miguel Insulza, a Chilean politician who has been secretary general of the Organization of American States since 2005. In any event, the U.S. government's internal reporting on the speech has clearly been classified (not surprising in light of what Shannen Coffin and yours truly explained earlier: foreign government information is presumptively classified). This is clearly very irritating to Secretary Clinton, who is anxious to read the speech. In the first e-mail, Clinton curtly instructs Sullivan, "It's a public statement. Just email it." Minutes later, Sullivan responds, "Trust me, I share your exasperation. But until ops converts it to the unclassified email system, there is no physical way for me to email it. I can't even access it."

So some group known as "ops" is going to "convert" a message from the classified message system to "the unclassified email system"? That's go-to-prison stuff right there.

If you are a fan of Hillary Clinton... are you okay with a

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[Obfuscant]

So some group known as "ops" is going to "convert" a message from the classified message system to "the unclassified email system"? That's go-to-prison stuff right there.

No, sanitizing classified material and releasing unclassified versions is their job. No "go to prison" there.

'Go-to-prison' comes in when someone orders a subordinate to send them a copy classified material over an insecure communications system. It also disproves any "I didn't know" defense.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[Anonymous Coward]

Two minutes of Googling found this:

http://www.state.gov/secretary/20092013clinton/rm/2010/02/136606.htm

Which is the statement in question.

That statement was issued one day after the emails you are talking about, and is publicly available on the U.S. Department of State website.

So, basically, someone made modifications to a statement that was intended to be a public statement in the first place on a classified system - and then they couldn't get the statement out, because it was on a classified system.

That's not 'go to prison stuff'. That's 'someone should have been using an unclassified system' stuff.

Simply asking to have something that you know was written to be a public statement, because you're the one that will be issuing it as a public statement emailed to you is hardly 'go to prison stuff', even if it can't immediately be (because someone used the wrong system).

I honestly don't really like *any* of the current Presidential candidates - but do you seriously think trying to swing a load like this past people is going to turn people towards your side?

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[phantomfive]

If you are a fan of Hillary Clinton

Kind of weird now that you mention it, I don't know anyone who's a Hillary fan anymore. I know plenty of people who were, but aren't anymore. But I don't know anyone who would describe them as a fan.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[BoRegardless]

Guilty, guilty, guilty. Where was the protective high quality router? Who did the backups on both Denver and Chappaqua servers (it seems there were two machines at least.) Was a RAID part of the system? Where were the local and remote backups kept? Who archived the emails? Where are the archives and backups? Who monitored daily machine and server access?

Providing "60,000 pages of paper copies of emails." is just an excuse to hide the metadata in the emails, which is just, well, criminal.

Come on, come on; we do this with our own home systems.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[Sarius64]

Funny how underlings pleading the 5th have started.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[SuricouRaven]

I know plenty of people who support Hillary because they have seen the horror show of the Republican candidates, and recognize that Hillary is the best hope of keeping them out.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[khallow]

No, sanitizing classified material and releasing unclassified versions is their job. No "go to prison" there.

If they were following relevant law, then that would be correct. These reports suggest the material was not legally sanitized.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[phantomfive]

That's not being a fan of Hillary, that's considering her a lesser of two evils.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[SuricouRaven]

That's how American politics works: You vote for the D or vote for the R, or throw your vote away on a futile hope of a third option.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[phantomfive]

Hating Republicans is not the same as being a fan of Hillary.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[EvilAlphonso]

Before anyone is given access to classified information, my understanding is that they have to take a class in how to manage classified information and they have to sign an agreement saying they will abide by the rules governing classified information.

We have a similar class at work, followed by a test that you have to pass again every year. I actually had to do the test two months in a row as I joined the company 6 weeks before the annual company-wide refresh. Failure to score 100% on that test in the required time frame, being caught violating one of the security rules outlined in the class or witnessing a violation without reporting it are all causes for dismissal. Yet, it seems that all but a handful of employees have forgotten anything to do with the class within 30 seconds of finishing the test.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[Anonymous Coward]

"Now Hillary Clinton is saying that she doesn't really understand all this confusing stuff. "Wipe the server.. you mean with a cloth?" Oh sure, Mrs. Clinton."

You are either a troll or you been trolled. Hillary made a joke there that seems to have gone over your head. I'd bet my life that Hillary knows enough about the details of computer security that she made that statement as a form of humor, rather than an expression of her understanding of cybersecurity.

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[steveha]

You are either a troll or you been trolled.

Nope, neither.

Hillary made a joke there that seems to have gone over your head. I'd bet my life that Hillary knows enough about the details of computer security that she made that statement as a form of humor, rather than an expression of her understanding of cybersecurity.

First, I agree with you: she understands computer security enough that she knows what "wipe a server" means. IMHO the subtext of that joke is "I'm not going to cooperate with you, you get no straight answer out of me, I'm mocking you instead of answering the question."

But that was a screwup; she's not as good at lying as her husband, the mask slipped and she let her contempt shine through for a moment.

The rest of her comments were to the effect of "I don't know anything about servers".

Here, for your benefit, I transcribed the back-and-forth. Here's the YouTube link so you can check whether my transcription is correct:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neCMc-GcAvQ

at about 2:45 in the video, Ed Henry starts pressing her:

EH: Did you try to wipe the server?

HC: I don't, I have no idea, that's why we turned it over...

EH (interrupting): But you were in charge of it, you were the official in charge, did you wipe the server?

HC: What, like with a cloth or something? [**makes a wiping motion with one hand, and grins**]

EH: I don't know; you know how it works, digitally... did you try to wipe the whole server?

HC: I don't know how it works digitally, at all. I do not have any...

EH: So you didn't try, you did not try?

HC: Ed, I know you want to make a point, and I can just repeat what I have said.

EH: It's a simple... [**unintelligable**]

HC: In order, in order to be as cooperative as possible, we have turned over the server. They can do whatever they want to, with the server, to figure out what's there or what's not there. That's for the people investigating it to try to figure out...

The grin after she said "What, like with a cloth?" suggests that she was joking, but she was not joking when she said "I don't know how it works digitally, at all."

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[Anonymous Coward]

It appears that "ops" refers to the State Department operations group. http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=7958537&cid=50466069

This seems like classic Clinton here. Hillary said that none of the emails on her server were marked as classified until later. That's actually a true statement as far as it goes... because those emails were summarized or paraphrased versions of classified emails, created outside of the normal classification system; as soon as someone responsible found out about those emails they got classified instantly. All sorts of classified information was flowing to her server, and as Secretary of State a lot of what she sent in email would have been "born classified", but what was going on wasn't exactly "removing the markings" from classified emails.

I'm pretty sure that paraphrasing and summarizing classified emails is just as forbidden as distributing the original emails outside of the classified network system. The information in the classified emails is the most important part, not the particular phrasing.

sanitizing classified material and releasing unclassified versions is their job. No "go to prison" there.

I don't think that sanitizing classified emails for re-release as unclassified is within the normal scope of duties for the State Department ops group. The article describes the ops group as: "the department's operations center, which arranges communication on weekends and after hours on weekdays."

Re:I'm not buying the "confused grandma" defense

[Anonymous Coward]

Two minutes of Googling found this:

http://www.state.gov/secretary...

Which is the statement in question.

Um, nope. You are just confused. Really confused. That web page is called "Statement by Secretary Clinton on Developments in the Middle East" and it is a list of things said by Hillary Clinton. The "smoking gun" thing was Hillary Clinton asking for an email with remarks made in public by a foreign government official (perhaps Jose Miguel Insulza, the Secretary General of the Organization of American States).

So, basically, someone made modifications to a statement that was intended to be a public statement in the first place on a classified system - and then they couldn't get the statement out, because it was on a classified system.

The thing is, Hillary doesn't get to decide what should be classified and what shouldn't be. If something is in the classified system she damn well shouldn't be berating her subordinates for not "just email[ing] it" to her.

I absolutely believe that there is a ton of stuff in the classified system that doesn't really need to be in there, but it is still not Hillary's decision. If something is in the classified system she needed to abide by that.

do you seriously think trying to swing a load like this past people is going to turn people towards your side?

I'm not sure whether you are "trying to swing a load" or just really really confused, but do you think you are turning anyone towards your side?

And do you really want to fly the banner that your side is the side of "just elect the Right People and then trust them to do any damn thing they please: subvert Freedom of Information Act requests, degrade classified information and send it over an insecure system, and lie about it all"?

Are you really that in-the-tank for Hillary? Or are you so afraid that Republicans might do something bad that you are willing to look the other way while a Democrat spends years doing lots of bad things?

A friend of mine commented that maybe the reason why Obama has been so frustrated in the Middle East was that spies were reading his Secretary of State's emails. If Hillary's lah-di-dah attitude toward email security screwed Obama's policy, are you still in the tank for her?

All Right! Where are the tape backups?

[BoRegardless]

Not one single mention of an email backup function has EVER been mentioned.

No one operates a server where you know accounts are going to have critical communications and enclosures with a tape or HD backup

Re:All Right! Where are the tape backups?

[BoRegardless]

"Without" a tape or HD backup. Sorry for the typo.

Depends on who is the threat

[bug1]

If "security" is just protecting against external threats, and she knew of internal threats, then a private email server makes sense for some types of email.

Re:Depends on who is the threat

[dunkindave]

If "security" is just protecting against external threats, and she knew of internal threats, then a private email server makes sense for some types of email.

Yes, but the "internal" threats were these pesky things like the Inspector General, Congressional Oversight, Special Prosecutors, FOIA requests, etc.

Re:Depends on who is the threat

[sphealey]

Or in the case of the Bush Administration, Dick Cheney using the NSA to spy on other government officials (admitted to by John Bolton).

sPh

Re:Depends on who is the threat

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, didn't realize that Hillary was the Secretary of State for the Bush Administration!

Snowden Has A Point

[Anonymous Coward]

But he did not make it well enough.

Allow me to improvise for Mr. Snowden.

Snowden [sic], "Look at what I did to the USA National Intelligence Operations within the USA and against all USA laws and against all USA citizens, other than those who presume immunity. If I were to return to the USA I would be arrested, if not assassinated at the airport by the Secret Service for the NSA/CIA/FBI/White House, then incarcerated without bail, legal protection, denied citizenship and human rights, tortured and probably die maybe 5 or 10 years later. Look at what Hillary did! And she walks!"

We need better people in government

[Anonymous Coward]

Hillary Clinton is just one example of how we need better people in high government positions who know what's going on. Her server mistake was just one of many and she has little to show for her stint as Secretary. Does she go around bragging on her accomplishments? Nope, because she had none. Voter's lets at least vote someone in with more then just their fancy speeches and worthless promises. Let's vote in someone with some experience and professionalism.

Snowden is right, but there's no there there

[rcase5]

Snowden makes a good point. Clinton's decision to use a private email server while conducting business as Secretary of State shows bad judgement. Besides, if she was privy to classified information, presumably she would have had to read email from her DOS email anyway. So, the whole story about her using a private email system for convenience just doesn't wash.

Having said that, this whole investigation is just yet another fishing expedition by the Republicans. There's no there there, and they're just wasting tax dollars on some stupid vendetta. The mere fact that they keep investigating the Clintons (and the Obamas) and keep coming up empty only diminishes their own credibility on, well, pretty much everything. It's been going on for over 20 years and I'm tired of it!

Re:Snowden is right, but there's no there there

[Sarius64]

You're another moron. Holding someone accountable to the laws and executive orders issued by the President is not a fishing expedition. The fact that you make this statement shows you're partisan enough to commit felonies to support your sociopath beliefs.

Re:Snowden is right, but there's no there there

[rcase5]

I would buy your explanation if this investigation was initiated by the Executive branch. It wasn't. It was initiated by the Congress which was investigating the Benghazi Embassy attack. They didn't find anything, so now they're investigating something that is tangentially related (at best), hoping they find some smoking gun to hold Clinton accountable for the Benghazi attack.

Only now, since she used her own server (again, bad call on her part), they're accusing her of compromising national security. They may be right, and she should be held to account if it is found that she did compromised national security. But this was not the original scope of the investigation. This all started with an attack on our embassy in Libya, and holding Clinton (and, by extention, Obama) accountable for bumbling our defense and response there, to which there was no wrong-doing found. Yet the investigation continues. If that isn't a fishing expedition, I don't know what is.

Congress's track record on investigating people they happen to not like is not good. In fact, during this investigation, Congress cutting the budget was found to be partially responsible for the Benghazi defense failure, even though the Department of State requested more resources at that embassy. You see, when I say there's no there there, I'm using things like facts and data to support my claims. In 20 years of Republican Congresses investigating Democrats in the Executive Branch, the worst they've been able to uncover is a sitting President receiving oral sex from an intern. Calling me a moron and a sociopath doesn't change the facts. It would be nice if the Congress would investigate the people who lied us into a war with Iraq, arguably the root cause of the Benghazi attack. If they were as thorough with that investigation as they are with the Benghazi investigation, they might actually send some people to prison. But they won't do that, because they like the people who were in charge at the time. Who's the sociopath again?

Be fair to clowns

[Bruce66423]

I think associating well organised and genuinely entertaining people with the present shower of politicians is deeply unfair...

No amount of blowing smoke

[Anonymous Coward]

will cover the failure to properly label and process messages before they ever got to her, or the malfeasance in record-keeping by recipients of her outgoing messages.

Yep, it just happened that way

[Chris Mattern]

That fact that she got to delete thousands of "personal" emails without any review was an unexpected bonus, that's all.

China

[ebonum]

We constantly blast China for hacking. I tend to think: If the data is worth stealing, US companies/gov/individuals have a duty to lock it up and protect it. I know it is very American to blame all of one's problems on someone else. If you get hacked, it is your own damn fault.
People such as Hillary have a duty to protect sensitive information. If her email was hacked, don't blame the Chinese (Or North Koreans or Russians...). Blame her.

Re:China

[Solandri]

That isn't an American thing. It's a eastern/western thinking thing.

The eastern (Asian) way of thinking is that if it's important enough to keep secret, it's your responsibility to keep it secure, and your own damn fault if you fail to do so. In fact in many Asian countries it's considered the duty of competitors to try to steal those secrets, and you can be fired if your employer asks you to engage in corporate espionage and you refuse. A lot of western companies would be having second (and third and fourth) thoughts about doing business in China if they truly understood this.

The western (Euro-American) way of thinking is that if someone is trying to keep something secret, then it's rude at best, a crime at worst to try to steal that secret.

There are more layers to this which can complicate things. The Hainan spy plane incident would seem to subvert what I just listed above. But the Chinese were offended by the spying because of the Asian expectation that such attempts to steal secrets should themselves be secret. You're not supposed to do it openly and overtly - like flying spy planes in plain sight. Hiding the radio eavesdropping equipment in commercial flights flying near China probably would've gone over better with the Chinese people, whereas that would be considered unethical in the West and military reconnaissance flights the correct venue. The U.S. reaction that the spying was OK was because the West holds the law to be paramount, and the actions of the spy plane were completely legal (flying in International airspace just off China). In the West, if it's legal, then it's OK to do regardless of how nefarious your intent. (I'm first gen Asian-American, so it was interesting to watch the culture clash during that incident. Even the apology letters were classic eastern/western. The apology in Chinese had the U.S. vaguely "taking responsibility" for the incident, which your'e supposed to do for honor's sake even if it isn't your fault. The apology in English expressed sorrow that a life was lost but admitted no fault, which is a very legalistic approach.)

Backup emails may still be alive.

[Freeman-Jo]

I would be surprise if NSA does not have them on the servers somewhere.

All systems are compromised

[sphealey]

= = = ... When the unclassified systems of the United States government — which has a full time information security staff — regularly get hacked, the idea that someone keeping a private server ... is completely ridiculous."= = =

It is becoming increasingly clear that there is no such thing as a secure computer. Even if it is never connected to the Internet, but certainly if it is. Government computer/network, corporate, private, personal; they are all penetrated or will be if someone cares to do so. And someone certainly cares to do so for every high level government official in the US, UK, Russia, China, etc.

sPh

Re:All systems are compromised

[phantomfive]

Increasingly?
"The three golden rules to ensure computer security are: do not own a computer; do not power it on; and do not use it." Robert Morris Sr

Re:And she wants to be President!Bullshit..

[subk]

I think she knew *exactly* what she wanted in an email server. This is classic "double speak"

What other choice is there?

[TiggertheMad]

A lot of people are going to vote for her because she seems to be the only Democrat that is going to have a chance of winning, and sweet Jesus, the candidates that the Republicans are putting up are terrifying. I don't even like her, but I will vote for her just to keep a Republican out of the white house. Some of those people make George Bush Jr. look like a genius.

Sanders is interesting, but I doubt he is going to get national traction. What other realistic choice do you have?

Re:What other choice is there?

[fustakrakich]

The republican campaign is a Hillary campaign. It should be obvious by now who they are working for. Eh, whatever, the choice to play along is yours. I hope the payoff is what you expected.

Re:What other choice is there?

[HairyNevus]

I don't even like her, but I will vote for her just to keep a Republican out of the white house.

This is why we need Instant-runoff voting. It's the same for both sides, there's usually a third-party candidate for either side who is more practical politically, but doesn't have enough corporate sponsors to really run in the race--to stand a chance.

Re:What other choice is there?

[FlyHelicopters]

I don't even like her, but I will vote for her just to keep a Republican out of the white house.

The irony is that you're part of the problem. The same people who will vote for any R just to keep a D out of the white house.

Further, your vote might not even count, if you're in one of the majority of states that aren't a contest, which is even more of a crime.

Frankly, our elections are a joke, anyone with any brains can see that. You think we really have a choice?

Re:What other choice is there?

[Kavonte]

We already have something better than plurality voting, but most voters don't bother to utilize it. Instead they sit at home during the primaries and only bother to vote until they have only two choices, if they bother to vote at all.

Since the states have their primaries on different dates, the effect is a sort of run-off voting. The first states vote, and those candidates who do poorly are ignored by voters in other states who vote on later dates, so that they can put their votes where they will make a difference: choosing between the two most popular candidates. Since there are many different dates over which the primaries occur, this is a gradual process, with each election causing a few more of the least-popular candidates to drop out of the race, or at the very least, causing voters who might have voted for them to reconsider since they now realize they have no chance of winning.

Indeed, even without primaries, we still have pre-election polls which are usually clear enough in telling us who the top two contenders are, and we can simply choose between those two candidates. With no "wasted vote" effect, polls can tell us each candidate's true level of support, since no one has any reason to tell a pollster that they will vote for any candidate other than their favorite, even if they will do so in the election after seeing the incredibly poor poll results for their favorite candidate.

I'd love to have condorcet voting if we could make it happen, but I don't believe its absence is the cause of our problems.

Re:What other choice is there?

[aardvarkjoe]

A lot of people are going to vote for her because she seems to be the only Democrat that is going to have a chance of winning...

Anyone who votes for her based on that logic is so stupid that they don't deserve to live, much less vote. Hillary being the Democrat nominee is the absolute best way of guaranteeing that we end up with a Republican president.

Re:What other choice is there?

[Sarius64]

I too just stare when people are ready to elect future felons. Will Obama prosecute her? How did the smartest person in the world not know the Secretary of State (if you only knew the balance checks on this you'd cry) was not using official e-mail, at the very least. Any other person would already be in Leavenworth.

Re:What other choice is there?

[SuricouRaven]

Voting for D to keep out the R or vice versa may perpetuate a flawed system, but it's also an acknowledgement that the system is flawed and you have to work with what you've got.

Re:What other choice is there?

[khallow]

We already have something better than plurality voting, but most voters don't bother to utilize it.

[...]

... primaries ...

[...]

The first states vote, and those candidates who do poorly are ignored by voters in other states who vote on later dates, so that they can put their votes where they will make a difference:

[...]

Indeed, even without primaries, we still have pre-election polls which are usually clear enough in telling us who the top two contenders are, and we can simply choose between those two candidates. With no "wasted vote" effect, polls can tell us each candidate's true level of support, since no one has any reason to tell a pollster that they will vote for any candidate other than their favorite, even if they will do so in the election after seeing the incredibly poor poll results for their favorite candidate.

This superior voting mechanism wouldn't happen to be sarcasm, would it? I find your arguments otherwise strangely neutered.

Re:What other choice is there?

[Anonymous Coward]

A vote for the lesser of two evils is still a vote for evil.

Don't forget that Hitler was elected at first too.

Re:What other choice is there?

[FlyHelicopters]

A vote for the lesser of two evils is still a vote for evil.

Don't forget that Hitler was elected at first too.

^ This, all this...

Re:What other choice is there?

[laird]

Well, since primaries are also "winner takes all" they actually make the situation worse, not better. That is, if the district is gerrymandered so that one party is guaranteed to win, then only that party's primary matters, which is the case for 80% of districts in the US. This means that if the district is 45% Democrats and 55% Republicans, the Democrats' votes don't affect the election, so a block of the Republicans (27%) can determine the primary winner and thus the election.

For example, imagine three candidates:
- Democrat with 45% of the vote
- Republican1 with 30% of the vote
- Republican2 with 25% of the vote

Re:What other choice is there?

[Anonymous Coward]

In the short (meaning herself) and long (meaning the next one) term.

Re:What other choice is there?

[dfenstrate]

A lot of people are going to vote for her because she seems to be the only Democrat that is going to have a chance of winning, and sweet Jesus, the candidates that the Republicans are putting up are terrifying.

Have you considered that you've bought a line of bulsh*t the mostly Democratic media has been feeding you? They're not journalists, they are party operatives with bylines. Sadly for the republic, they're very effective.

Re:What other choice is there?

[Kavonte]

I'm certainly not saying that what we have is any version of ideal, I'm just saying that it's far enough from awful that I'm confident that it isn't really hurting us.

Our real problem is that our candidates suck, our ability to acquire information about them sucks, our electorate sucks, what we expect from our politicians after they are elected sucks, and where we draw the line between what we should and shouldn't pass laws about totally sucks. Using a better voting method isn't going to fix any of that. It's just going to more accurately allow a bunch of morons with little to no information to chose one of many awful candidates who will then proceed to vote in any way they please on bills that seek to create laws about things that the government shouldn't be involved in anyway. It won't change a damn thing, and so putting effort towards the adoption of condorcet voting is simply wasting effort that could be better utilized towards a cause that would actually make a difference.

Re:What other choice is there?

[Agent0013]

I'd love to have condorcet voting if we could make it happen, but I don't believe its absence is the cause of our problems.

When I hear people talking about wasting your vote because you vote for a third party I don't agree with you. It seems we have two teams that argue for the sake of arguing. Even when team 1 tried to get something passed during the previous administration, now that team 2 is trying to pass the SAME DAMN THING, they argue against it. If we had 5 parties, each with a very small portion of the majority, it would require more cooperation. Condorcet voting will allow people to take a change at alternative parties without being afraid of "wasting" their vote. Because we don't want the wrong lizard to get voted in, do we!

Re:What other choice is there?

[Anonymous Coward]

A vote for the lesser of two evils is still a vote for evil.

Don't forget that Hitler was elected at first too.

^ This, all this...

Adding third, fourth, or more evils doesn't improve the situation, just the coordination needed by the groups to violate the citizenry. Seriously, peruse the Constitution Party web site sometime. Just knowing the name, it sounds fine, but there's a lot of bat-shit insane behind it.

I used to think that having at least one more viable and similarly popular political party would improve things dramatically, but that reasoning is broken. The presumption is that because no one party of the three or more would ever (well, nearly ever) hold a majority, at least two would need to work together and compromise in order to get anything done, which isn't even valid by itself. US politicians have repeatedly demonstrated their ability and willingness to accomplish very little, even required matters like passing an actual budget. Imagine just one Ted Cruz in each of two or more of the several parties, and even budget extensions won't be feasible, with staccato government shutdowns eventually becoming the norm. Furthermore, when two or more parties could come to a passable compromise, assuming such compromises would represent some amalgam of the best ideas of each party rather than the worst is just naive.

If we want to truly improve things, we need to find a constitutionally viable way to end political parties, with a nod of thanks to Washington for first warning us of their danger (and an apology for taking so long). I consider this to be even more worthwhile than finding ways to curtail the influence of money on politicians. However, I don't have any idea how to accomplish such a lofty goal given that the explicitly guaranteed rights of freedom of speech and peaceable assembly, when taken together, practically guarantee the constitutionality of political parties. We don't need more of them; we need a guaranteed count of zero.

How did we get to a point where compromise is a dirty word, when even Tip O'Neill and Ronald Reagan could grudgingly reach agreements? By not understanding the self-serving nature of political compromise. Compromise used to be achieved through blatant pork-trading far more often than principled negotiation of policy. We haven't eliminated pork, but it's far less frequent and obviously tied to policy concessions, and now we have the unintended consequence of limited bargaining power within the legislative houses. So, by example, an ideologue like Ted Cruz cannot as readily go back to his constituents at the next election cycle and distract them with a shiny new bridge or forestalled military base closure to keep their minds off of any non-partisan votes he may have had to cast in order to get them. Worse, a guy like him is as much a symptom of this unintended consequence as he is a perpetuator of it. I'm not advocating for bringing back pork-trading, but without it, we're going to have to find other ways to force political accommodation which results in reasonable policy outcomes.

- T

Key facts

[Tablizer]

Here are some key facts that many people get wrong. If you have evidence they are incorrect, feel free to provide alternative evidence.

1. She claimed she did not knowingly send or receive classified info through her server. It's quite possible somebody ELSE sent her classified info when they should not have, and didn't label it properly. Whose "fault" that is, well, we will wait and see.

2. The "office" server she should have been using was NOT designed for classified material either. (There was a separate system(s) for that.) Thus, her home server being more of a secrecy risk than the regular office server is a questionable claim.

3. Messages that were deemed to have classified info were either mostly or entirely re-classified after the fact. The scope of this is still under investigation.

4. Using a home server was NOT illegal at the time, as long as a copy of each work message came from/to a gov't server, which would typically be the case. (So far they have not found a non-copied work message that I know of.)

5. She has admitted twice that her "home server" decision was a poor decision.

6. Jeb also has "email problems" such that if the two face off in the final election, the email issue is mostly a wash.

Re:Key facts

[Snotnose]

1. She claimed she did not knowingly send or receive classified info through her server. It's quite possible somebody ELSE sent her classified info when they should not have, and didn't label it properly. Whose "fault" that is, well, we will wait and see.

She was Secretary of State. She didn't think classified stuff would be flowing through that server? Uh huh.

2. The "office" server she should have been using was NOT designed for classified material either. (There was a separate system(s) for that.) Thus, her home server being more of a secrecy risk than the regular office server is a questionable claim.

But when her email was subpoenaed it would have been turned over in a timely manner, without her getting to choose which emails got turned over.

3. Messages that were deemed to have classified info were either mostly or entirely re-classified after the fact. The scope of this is still under investigation.

See #1.

4. Using a home server was NOT illegal at the time, as long as a copy of each work message came from/to a gov't server, which would typically be the case. (So far they have not found a non-copied work message that I know of.)

True. This is how we know that when she cherry picked her messages to turn over, she left quite a few out. "Chelsea, meet me at Starbucks at 3" is quite different from "Hil, this dude will give me $500k for a speaking fee if you don't hold fast to calling them a terrorist supporter".

5. She has admitted twice that her "home server" decision was a poor decision.

Mostly because it turns out that wiping the server made things worse, considering there were ways to reconstruct messages that weren't deemed "important" by Hil.

6. Jeb also has "email problems" such that if the two face off in the final election, the email issue is mostly a wash.

The only reason I would ever vote for Hillary is if Jeb were her opponent.

Re:Key facts

[Tablizer]

She didn't think classified stuff would be flowing through that server? Uh huh.

Review #2. It's NOT a home versus office server issue. If she had put classified info on the "regular" office server, it would STILL be the INcorrect action.

But when her email was subpoenaed it would have been turned over in a timely manner

I'm not sure what your point is here. (Actually, the office server died. It would have been gone.)

This is how we know that when she cherry picked her messages to turn over, she left quite a few out.

I have seen NO evidence she left out work-related messages in the stuff she handed over. If you have some, please show it.

The only reason I would ever vote for Hillary is if Jeb were her opponent.

It's tweedle-dee versus tweedle-dum.

Re:Key facts

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no such thing as "classified after the fact". Information is classified, documents are merely marked as such for convenience. If a message contained classified information, it was classified the moment it was created, no matter what markings were applied (or not applied). Sometimes an investigation will determine that a document was mismarked after it was created (which is actually what was said here) but this is not a "retroactive classification". Please stop repeating this falsehood.

Re:Key facts

[phantomfive]

such that if the two face off in the final election,

That is my nightmare.

Re:Key facts

[Tablizer]

It's a shortcut for "designated as classified". And there are plenty of grey areas. Categorization of human activity and objects via language almost always is an inexact science. English is not math. It's why we have judges and juries.

Further, the issue of who is responsible if something is misclassified (put into the wrong category) is also at play, which itself may be messy or based on interpretation.

Why Snowden?

[goodmanj]

Do we really need Snowden to tell us this? What is he now, the media's go-to guy for computer security? He's playing a key role in our understanding of CIA/NSA operations, no doubt, but he doesn't have any more expertise on the Clinton email scandal than your average Slashdot reader.

Re:Why Snowden?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because Snowden is smart.

He's a hero to many, but he's on the top of the government TLAs' shit-list. And now he's making statements about things he wasn't involved in, but are near and dear to the hearts of those whose shit-list he tops. He just played a political card to align himself with someone anti-Clinton, probably within one of the spook TLA's. If he can bring the people who think he's a good guy down on Clinton's head (not like that! the other Clinton!), then he's making baby-steps to come home without a nasty kangaroo-court trial.

The best way to get off of the shit-list is to be useful to the person in charge of the list.

Captcha: morass. Indeed.

Re:Why Snowden?

[Antique Geekmeister]

Edward Snowden is also a computer professional with direct experience of of federal failure to obey laws in the name of political benefit, and direct experience of how "secure" documents can be duplicated and leaked.

Re:Why Snowden?

[Anonymous Coward]

Smart? Get serious. He's bottom of the pile, mate.

The KGB is returning to manual typewriters

[Bruce66423]

or at least the FSB - the renamed KGB http://intelnews.org/2013/07/1...

Bullshit!

[Anonymous Coward]

Email. Is. Not. Secure. Period. If classified information was being sent by email, then the problem is not with Clinton's email server for fuck's sake!

Other Key facts

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Claimed she only deleted emails to her husband. truth: Bill Clinton hasn't used email since the 1990's under his own admission.
2. Claimed she used the server to only need 1 device. truth: emails are from at least 3 devices
3. Claimed server protected by Secret Service at her house. truth: was hosted by other party in building that may not have even had an alarm.
4. Claimed she never got a subpoena for emails. truth: she was given one 14 months before deleting the emails from the subpoena.
5. Claimed she never sent or received classified information. truth: classified information was in her emails.
6. Claimed she handed over all relevant emails. truth: Sydney Blumenthal handed over emails from Clinton in another investigation that she never handed over.
7. Now claims she never sent emails that were classified at the time. truth: signal intelligence from NSA is classified at time of origination, she had a class to learn this upon becoming secretary of state.

Now can we stop having people make up talking points to excuse her behaviour? There may be NOTHING in her email to find, but she lied to the American public at least 7 times about it so far. In fact every single statement she has made about them to this point has been shown to be a known lie, EVERY SINGLE ONE! She is unable to tell the truth about even trivial things. She is unfit to be a leader of a country.

Re:Other Key facts

[Tablizer]

1. Link?
2. It would have reduced total number either way. That's splitting hairs
3. Alarms are a different issue. The SS has neither confirmed nor denied monitoring. They probably can't talk about it.
4. Link? Note that a subpoena for work-related emails and a subpoena for the server are two different things.
5. Has yet to be proven. Much of it was classified AFTER the fact.
6. The info Blumenthal sent was already public. It was not secret.
7. Link?

Re:Is there any proof she ran her own server?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hillary Clinton admits she not only had a private e-mail server, but that she wiped the server as well.

Born Classified

[SuperKendall]

A number of emails a secretary of state are inherently classified by nature - the official term is "Born Classified". It is not possible to be secretary of state and not send some classified information from whatever email account you are using for that job - even if it was a one word reply on which way a decision with long-term ramifications should go in regards to another country...

Re:Born Classified

[laird]

The previous SoS's also used personal email accounts for non-classified information. And according to the FBI, none of the information in the emails was classified. What is going on now is that in response to the FOIA request they're reviewing the information and retroactively classifying a little of it. That's routine when FOIA requests are for sensitive information. But they're not making any accusation that Clinton did anything illegal or even unusual - that's coming from right-wing politicians, not law enforcement.

Note that she used a classified email system for classified emails, and a non-classified email system for non-classified emails. She didn't do everything through personal email.

The problem is much worse than it seems

[SuperKendall]

The really awful thing about Clinton storing all kinds of classified data on her server is not just that some of it may have been stolen...

Np, the far worse problem is that because she wiped the server, the intelligence community now has now way to know exactly WHAT information may have been leaked, and (again because the server was wiped) no way to have a good idea of the probability of it having been hacked or not - meaning anything she or anyone she worked with had access too, has all got to be considered compromised now.

More details here...

Re:The problem is much worse than it seems

[multimediavt]

Sorry, "powerlineblog.com" is not a credible source of information, but please remember to refit your tinfoil hat.

Re:The problem is much worse than it seems

[cold fjord]

If you bothered to read the post there is an argument being made there, and a credible one. It is consistent with reporting on the post-incident damage investigation and remedial action in other national security incidents. The lawyers that write at powerlineblog are knowledgeable and tend to make informed and thoughtful arguments. They are credible, your opinion not withstanding.

Re:All Right! Where are the tape backups?

[tanderson92]

Excellent point. A federal judge said today that they may want State to confirm that there is not a backup of the entire e-mail archive (personal incl.). This will be developing for quite some time I imagine.

OJ Syndrome?

[Tablizer]

From what I've read, experts say the rules are nebulous and nuanced. This probably means the person with the best lawyers probably "wins".

Re:OJ Syndrome?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the rules about classification are not nebulous or nuanced.

In every office that handles classified information, there is a book, usually hundreds of pages long, called a Classification Guide. This guide describes all the types of information a system can handle that are classified, and at what level that information is classified.
Any document that contains classified information is labeled appropriately. If you fail to label a document containing classified information appropriately, or if you remove the classification markings, then you are guilty of mishandling classified information. In many cases, accidents are not punished - unless they happen more than once or twice. At that point, Security will revoke your clearance, and out you go. Deliberate mismarking, or deliberate removal of markings, is an automatic out. Frequently out of the job and into a jail cell.

Re:OJ Syndrome?

[Tablizer]

Okay, there are some clear-cut areas, but there are also nebulous areas. There's no evidence so far that H received or forwarded marked messages. So the issue of what happens if she received unmarked classified messages or portions may be at play.

Okay, but what's the motive?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm confused, what is the hypothesized motive? She claims busyness or laziness or confusion, and a lot of people don't seem to believe that. What alternative sinister motive could she have had?

Re:Okay, but what's the motive?

[Camel Pilot]

To control the message and hide shady deals... ie contributions to the Clinton Foundation in exchange for political favors... most likely.

Oh, bullshit ...

[Anonymous Coward]

... if she had kept the shit on the government servers, China would have it, right?

Let's go back to distributed storage.

What is it going to take

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, I can't believe I see posts here STILL defending Hillary. What the hell would it take for people to wake up, if not for this? Those of you still on her side are complete robots. I lost faith in humanity long ago, but damn...

Re:Is there any proof she ran her own server?

[Anonymous Coward]

No facts allowed! Democrats in charge! Sandy Berger was a hero!

Natural distrust of official assetes

[Max_W]

We should remember that Hillary personally was let down in a bad way by the highest rank official. It is only natural that she did not trust official channels. It is not an excuse, but at least it could be on subconscious level.

Origional Classification Authority

[Uberbah]

Hillary Clinton is not stupid, and she's a lawyer. Before anyone is given access to classified information, my understanding is that they have to take a class in how to manage classified information and they have to sign an agreement saying they will abide by the rules governing classified information.

It goes well beyond that for Hillary. As another government employee has said of the information passed around on her server, "it was born classified". If this were a mid-level State Department employee, they would have been signing a plea deal by now for 5 to ten years in federal prison for mishandling classified information. Because Hillary was given special training on being a Original Classification Authority, as much of her work was automatically classified as Top Secret or higher.

Re:Origional Classification Authority

[steveha]

Because Hillary was given special training on being a Original Classification Authority, as much of her work was automatically classified as Top Secret or higher.

I don't know very much about how classified information is handled. You seem to at least know enough to know some lingo pertaining to it.

If you would, please answer a question for me: who do you think Sullivan meant when he said "ops"?

I immediately assumed the worst, that Hillary had a team copying secured emails to her unsecured server ("ops" seemed to me that it likely meant "the people operating Hillary's server"); but Slashdot user "Obfuscant" argues that "ops" must mean an official group that releases sanitized versions of confidential messages in its official capacity.

Is there any official government group that releases previously-secured messages that anyone refers to as "ops"?

Re:Origional Classification Authority

[Anonymous Coward]

"ops" appears to mean the State Department operations center.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/sep/1/hillary-clinton-emails-contained-spy-satellite-dat/?page=all#pagebreak

"As soon as I'm off call now. Tell ops to set it up now," Mrs. Clinton wrote from her personal email account on Oct. 3, 2009, to top State Department aide Huma Abedin on Oct. 3, 2009, seeking the department's operations center to set up a high-level Saturday morning call with two assistant secretaries of state and a foreign ambassador.

Also from that article:

The email does not appear to have been copied directly from the classified email system and crossed what is known as the "air gap" to nonclassified computers, the sources said.

Rather, the intelligence community believes a State Department employee received the information through classified channels and then summarized it when that employee got to a nonclassified State Department computer. The email chain went through Mrs. Clinton's most senior aides and eventually to Mrs. Clinton's personal email, the sources said.

I guess Hillary and the other people at State thought it would be okay to summarize sensitive information and paraphrase it before sending it to the unsecured server. This must be what Sullivan was referring to in this quote:

...until ops converts it to the unclassified email system, there is no physical way for me to email it. I can't even access it.

I'll bet the people from "ops" who performed this service for Hillary will end up taking the Fifth over this.

Re:Origional Classification Authority

[Obfuscant]

Is there any official government group that releases previously-secured messages that anyone refers to as "ops"?

There are, of course, people whose job it is to create sanitized summaries of classified information for dissemination to those people who are not authorized the unedited versions. They're the ones who redact or summarize so that the other, unclassified information can be used by people who need it while not letting the classified stuff get out.

The subordinates who Clinton was pressing for copies of classified material would, correctly, be dealing with those people whose job it was to redact; it would be her subordinates who were "copying" email to her server by forwarding her copies as she was ordering them to.

I wasn't necessarily arguing that it was the correct people who were doing the summarizing, just that what I assumed was that the reference was an informal one to them and not the people she employed.

The one reason she did this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Clinton is not stupid, so she used her own server for one reason and one reason only. She knew that any potential fallout from people finding out about the private server and her cavalier approach to information security would be FAR less damaging than people finding out what the actual content of those emails is.

consider the source

[Anonymous Coward]

People are listening to suggestions from an individual who leaked classified information on how Clinton should not have had a private email server? Unbelievable

Palin wasn't dealing with TOP SECRET INFO!

[Anonymous Coward]

Sara Palin, as governor of Alaska, was NOT dealing with TOP SECRET INFORMATION. To compare the two situations is total idiocy!

So what is the problem?

[Anonymous Coward]

I bet she has private pen too. Many bring their own tools to work. That is not special just because it involves computers. A server can be safe even if it is private. Just a tool. And I suspect she doesnt have time to run it herself - whoever she hires may very well be competent.

I Find It Fascinating....

[Ferretman]

...that many who are so keen to defend Snowden are also so quick to make excuses for Hillary.

Ferret

Re:And she wants to be President!Bullshit..

[Anonymous Coward]

true enuf. If anyone is really seeking the truth, do some net searches on the original law that provided "fourth ammendment like" protections for email, *but only for the first 6 months of it's existence on a remote server such as Google's gmail cloud, or my great grandmother's squirrelmail cloud*. Then spend a decade researching what each member of the government, particularly people like the NSA and Snowden and Hillary knew about real security and spying, and when they knew it. The citizenry of the U.S. was basically hoodwinked into letting their historical expectations of privacy evaporate into a cloud of lies and disinformation.

Mena, Arkansas (Lies upon lies)

[Anonymous Coward]

Two words: Chip Tatum.

Chip describes delivering cocaine, for the CIA, to Governor Clinton, and says that his wife was with him.

ObURLs:

http://whatreallyhappened.com/RANCHO/POLITICS/MENA/TATUM/tatum.html

https://www.google.com/search?q=chip+tatum

CAPTCHA: 'Pockets'

"less prominent government employees would..."

[Anonymous Coward]

"less prominent government employees would have probably been prosecuted". Bad wording. In a democracy it does not matter whether you are "prominent" or not. You break the law, you are a criminal. But in the US law applies only to the people without power. Just like Russia.

Contrary to Accepted Slashdot Wisdom

[mschwanke97402]

A serious case can be made that use of an off the books, private server might actually be a good thing. The Bush administration had one for all the big boys to deal directly with one another. I believe they cooked up the Iraq war and several other interesting plots this way. Executive level types need a way to speak openly with one another so they can get such important things done without worrying about who might be listening in now or reviewing their conversations in the future. Once the job is done the server is destroyed.

One can also make the point that the government has been hacked and remains hackable. From the Pentagon to the White House to the State Department all of them have been hacked. The Clinton's private server on the other hand remained secure. Set up by a state department staffer and guarded by the Secret Service. Known only to a limited universe of Clinton confidants and government officials it was far less of a target than official government run IT.

Decentralize

[allo]

You do not want the whole government to be hacked. So the more people bring their own infrastructure, the more people will be spared, if a single server gets hacked.

Trump has a plan read his book Time to get tough.

[Anonymous Coward]

The real problem is all you morons who keep voting Democrat! Who runs Baltimore, Chicago, DC, and New Orleans? Are you proud of the corruption? Democrats are the problem! We need a person that cares about the current direction the country is going! Clinton helped make this mess! Vote Trump!

If you think Trump doesn't have a plan read his book from 2011

http://www.amazon.com/Time-Get-Tough-Making-America/dp/1596987731

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/time-to-get-tough-donald-j-trump/1104038264?ean=9781596987739

Re: Trump has a plan read his book Time to get tou

[Anonymous Coward]

you think people's problem with Trump is that they think he doesn't have a plan?

My problem with Trump is that someone who lack the wisdom to avoid gleefully jumping into a public pissing contest with a reporter while simultaneously making themselves look like an idiot is quite likely lacking the wisdom required to successfully run a world superpower.

But hey, if you think having a plan is the decider ...

it's not your damn job!

[X0563511]

"I was not thinking a lot when I got in. There was so much work to be done. We had so many problems around the world. I didn't really stop and think what kind of email system will there be."

... and you shouldn't have. It's not your damn job. There's IT people who are supposed to do that, not you. You created this problem by trying to run the chef's kitchen for him.

Clinton "magic"

[Anonymous Coward]

She is counting on the press accepting and promulgating whatever fig leaf she offers (as they did for her hubby) NOT because it is believable but because most of them agree with her and her husband on politics. This worked remarkable well for all the previous scandals when she or Bill boldly lied about this or that but then got a free ride with the press. Remember: the mainstream press all had the Monica story long before the public knew and they all agreed to cover it up. It was a plucky internet guy who overheard the journalists in a DC eatery talking to each other about the story they were spiking, who then put it on his website (thereby making him famous as Matt Drudge) to break through the group-think of the press.

If she really DID do what she did because she was too tired or too over-loaded with work, etc then the default, which would require NO effort on her part, should have been to properly use the government server! Arranging her own server, making decisions about it, hiring people to run and maintain it, etc all require time money and attention that would not be needed if one simply followed the laws and regulations. This point should be obvious and it's dangerous to her credibility, so she offers-up the weak nonsense argument and trusts her friends in the press to push it out to the masses, perhaps accompanied by "analysis" from talking-heads about how legit this is because the secretary of state job is so very vital and overwhelming.

90%+ of US journalists self-identify in every poll as Democrats (or further left) so she is probably right to assume they will be there for her in the end to save her presidential run from whatever candidate the GOP selects to run against her.

You do not understand US Govt "classified"

[Anonymous Coward]

Although journalists and commentators are sloppy with their terminology, the fact is that DOCUMENTS are not "classified" in the US, their CONTENTS are what is classified; It's not the document that is "classified" and happens to contain some information. It's the other way around: the information is classified, no matter what document contains it. Any "Classified" marking on a document is advisory - it warns the reader that the information is classified. The information itself is classified (or not) on its own without regard to any markings on a bit of paper.

Large swaths of data in the State Dept and in the Pentagon is presumed to be classified the moment it is created and it requires no big red "CLASSIFIED" stamp to "become classified" - it is already considered classified at the moment it is created. Included in this category which is presumed classified at time of creation is information about private conversations with foreign leaders and diplomats. Also in this category of "born classified" is all intel from the NRO (the spy satellite agency). Hillary KNOWS this which is why she is carefully copying her husband's deceptive tactics and saying she never e-mailed anything "marked classified" (which has NOTHING to do with the law, which makes NO mention of a requirement for classified info to be marked as such). Indeed, in 2008 Hillary campaigned in part on the claim that she knew all about things like classified info and was therefore more qualified than Obama to be President. This is like Bill quibbling over the meaning of the word "is" - it's great lawyer-theater that is designed to deflect from the obvious lie. It gets everybody arguing/laughing about Bill's audacity and the silly abuses of a basic word, and gets people to look away from the fact that the chief law officer of the nation has obstructed justice to derail a lawsuit for his own benefit - over a law he himself signed and has used against other people.

In the US it's not only a federal offense to mishandle classified info (marked or not), but its a federal offense to put it in an unapproved location (if Obama did not giver her a waiver for her server before she used it she is in violation) and it's further a violation of federal law if she knew classified info was in an unapproved location and failed to report it.

Total Fail

[Anonymous Coward]

First, Powell did his private e-mail before the us govt had "gotten with the times" and established rules for it. Powell did not setup a private server on his own turf so he had total physical control over it, AND most-importantly he did not wipe his email server while there were congressional subpoenas and FOIA requests pending in the courts for the info on the server (that's a criminal "obstruction of justice" and "destruction of evidence"). Also, Powell is at the liberal-end of Republican politics so you further fail if you think his actions taint conservatives (it was Powell's guy Richard Armitage who outed Valerie Plame, NOT Dick Cheney or his guy Scooter Libby - the prosecutor in the Libby case knew this from the outset but did not want to go after these two left-leaning Republicans)

Second, DEMOCRATS went bananas early in the Bush years over the idea that the Bushies might be doing politics on their government accounts (thus imparting some form of official status to lowly political content) so the Bush admin setup the separate accounts they used as a capitulation to the Dems who loved the fact that Bush admin people had to walk out of the White House to an adjacent site to do political email and then back to the office to do official work (which made the political stuff very inconvenient). Now, in the aftermath of Hillary, the Dems are turning this arrangement around and dishonestly pretending it was some evil GOP scheme. Oh, and all these emails were NOT wiped; they are in the archives and will be available to future historians.

I don't even like the Bushes and I therefore find it highly annoying to defend them in any way, but I am MORE offended by people perpetrating false ideas and re-written history to the gullible masses. The old Soviet line that "the future is known, the past is unknown" and the accompanying political re-write of history is too vile to be left unopposed.

um

[Anonymous Coward]

The Democrats demanded that Bush and his sleazeballs have separate e-mail systems to keep political activity separate from govt activity. Rove and company used to complain that they had to go to some other building to do political phone calls and e-mails, because being the elite pig he is he was upset about the personal inconvenience.

I guess by YOUR rules, the Bush admin loses either way: all e-mails on govt servers == corruption, and separate e-mails on separate servers == corruption.

Can we apply the same logic to saints Obama and Hillary, or are your standards different for them?

Clinten responds

[dcsutliffe]

Touché! However, there was proof of intent by your actions under law.

Snowden is a threat to national security

[PeterHolland765]

Snowden commenting about threat to national security of the US? Sounds kinda funny considering he spilled classified information himself, betrayed his country, defected to a (potential) enemy nation where he is sharing all kind of secrets with. If Putin's puppet shouldn't comment on 1 thing its about threatening national security of the US. What Clinton did was stupid but not anywhere as much a threat to national security as what Snowden did (sharing all kinds of secrets with Russia).