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Trump Fires FBI Director James Comey (washingtonpost.com)
The White House said today that President Trump has fired FBI director James Comey. Press Secretary Sean Spicer said in a statement: "President Donald J. Trump informed FBI Director James Comey that he has been terminated and removed from office. President Trump acted based on the clear recommendations of both Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Attorney General Jeff Sessions. 'The FBI is one of our Nation's most cherished and respected institutions and today will mark a new beginning for our crown jewel of law enforcement,' said President Trump. A search for a new permanent FBI Director will begin immediately."
The Washington Post reports: Earlier in the day, the FBI notified Congress that Comey misstated key findings involving the Hillary Clinton email investigation during testimony last week, saying that only a "small number" of emails had been forwarded to disgraced congressman Anthony Weiner, not the "hundreds and thousands" he'd claimed in his testimony. The letter was sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, more than a week after Comey testified for hours in defense of his handling of the Clinton probe. In defending the probe at last week's hearing, Comey offered seemingly new details to underscore the seriousness of the situation FBI agents faced last fall when they discovered thousands of Clinton aide Huma Abedin's emails on the computer of her husband, Anthony Weiner. "Somehow, her emails were being forwarded to Anthony Weiner, including classified information," Comey said, adding later, "His then-spouse Huma Abedin appears to have had a regular practice of forwarding emails to him for him I think to print out for her so she could then deliver them to the secretary of state." At another point in the testimony, Comey said Abedin "forwarded hundreds and thousands of emails, some of which contain classified information." Neither of those statements is accurate, said people close to the investigation. Tuesday's letter said "most of the emails found on Mr. Weiner's laptop computer related to the Clinton investigation occurred as a result of a backup of personal electronic devices, with a small number a result of manual forwarding by Ms. Abedin to Mr. Weiner." The letter also corrected the impression Mr. Comey's testimony had left with some listeners that 12 classified emails were among those forwarded by Abedin to Weiner.
So, how many in the White House were under indictment for Treason, then?
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
After all it was Comey who got him elected.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
CNN and FoxNews both have the story.
Haven't checked NetCraft yet.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
Who's next?
next a russian mole as head of the FBI.
Next up: NSA.
It's alt-right.
... you know the rest.
This is what get you with this guy: used and thrown away. Sounds like Comey wasn't willing to help bury the investigation into the mango-in-chief's ties to Russia. With the way the swamp is being "drained" in DC, I expect the new head of the FBI to be someone from the mob. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Starting ASAP.
FBI Directors are traditionally non-partisan, and serve a 10 year term that is not at the pleasure of the president, unlike political appointees. This isn't to say that the President doesn't have the power to fire the Director, but it hasn't been done before, and would be a very unusual step. The question then is what is the cited reason for it, because given the current situation and ongoing investigations, it's really really suspicious, on par with the Watergate "midnight massacre" where Nixon fired both the Attorney General and the Deputy AG before getting to someone that would agree to fire the Special Prosecutor that was investigating Watergate.
In other words, it had better be a really damn good reason.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/09/us/politics/james-comey-fired-fbi.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
It sounds as if they intend to prosecute Secretary Clinton...
Also, why is this on Slashdot?
Because it's news for nerds (and everyone else).
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/0... Good luck, Secretary Clinton.
I know that a lot of OTHER READERS OF SLASHDOT hold a clearance, for their jobs. If you had done one 1000th of the shit that Hillary and Huma had done, do you have ANY DOUBT that you wouldn't be pounds rocks into gravel, in Leavenworth?
Pounding rocks into gravel? In Leavenworth? Doubtful. On the other hand, I have no doubt if any one of us were caught doing half the shit they got up to that we would be losing our clearances and our jobs. No doubt about that.
Go eff yourselves, liberal monkeys. The law matters.
Yeah, yeah, yeah! Whatever. In case you hadn't noticed, we now live in the age of Trump. Laws don't matter much any more. It's much more important to confidently double down on your own alternative facts...and to look chic and stylish while doing so!
Except the Senate has to confirm whomever his pick is, so while the Senate is wearing the same team jersey as Trump, I don't think you're going to find it is in fact Trump's biggest fan. That's the real irony here, that Congress doesn't like the man at all, and while they're going to put up with him to a point, if they get enough intelligence to draw a line between the Kremlin and the President, you're going to watch support melt away as it did for Nixon.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I know, a lot of you disagree and think that it's cliche and not authentic, but I do enjoy that new sitcom about a TV buffoon getting elected as the US president. Every week a new episode full of laughter and surprises.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
the Senate is wearing the same team jersey as Trump
No, Trump grabbed a T-shirt the same color as the GOP's jersey, spray painted '00' on the back, then snuck into the Team party, and when asked who invited him, pointed to the guy that just left the room to use the can, then scurried away to talk to someone else before anyone could question him. By the end of the night everyone thought everyone else invited him. By the next morning he was already POTUS and everyone wondered what the hell happened.
keep getting rid of the players and the only person left to look at is the manager
"Old man yells at systemd"
"Trump Fires FBI Director James Comey"
L-O-fucking-L!
I swear, if this so-called president wasn't busy destroying the country through his greed, ignorance, and epic incompetence, I'd be laughing my ass off at the antics of this draft-dodging clown.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Republicans have spent a billion tax payer dollars trying to find one thing Hillary is guilty of other than being a power hungry bitch.
No one. Not even Donald Trump can stay free under that kind of scrutiny unless they are not guilty of legal wrong doing. No one can hide with that many private and public investigations going againist them.
Morally she might be bankrupt, but we don't try people for being morally bankrupt or trump would have been executed for his crimes decades ago. Crimes like never paying back contractors what they are owed. Like hiding money from legally owed taxes. Oh and running more companies into the ground than airlines have crashed planes.
So name one legal thing she has been found guilty of in a court of law?you can't all you know is propaganda heresey and lies told by Fox news and other conservatives. The fact you use liberal monkeys shows you are too stupid to use reason and logic.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
NO, Comey was playing the Hokie Pokie over the last election and kept putting his hand in and out. He may have been a victim of circumstances and truly thought he was doing the right thing but after his last congressional testimony he really turned out to be damaged goods. Right or wrong, he needed to go.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
From my understanding Comey was not telling the truth quite frequently when testifying, even last week.
He said Huma had sent her husbands hundreds of thousands of Clinton's emails, and they had to use "electronic wizadry" to get it down to 6000 to review (there is audio/video of him saying this). Apparently I'm now hearing that the number of Clinton emails on Weiner's computer was 12. With 12 he could have gone over them in an hour or two, gotten the results and secretly given it to Congress and not made the mess in late October. Its now difficult to track down if this is true or not.
-- Being a Trump supporter, I believe if this is true he deserved to be fired --
A couple weeks ago he was asked point blank if the FBI was wiretapping Trump or his campaign, he said no. You will notice IMMEDIATELY Rodgers next to him said not to rule it out. Since then we found out Carter Page, a US citizen and Trump campaign advisor, was being listened on with a FISA warrant from the FBI. Comey purged himself under oath to Congress when he said that. I assume he did that for political reasons.
-- Comey should be fired for lying under oath to Congress ---
I'm sure there are plenty of other examples, including what Trump put into his letter firing Comey. But it was becoming apparent Comey could not be trusted to be honest or do his job competently.
So long and Thanks for all the Fish! - DJT
Time for a new Political party in the US (or two!) One is off the rails Other cant pony up a leader.
Trump does not suffer fools....
And the entire left wanted Comey fired up until the minute Trump fired him.
5 out of 6 people enjoy Russian Roulette & 6 out of 7 Dwarfs are not Happy
I find it curious that so many people who have spent months crying that Comey was a scoundrel who needed to be fired, are now complaining that Trump fired him.
Almost like nothing will please them?
-Styopa
It was the "Saturday Night Massacre."
The "someone" that agreed to fire Nixon's Special Prosecutor was Robert Bork, who is more well-known these days as President Reagan's nominee to the post of Associate Justice of SCOTUS in 1987.
I'm curious as to how you can say this? Since the investigation is ongoing, doesn't it seem a tad premature to declare "Nope, nothing to find here?"
Maybe this is Trump getting rid of a crappy FBI director, or maybe it's his own Saturday Night Massacre. I guess we'll find out.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Is this right?
Sort of. It's hard to say exactly why he got canned, really. The only thing really news-ish here is that the number of emails that involved Clinton were laughably small, so small that breaking the investigation news ahead of the election was certainly the wrong thing to do. And that even today, Comey is trying to claim that it was hundreds of thousands (actually only two, per the sources. Not two thousand... just two.) But then that kind of flies in the face of Trump's claim that Comey was too soft on Clinton.
So I'll go with the tinfoil hat folks on this one, and tend to believe it's more because he's been investigating Trump & Company's financial ties to Russia (etc.)
I'm a bit confused here, so could someone check if I get this right:
About ten days before the election, Comey comes out with news saying that tons of new evidence against Hilary Clinton has been found. This certainly didn't help her campaign, and it is quite possible that this ensured that Trump became president. Clinton supporters obviously think that what he did was wrong, and that he should have kept his mouth shut. Some Trump supporters may think the same thing, but may be happy that he gave Trump an advantage. Other Trump supporters may think he did the right thing.
Everyone thinks that Trump has reason to be grateful to Comey. But now comes the news that what Comey said was actually not the truth: That there was very little evidence found, and no really bad evidence. So while people may disagree whether or not he should have spoken, everyone agrees that he shouldn't said things that are not true.
So he may have handed Trump the election, but not just by talking, but by talking and not saying the truth. And now instead of being grateful, Trump says (correctly) that it is not acceptable for the chief of the FBI to lie in such important matters, and fires him.
It really makes you wonder what Comey's motivation was. Did he want to throw the election, did he just want to look important? I'd say he got what he deserved, but the way it happened was in a very unexpected way.
Actually, I've seen at least two people do it in the time I was in the government, holding a clearance. I'm not talking about hearing a rumor second or third hand, I'm talking about a guy who sat two desks over, that I knew on a first name basis, and worked with daily. Neither were anyone of remote importance, just average joes, and these were in two separate offices/commands, separated both by hundreds of miles and several years.
Both of them did exactly that - they sent classified information via an unclassified email system. In one case, I was one of the recipients. Want to know what happened? There was an investigation to determine just what happened, and when. The investigators then wiped all the unclassified systems that touched those emails, including the servers they passed through. The guys who sent the email? They received a reprimand (I'm not sure if it was verbal or something more formal), and had to retake the security training on handling classified material.
That was it.
Neither was fired. If they did it again, they might have been, or if they violated security procedures some other way (bringing a cellphone into the secure area, or leaving a vault door unlocked or something). They sure as sh*t weren't sent to court, let alone jail over it.
Now, if the unclassified email was their own system? They might have gotten fired/lost their clearances, sure, but unless the investigators determined that there was intent to leak classified information, a la Manning/Snowden/etc, or worse, sell it to someone a la Ames/Hansen/etc, that's almost certainly all that would happen to them.
No, Trump grabbed a T-shirt the same color as the GOP's jersey, spray painted '00' on the back, then snuck into the Team party, and when asked who invited him, pointed to the guy that just left the room to use the can, then scurried away to talk to someone else before anyone could question him. By the end of the night everyone thought everyone else invited him.
I think it's a little more like.. you can show up at the party as long as you hold up your hand at the doorway and pledge not to trash the place. No one needs invites, and when people saw him, they rolled their eyes and said "oh god, that guy's here too? Why couldn't he have stayed home? He's a total party ruiner."
It seems it really should not matter how the classified emails and documents got onto Anthony Weiner's or Huma's home computer, whether by emails or backups. Either way, classified materials should never have been there.
Employees fired by Trump:
Sally Yates
Preet Bharara
James Comey
Employees investigating Trump:
Sally Yates
Preet Bharara
James Comey
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
An exceprt from Trump's letter to Comey:
While I greatly appreciate you informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgement of the Department of Justice that you are not able to effectively lead the Bureau.
Trump went out of his way to mention -- in a letter he knew would be at the top of the news cycle -- that Comey told him three (count 'em, three!) times he wasn't under investigation. We'll be hearing that repeated by Trump surrogates ad nauseum in the days to come.
Trump is afraid. He's getting rid of Comey on a flimsy pretense of mishandling his Clinton e-mail testimony, but his real concern is that he may not be personally under investigation at present, but he might be in the future.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
This quote is interesting:
"While I greatly appreciate your informing me, on three separate occasions, that I am not under investigation, I nevertheless concur with the judgment of the Department of Justice that you are unable to effectively lead the Bureau."
Bring back the old version of slashdot.
Donald Trump publicly complemented Comey's press conferences and other actions related to Hillary's email during his campaign events.
How stupid would you have to be to believe that Donald Trump fired Comey for the actions which he publicly commended him for?
Donald Trump is preparing for his criminal prosecution and impeachment just like Richard Nixon did in the leadup to his resignation in disgrace.
Comey has found NOTHING after over a year of trying to prove a link between Trump and the Russians.
It hasn't been a year yet (July or August of 2016 is when the investigation started) so it hasn't been over a year.
There are plenty of links between Trump and Russia when you look at the folks on his campaign and their own connections. Roger Stone bragged on several occasions he was in communication with Guccifer 2.0 and knew when the next batch of emails was going to be released. Guccifer 2.0 is part of the Russian intelligence services.
Flynn, well, we know about his numerous ties to Russia and that he lied about not having any.
Carter Page, who at first said he never helped the Russians with classified or other such materials, then changed his tune to "no comment" when asked about the investigation into his dealings with Russia, and now is saying, "No I'm not going to hand over evidence of my dealings with the Russians so you can hang me with it."
As we saw a day or so ago, Eric Trump bragged that it was Russians who were financing his father's golf courses during the Bush recession. This on top of other financial dealings Trump has with Russia.
Then today, the Senate committee investigating collusion between Trump and Russia during the campaign has asked the Treasury Department's criminal division to hand over any and all documents related to Trump, his campaign and campaign aides.
That doesn't sound like "nothing important".
I don't understand why Comey didn't indict not only HRC, but also Huma and Weiner over mishandling of classified material. But the guy seemed to be trying to thread the needle.
Comey seemed to be trying to Do The Right Thing, as opposed to the rest of Washington.
Keep in mind folks, had you or I done anything these three did we would be in prison looking at 20 years.
Just fire the nukes already!
Well, the next director cannot do any worse for you... Comey has found NOTHING after over a year of trying to prove a link between Trump and the Russians.
The Watergate scandal took 26 months from the day the burglars were arrested to the President's resignation. Just because you watched it all in 140 minutes doesn't mean that's how it actually played out.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
The range of commentary on this story is quite extraordinary. Making for some really good reading.
It appears the liberals are scattered across a wide gamut of emotion.
Caution: Contents under pressure
America cannot afford to have a lawless traitor dictator.
Too many right wing nut jobs here. This place is starting to sound like Fox News in the comment section.
If you people are supporting Trump, the dumbest idiot ever to get elected president, on a site for geeks and nerds (hey, he's good at the cyber!), then something here is seriously wrong.
So long, and thanks for all the fish. I'm sure that reference will go over the heads of the right wing nutjobs.
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
if they get enough intelligence to draw a line between the Kremlin and the President
Isn't that what the New York Attorney General is doing right now?
It was helluva long ways into Watergate before anyone could say "Nixon must have known..." I wouldn't put the deposit down on the "Trump's Innocent" parade yet.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Yea, and Ken Star didn't find anything after years of trying, until Clinton lied about the blue dress like a stupid idiot. Congressional investigations of criminal activity rarely find anything more than process crimes (lying under oath and such). It's all political theater, a show you put on for the supporters who send you cash.
The odds say they won't find anything... Although they will continue to try for years and yeas. Remember Benghazi? How long was that?
This is about appearances and the political damage you can inflict with all the investigations, innuendo and rumors, not about reality or truth. The FBI did their investigation and didn't find anything. They could have missed something, but I doubt it. Comey's FBI did a fine job of investigating Hillary's E-mails and Anthony Weiner's issues, and I bet they did the same for Trump.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
If Barack Obama had fired an FBI director who was investigating him for treason, Fox News would be arming themselves on national television.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Good riddance to filthy garbage. I hope he wallows in disgrace and dies.
Interesting anecdote, but you left out what level of classification that the information was. I'm guessing if it had twenty two instances of top secret information or anything even resembling SAP level confidentiality, as was the case with Secretary Clinton, that things would have ended differently for them.
While we are at it, can anyone "name one legal thing" that Trump "has been found guilty of in a court of law?"
See that "Preview" button?
The one thing for Trump is he seemed to value his loyal cronies. And he owed Comey big time. Comey got him over the line, into the white house.
Maybe Comey was just crazy, and not one of Trump's cronies. Or maybe there is some real dirt that Trump wants buried.
But I actually doubt the latter because Trump would not be able to distinguish between what is reasonable dealings with a foreign power.
But for the Trump faithful (half the population) this just confirms that Trump is an honest broker. Prepared to make hard decisions when needed even if it affects those that supported him.
The DNC gave Bernie a good fucking - that undoubtedly helped put Trump in the White House
Eh - water under the bridge at this point.....
Stop confounding 'not guilty' with 'innocent'.
It is much more likely to have a conviction when key witnesses such as Vince Foster or Ron Brown can show up to court and not die under mysterious circumstances. There also isn't much hope for due process when deeply entrenched political interests run interference every chance they get.
No, it means nothing of the kind. The FBI investigation into Russian interference and links with the Trump administration continues.
POTUS firing the head of the FBI could be considered news that matters.
Say what you want, but at least the political commentary here is better than what is available on the propaganda outlets.
The fact is that 99% of the people in the media now "defending" Comey would want his head if he were behaving as a good FBI director under Trump after what they blame him for with Clinton.
It can be perfectly consistent to say that someone should resign and then to object when someone fires them. If you can't imagine a scenario in which that makes sense, then we're not having a conversation; we're just talking at each other.
Look, just because someone is an asshole who doesn't play by the rules doesn't mean that the rules don't apply equally to them. That includes the protections they offer as well as the penalties they impose. James Comey broke the rules by circulating what turned out to be false news about a candidate during an election cycle. He shouldn't have done that. But the President was wrong to fire him, too, because Comey was actively investigating him for alleged corrupt ties to Russia.
So people in the media called foul in the first instance and called foul in the second. They're not defending the man; they're defending the notion that the FBI should be apolitical and independent. It would be inconsistent not to decry both abuses.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
Nobody is defending Comey. They just don't believe that Trump cares about any of the bad things Comey did. They have good reason to believe this since Trump praised Comey for the same actions.
Play Command HQ online
If you are very very quiet and listen really hard you will hear the sound of everyone else laughing at the USA.
To pillage Dr Seuss "Huston hears a whohoohahahahahah"
That's true, however nobody believes Trump thinks badly of those antics. So what's his real motive?
Play Command HQ online
They have some evidence now. At the time of Flynn's firing, Trump said that he'd just learned about Flynn's problems, but now that appears to have been a lie. If so, Trump is implicated in the cover up at least.
Play Command HQ online
Did it occur to you that maybe I'm not inclined to go talking about exact clearance levels and such on the open internet where gods only know who's reading?
I'll simply say that this wasn't some low level operational crap - I was an intelligence specialist, and did intelligence work in a building that even the rest of the intelligence folks at the site weren't allowed in without special escort.
Comey says Trump is not now the target of any FBI probes
You are aware that congress asked Comey under oath if he was investigating the trump administration and comey testified under oath that he in fact was investigating the trump administration.
A testable claim! Oh God, I love testable claims about the law. No "could be this" or "could be that," just it's there or it's not.
18 U.S. Code sec. 798 - Disclosure of classified information
My criminal law class taught that "knowingly and willfully" are intent elements. If you didn't know it or didn't will the act to happen (e.g., the information that you were given was unmarked and only later retroactively classified), then it's not a crime.
Your claim that there's no "intent" test in the statute is false. Yes, the law matters, but your flawed understandling of the law does not.
Scott Adams has been calling this pre-bribery. Basically, they show the current office holder that they will be well cared for by throwing unearned money at the previous guy.
See that "Preview" button?
How many times have you heard the words "he has my full support" in the first few days of a scandal and then the person gets dumped a few days later? Surely you've noticed that in a few places, business, politics, all over the place.
As for Trump himself going from support to attack on something - consider his earlier praise for WikiLeaks and the current move to act against it:
http://bgr.com/2017/04/20/julian-assange-wikileaks-arrest-charges/
Is that sarcasm or something? Trump is not going to leave without leaving metaphorical claw marks on the floor as he's dragged out, and there's no sign of anyone dragging him out any time soon. He started in disgrace and isn't going to resign to avoid it.
The Benghazi hearings went on longer than that and produced nothing but smoke too... Remember Ken Star? Of course you do, how long was Clinton under investigation?
Yep, no argument from me. You're more or less making my point, which is that how long an investigation takes is no indication—one way or the other—of its outcome. I have no opinion on the likelihood of Donald Trump's personal involvement in corrupt collusion with a foreign power. I believe he's stupid enough to do it, but nobody has yet shown any plausible evidence that he actually did.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
I should remind the younger readers that it took three years to get rid of Nixon, and that's only because he "prepared a parachute" to jump before he could be pushed.
Can we possibly sustain having Trump as our president? And uh, we're seeing how that's turning out now.
What d'ya mean? Everything's going great! What's that, crewman? Large iceberg off the port bow? I'm sure it'll be fine. This ship is unsinkable!
Freedom to fear. Freedom from thought. Freedom to kill.
I guess the War on Terror really is about freedom!
As if that's the only law or statute on classified information.
Cough espionage act cough. Intent is irrelevant - ask any of the whisteblowers prosecuted for mishandling classified evidence. I have yet to see any of the "nothing to see here, move along" partisans come up for an explanation for why Kristian Saucier is serving hard time for having classified information on his unsecured, unauthorized cell phone - despite zero intent to distribute them - while Hillary remains free. Despite having a vastly larger amount of classified information on her unsecured, authorized email server.
Hand waiving. They could easily prosecute her for war crimes, obstruction of justice, and mishandling classified information. They don't because those are the things they love doing themselves.
Nice avoidance.
Uh huh. Were they Original Classification Authorities? Did they also destroy evidence without authorization, or set up their own unsecured, unauthorized email servers at their homes which they used for all electronic correspondence?
It was semantics (though it did indeed make him look like an idiot). At what point do you redefine kissing to be sex? Clinton seemed to be arguing never, and seemed to be arguing that only intercourse was "sex with that woman".
The really strange thing is we are still talking about it today as if it was important enough to waste all that time in court. Clinton was already known to be sleazy, it was just his political opponents trying an "angle" to damage him and progress their own careers and the country be damned.
It's hard to say exactly why he got canned, really.
Trump said it himself.
“And it took guts for Director Comey to make the move that he made in light of the kind of opposition he had where they’re trying to protect her from criminal prosecution. You know that. It took a lot of guts.”
“I was not his fan,” he added, “but I’ll tell you what: What he did, he brought back his reputation. He brought it back.”
“A lot of people want him to do the wrong thing,” Trump suggested. “What he did was the right thing.”
So he obviously had to go.
Freedom to fear. Freedom from thought. Freedom to kill.
I guess the War on Terror really is about freedom!
I agree with you, but he wasn't fired for doing the Hokie Pokie during the election. He was probably fired because he won't close the Russian investigation, and Trump has no patience with anyone who is not a yes-man.
why is this on Slashdot?
Wait... why are you on Slashdot?
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
personally under investigation at present, but he might be in the future
The operative word is "yet".
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
Trump impeachment odds now even.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
how long was Clinton under investigation?
And Clinton was impeached, as Trump surely will be. Clinton's transgressions are ridiculously minor compared to Trump's treasonous selling out of America.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
how do you even begin to respond to something this batshit crazy? Also, you'll still find the left wing media calling him a PoS, they're just as baffled as everyone else over the firing though.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Russia's too complicated a mess to turn into anything the American people can sink their teeth into, but interfering with an investigation? Well "The coverup was worse than the crime" has such a nice ring to it. It reminds them of Nixon and (Bill) Clinton's scandals. Americans will get that.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Exactly this. In austin the DA was caught driving drunk and made a total fool of herself on dashcam video and video in the jail. She should have resigned. She did not unfortunately. But then Rick Perry tried to fire her when he did not have the authority, which was also wrong.
if Trump doesn't somebody in the Republican party will step up to hand this guy a cushy seat at a think tank and some juicy speaker gigs.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
It certainly is given that Comey informed the public on three separate occasions that Mr. Trump was under investigation.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Guess some people never bothered to learn from it.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Well, Trump himself has said that he is firing Comey for the actions that he previously praised. Why would he lie? If you can't believe the president, then who can you believe?
They could easily prosecute her for war crimes, obstruction of justice, and mishandling classified information.
And my dad could easily beat up your dad. Any reason we should believe your [so far] unfounded assertions?
Posting as AC, 'cause I still have a job and a clearance and I don't need the hassle.
Fire_Wraith is right - this is what usually happens with inadvertent disclosure of classified info over an unclassified system. I too have seen this happen exactly as described.
However, once you get beyond "accidental disclosure" and go to deliberately sending this info knowingly over unclassified networks onto unsecured systems - and later destroying the materials yourself instead of reporting it promptly to the appropriate people to cover up the act - that gets into very dangerous territory, from lose your clearance and get fired to throw your ass in jail territory.
I cannot believe anyone who holds a clearance and saw what Clinton did would think for a moment that they could get off so easy too if they did the same thing.
Best comment in this thread...
This is all politics and has nothing to do with Slashdot. Do we get all kind of political news from all the countries in the world posted here? Waste of space.
If firing Comey was meant to make the issue go away I think Trump is in for a shock. It's thrown fuel on the fire. There'll come a tipping point where most of his support base in congress is going to melt away and then it'll be curtains for this traitorous asshole.
I can't. It's perfectly legal to defraud investors through corporatised entities. A normal person declaring bankruptcy = bad for them. Trump declaring like 5 times = good for him.
Let's face it, declaring bankruptcy is a means of reneging on dept or in other words a means of defrauding the people you borrowed from. Trump has managed to declare bankruptcy a half dozen times and use it as a tool to enhance his wealth rather than have the punitive measure it is for the rest of us. He's not good at managing money at all, he's just good at losing other people's money and then saddling them with the bill.
I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
Trump knows he is in deep trouble and everyone knows it. We have an extremely corrupt president. One of the latest scandals is Jared's sister offering green cards to foreigners willing to make a $500,000 investment. Jared is about to have major legal issues as well under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act as is Trump. There are so many violations by Trump that we could create a whole new criminal agency to prosecute a long list of crimes involving Trump. It seems that one new violation a day is being unearthed. We no longer live in the USA. Currently we are the US Banana Republic.
Trump should appoint a horse as the new Director (and perhaps change the name of the position to "Incitatus"). That would make the U.S. government even more amusing.
He called out the Espionage Act. That's the classified information section of the Espionage Act. Is there another Espionage Act?
It's called "moving the goalposts." You've just done it.
That IS the Espionage Act. Tell you what, why don't you specify the section of the U.S. code that you're referring to and we'll test that claim as well.
I hope the next president honors American values.
https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
Did you just admit that, although Comey indicated that the Trump Campaign WAS under investigation for more than a year, that he is NOT NOW under investigation?
Your reading comprehension is astonishingly lacking. He admitted that Trump has claimed that Comey told Trump that Trump is not under investigation. A claim that many people dispute is based on any factual basis.
Are we ready to admit that this whole Russian Collusion charge was (to coin a phrase) "trumped up"? That the investigation is over and has turned up nothing over at the FBI?
Absolutely not. Only a god damned fool would say "I guess they didn't find anything" immediately after the man being investigated fires the man investigating him.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
You and your opinion are at best 50% of the US view of the situation. Your ego is making you a fool, or you are paid to be a fool. Either way, your generalization fallacy is bullshit. I'll say the same with the appeal to authority fallacies.
The newly appointed Deputy Attorney General provided the opinion that led to the dismissal. This was not, as you whacko leftists attempt to claim, a President taking action on his own.
Lastly, Comey was not the only investigator working on allegations, in fact he was not an investigator at all. He was the Director for the agency. What ever investigators are working will still be working.
Reality check - When a director or chief of police is fired, the pending cases don't all vanish and go away. Operations don't all stop and agents and officers don't sit at home with nothing to do. A temporary head takes over (defined by the chain of command) until a new director/Chief comes in and heads the agency.
The over the top hysteria and baseless claims are why Democrats keep losing people. You are dropping in California for pity sake, wake the fuck up! (or don't, and be the party of extremists without relevance)
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
This isn't going anywhere... Trump isn't stupid enough to get caught up in a process crime and the FBI isn't finding anything after all their looking.
On, the contrary, I think Trump is exactly that stupid, but time will tell...
Fanatically anti-fanatical
The hacking (which outside of the paid by the DNC agency, there is no evidence for) revealed that Clinton was boosted and Sanders was shafted. And you claim that people outside of the DNC made it something other than a "fair fight"? Wholly delusional bullshit Batman!
The FBI requested access to the DNC servers and were _REFUSED_, so the only people claiming Russia hacked the DNC is the DNC and the agency that THEY_PAID FOR AN OPINION.
Other agencies claim Russia meddles, but Russia has meddled in EVERY election since the 1940's if not longer. The Police and FBI make sure that their meddling lacks direct impact. Russians cast 0 votes this election, and we have 0 voting machines tampered with by Russian agents. Voter fraud exists, but is more likely from illegal aliens when it occurs. I have seen no cases of absentee ballot fraud by Russian KGB/FSA agents.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
While we are at it, can anyone "name one legal thing" that Trump "has been found guilty of in a court of law?"
Interestingly, according to Wikipedia's summary of Trump's legal affairs the only thing he seem to have actually been convicted of appears to be "circumventing casino financing laws". Trump appears to have settled almost every other case against him with gag orders to prevent the plaintiffs from discussing the settlement and without publicly admitting fault.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
I was saying this on Monday.. BEFORE Comey got the ax.. Based on Comey's testimony last week before congress.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
I have yet to see any of the "nothing to see here, move along" partisans come up for an explanation for why Kristian Saucier [dailymail.co.uk] is serving hard time for having classified information on his unsecured, unauthorized cell phone - despite zero intent to distribute them - while Hillary remains free.
Because he had intent to distribute them, and he was explicitly warned before taking the pictures that what he was doing was illegal?
Fanatically anti-fanatical
If Trump really is that stupid, he's really lucky to have escaped so far and the longer he's president the chances of what you think being true continue to fall.... Eventually you will have to start thinking that perhaps the truth isn't what you hoped it was.
I suggest you put away the partisan glasses and at least consider the possibility that Trump isn't stupid, nor has he done what you clearly think he has...I'm not asking you to believe in Trump, only to engage in some critical thinking about what's being said about him and realize that a lot of what you are hearing is partisan rhetoric from folks who hate him (and folks that love him).
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
I suggest you put away the partisan glasses and at least consider the possibility that Trump isn't stupid, nor has he done what you clearly think he has...
I don't know what you think that I think he's done, but I think Trump has poor impulse control and that's why he may get caught up in a process crime.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
The fact is that 99% of the people in the media now "defending" Comey would want his head if he were behaving as a good FBI director under Trump after what they blame him for with Clinton.
It can be perfectly consistent to say that someone should resign and then to object when someone fires them. If you can't imagine a scenario in which that makes sense, then we're not having a conversation; we're just talking at each other.
The distinction between being asked to resign and being dismissed is a purely academic one. You're still being fired.
The real question is, was he fired for being bad at his job or fired because he was a political liability. My money is on the second. He used his position to "assist" Trumps election. Now Trump is having his night of the long knives by getting rid of anyone who could threaten him.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
What would happen if those employees had asked to use their own Blackberries like the President had, were denied, but decided to set up their own servers instead?
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
After all it was Comey who got him elected.
Did you help Trump get elected... Because this is what happens when Trump gets elected.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Why did you not scroll down to Title 18, 793(f)?
(f) Whoever, being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, note, or information, relating to the national defense, (1) through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust, or to be lost, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, or (2) having knowledge that the same has been illegally removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of its trust, or lost, or stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, and fails to make prompt report of such loss, theft, abstraction, or destruction to his superior officer—
Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
While we are at it, can anyone "name one legal thing" that Trump "has been found guilty of in a court of law?"
If we're using Hillary standards here, shouldn't we be judging him on all the things he's just been accused of... and there's been a lot of that in the last 2 years alone... Lets not even mention potential links to organised crime with suspicious payments to several crime families.
Trump == Innocent until well and truly proven guilty, then give him the benefit of the doubt.
Clinton == Mere accusation is evidence of extreme wrongdoing.
No double standards there.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Beyond the basic fact that 793(f) applies only to national defense information, and instead these were state department materials?
Gross negligence is "carelessness which is in reckless disregard for the safety or lives of others, and is so great it appears to be a conscious violation of other people's rights to safety. It is more than simple inadvertence, but it is just shy of being intentionally evil."
Colnaghi, U.S.A., Inc. v. Jewelers Protection Services, 611 N.E.2d 282 (N.Y. 1993) defines gross negligence as "conduct that evinces reckless disregard for the rights of others or 'smacks' of intentional wrongdoing," and "represents an extreme departure from the standards of ordinary care to the extent that the danger was either known to the defendant or so obvious that the defendant must have been aware of it."
That's essentially intent, but eliminates the requirement that there be contemporaneous consciousness of the nature of the action. Combine it with the requirement that it be national defense information and you're still behind the eight ball if you attempt to bring a charge.
Finally, the proposition was "There is no 'intent' test in the statue nor CFR regarding violation of the espionage act." Well, there is. You're merely attempting to move the goalposts, like the others before you.
Clinton was impeached...on a party line vote, by an opposition majority
With the Gerrymander safe behind the 5-4 wall of Federalists, there will BE NO opposition majority.
And America will be sold to Putin, so much the pound
Trump is just negotiating the price.
Fair enough.... However, it's a pretty bad position when you depend on your opponent to make a mistake before you can possibly have any advantage...
BTW, He's been showing remarkable restraint with a number of issues from my perspective. All I'm really seeing from him are hiccups which are a result of his not caring about political correctness. He's brash, bold and unpolished, but I don't see him as impulsive or stupid, he just doesn't care about the politically correctness of what he says, tweets or does. (Which, by the way, is EXACTLY why he was elected..)
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Don't you know it's illegal to write real facts these days, As well as totally ineffective.
What you need is a story with pizzazz, chutzpah, and legs, such as that it was the Russians who forwarded those emails onto Abedin's husband's computer.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
I argued against a person claiming everyone agrees with them. That does not mean I believe the same thing, and a tiny amount of thought would indicate that I have no such delusion or would have claimed "my side is right" instead of "half disagree". You just took some "common" out of common sense.
Jeff Sessions is not the "assistant Attorney General", your facts are wrong. At least try to use facts and reality, not bullshit and hyperbole put out by whackos.
Lastly, President Trump has not yet nominated anyone. You are basing your position wrong doing in fantasy land. Who exactly is telling you his appointment is bad, imaginary friend got your ear? Do you believe you are tuned into the aliens and they told you his pick would be bad? Or are you simply believing bullshit spread by jackasses with a political motivation for spreading bullshit? Until reality hits, if you truly believe your imagination, seek medical attention and get on some medication as you are a danger to society.
If Trump appoints someone other than a law officer who is capable of the job, I'll be right there with you bitching about the appointment. I am not happy with some of his picks so far, but the key appointments (AG, Supreme Court, HHS, DHS) have been pretty good. I base my opinion in reality, not fantasy land.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Your own link says that he was charged with "one count of unauthorized retention of defense information" and "one count of obstruction of justice."
Was the information on Clinton's server defense information? Was she not authorized to have it? Did she destroy defense (or classified, or U.S. government-owned) information to thwart investigation?
And no, her lawyers decision to withhold personal emails does not qualify as Clinton herself destroying information that is relevant to the investigation.
One of these things is not like the other...
TL;DR, if you think Comey acted inappropriately, you're a butthurt partisan hack and you've never had to make a hard decision in your life.
But he did break the rules, which is the fundamental point here. To claim that a letter to a Congressional Comittee was private and that it never entered Comey's mind that it might be leaked is utterly disingenuous. All he had to do was wait a week or so. His rationale was that there would be a political furore if it came out that he knew this information before the election. That's weak. He made assertions about the emails that were not borne out by the facts, and which took only a few more days to determine. I'm not saying he was lying; I'm saying that he spoke before he knew the facts.
For someone whom you defend as being good at making tough decisions, that's a bit of a rookie error. The most generous conclusion is that part of making tough decisions is living with their consequences, and that breaking precedent about non-interference with elections was an historically momentous decision. In hindsight, there was nothing in the actual emails that justified the decision. So he broke the rules, and he was wrong to do it. Whether he could have known in advance what the impact would be is moot. It's precisely because the results of such actions are unpredictable that Justice Department employees have a policy of simply not making statements about ongoing investigations—such as the Russia probe, for example—during an election campaign.
You can portray it as a partisan issue, but no other FBI director—not even Hoover, who was no wilting lily when it came to political shenanigans—ever actively intervened in a Presidential election. Ever.
There is strong empirical evidence that, had he not spoken up, the election could easily have gone the other way. The FBI are required to be non-partisan and apolitical. That is a fundamental precept of virtually all of the Justice Department's activities. Yes, Lynch made a mistake in allowing Bill Clinton onto the plane that day, but to revisit grammar school ethics for a moment: Two wrongs don't make a right.
I'm not butthurt, by the way. I don't even have a dog in this fight. I'm just deeply saddened that people are willing to play the same stupid fucking political games while your republic's democratic institutions circle the toilet. The point, you may recall, is not only whether Comey did right or wrong, but whether the President was right to fire him for what he did. And my point, as you might recall, is that the President was wrong to do so, even if, as the Justice Department memo claims, he handled the Clinton case in a way that undermined the integrity of the FBI as an apolitical and non-partisan organisation.
If the only way you can conceive of a differing opinion is in terms of butthurt partisanism... then I'm very sorry for you. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
The distinction between being asked to resign and being dismissed is a purely academic one. You're still being fired.
Tell that to William Sessions, who was asked to resign, and did not, requiring Bill Clinton to fire him. Those are two very distinct actions.
But the point is that the people calling for his resignation were not in the same group as the people who ultimately fired him. They didn't have the power to make him step down.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
There was no requirement to authorize them. Clinton had the authority to do that herself.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
And trump has always been known to be sleezy. One is ok and one isn't ?
Funny isn't it.
The game is almost over.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
We need a new term to be defined here, here's one.. Democratic Dictator.
Pure, unadulterated nonsense, but I'll give you points for brazenness.
Says the AC engaging in lazy avoidance rather than address the facts. Did the government prosecute a sailor for storing classified information on an unsecured, unauthorized electronic device at the same time it was letting off a high level official for having a vastly higher amount of information on her unsecured, unauthorized server, or did it not?
Yes or no.
Willfully obtuse. Sailor was prosecuted for having classified information on an unauthorized device. Hillary had far, far, far more classified information stored on an unauthorized device. The math here isn't hard.
You mean delete thousands of emails. You're going from being willfully obtuse to being willfully stupid or dishonest - which is it? What do you think the sailor was charged with obstruction of justice for....hint, it was trying to dispose of the evidence after he realized he had screwed up.
No, he had no intent to distribute them for espionage, as even the prosecutors will tell you.
Hillary was explicitly told of her responsibilities as an Original Classification Authority, and a mere two years earlier lambasted the Bush Administration for.....conducting business over private email. So you can add naked hypocrisy to her already established corruption and negligence.
Next excuse?
Are you really this incompetent? The Espionage Act DGAF about intent, which was the point that was made, that you skipped over.
Well, the thing is - it's difficult to know if Trump really lies per se. One definition of "lie" is to tell something inconsistent with observable reality - Trump does that all the time.
But the other (the one that applies in courts for example) is to tell something inconsistent with what you sincerely believe the truth to be (or to put it in legal terms 'to the best of your knowledge').
Trump may not be violating the latter in fact - it's just that his sincere beliefs, the best of his knowledge, bares no resemblance whatsoever to observable reality or, for that matter, to what he sincerely believed an hour ago.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
Until Congress changed the law a year after Clinton left the State Department, there was no reason the Secretary of State couldn't use an outside email service for official business. Her server may have been ill-advised and badly administered, and there were certainly things on it that shouldn't have been, but the server itself was legal and needed no authorization.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Fair enough.... However, it's a pretty bad position when you depend on your opponent to make a mistake before you can possibly have any advantage...
That's not at all what I said.
BTW, He's been showing remarkable restraint with a number of issues from my perspective. All I'm really seeing from him are hiccups which are a result of his not caring about political correctness.
Your bias is clearly preventing you from coming to an accurate assessment of the situation. Your evaluation of Trump may be affected by the a Halo effect, because impulsiveness seems to be one of Trump's defining character traits. Note, despite what I wrote, don't actually think Trump is stupid*, but I won't be surprised if he gets caught committing a larger crime while trying to cover up (or punish) some other lesser transgression.
* I do think he's a corrupt, vindictive, and petty narcissist who cares very little for his country. Sure, he loves the adoring crowds, but he seems to have little interest in the actual business of running the country from everything I've seen and heard from both his friends and his enemies. But he's clever enough to manipulate both his partners and his opponents to get what he wants, most of the time, and to generally leave someone else holding the bag when things fall apart.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
* I do think he's a corrupt, vindictive, and petty narcissist who cares very little for his country.
Where you think my preconceived notions cloud my judgment of Trump, I think yours do. You don't like him, so you are ascribing all your perceived faults as further evidence of why you are right. It's the same charge you make about me, so who's right? First, your assumptions about me are wrong....
I don't hold Trump up as some ideal person, far from it. What politician is? None that I know of. Trump is many of the things you claim. He's brash, unpolished, braggart that cares little for political correctness or being nice. He doesn't take garbage or suffer foolishness (from his perspective) or play games. However, none of that disqualifies him from holding office and I support him because of his policies, which I agree with more than Hillary's.
Corrupt? You are going to have to come up with proof of that... He's a rich business man who's been in the public eye for decades, surely you have proof of this charge by now...
Vindictive? I don't think so, but I won't argue the point because so what if he is?
Narcissist? Fine, I'll give you this. However, most politicians and well known people have similar characteristics... This isn't unusual. I think Obama is one too, but it's not something I'd use to bash him with.
Cares very little for the Country? LOL.. Really? Sounds like a typical political "I don't like him" laundry list item...
Who's bias is showing? Mine may be, but yours surely is too..
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
After the politicization of other federal entities under the previous administration I think you are being too lenient.
Also, I find it hard to believe that the media or any democrat would be opposing the firing of Comey if Hillary were the president.
So it can be perfectly consistent to say someone should resign, and object when someone fires them. However, it is the height of inconsistency when you would accept one person firing someone but not another. That is not consistent. That is blatant misinformation and politicking.
Again, if Hillary was in office and the FBI was still investigating her for whatever reason and she fired Comey, are you completely sure that the press and democrats would be grilling her the same way they are the Trump administration? If you answer this question honestly, I will be surprised.
Besides, why would any democrat want a hardcore failure like Comey investigating the president? He would have failed to protect the interests of the people as he had done so many, many times before and Trump would be exonerated. Jesus you people are dense.
When the only tool you have is a claw hammer every problem starts to look like the back of someone's skull.
The difference is I see both his strengths and his weaknesses, while you excuse obvious faults with inane platitudes like "he's just not politicaly correct". No, that's not it at all, and you're wilfully blind if you actually believe that.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
So you don't wish to debate my point that you are biased too and I can assume you agree with me on that? Fine, we are done here then.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Your point is irrelevant, it doesn't matter whether or not I'm biased. In fact, you can like Donald Trump all you want, but you should stop trying to ignore or dismiss the actual facts, to suit your positive view of him. Either accept Trump, flaws and all, or recognize that you refuse to deal with reality.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
Now you're just engaging in willful dumbfuckery. Do show where in the Constitution where it says cabinet appointments may flout federal law?
zombie Sandy Berger is fascinated by your alternative facts and would love to subscribe to your newsletter:
Hillary had the same amount of authority to set up her own email server as Berger had to take out classified information in his pants, as much Petraeus had to show classified information to his mistress. Hillary is also a hypocrite of Newt/Bob/Denny proportions as she had blasted the Bush Administration for using a private email service two years before setting up her own private email server.
It's also fascinating to watch Dems continue to defend Hillary's email server as a great idea, at the same time they are seeing Russians hiding under every bed trying to hack into computing systems and engage in shenanigans. But her unsecured server was still a great idea!