The Drip Drip Drip...

[Lord Jim]

Not enough evidence to support a conclusion of wrong doing and a decision to prosecute.

Now wait a second...

He presented boatloads of evidence that she engaged in all kinds of "wrong doing"...(repeatedly lying to the American people about this on point after point is just one example of the "wrong doing" he demonstrated.)

The only thing he has said thus far is that he didn't think a prosecutor would go to trial with the amount of evidence he had.

Hopefully he will shed more light on this tomorrow.

[RayThom]

...I can certainly understand why someone supporting Hillary Clinton would prefer that the extremely damning findings of the FBI investigation not have been made public, but Comey absolutely did the right thing... I applaud Jim Comey for providing the information that the electorate has every right to consider when deciding how they will vote. His transparency helps strengthen our democracy.... This wasn't "political" on his part. It was a matter of supreme public interest.

I agree completely. However, I do not -- and will not ever -- believe these findings to be conclusive. Unfortunately, from now to whenever, anyone bitchin' n moanin' about the outcome might as well be howling at the moon.

Hillary Rodham Clinton is an American politician soon to be serving as the 45th President of the United States. "Seat belt buckled, tray tables and seat backs in their full, upright, and locked positions"... it's going to be a bumpy flight.

[rubato]

No Clinton infraction is so small that it is not worth bringing the entire Republican congress to a complete halt, hurting the millions of people who need effective government, to consider it.


The GOP, mean little children torturing everyone else to make their enemies itch, briefly.

yrs,
rubato

[Jarlaxle]

The more I hear coming out of this guy's mouth, the more I wonder how anybody with even half the brains God gave to a gopher can still think of voting for him.

-"BB"-

He's not Hillary.

If that's your only validating criterion for what it takes to be POTUS, then there's a world of people out there who are "not Hillary".  And you're saying that 'The Hairpiece That Walks Like A Man' is the best of the lot?  Good God, man, he's not presidential timber; he's a loose cannon on deck!

-"BB"-

[/quote]

My main criteria were and are: not Hillary, not Jeb Bush.

[Big RR]

No Clinton infraction is so small that it is not worth bringing the entire Republican congress to a complete halt, hurting the millions of people who need effective government, to consider it.

The entire Congress? This is a committee hearing tying up maybe a dozen or so reps--the rest of Congress can carry on with its business--unfortunately, they are doing it as well as they usually do, hearing or no hearing.

[Lord Jim]

That's a nice attempt at spinning the result, Jim

Oh gee whiz, looks like my interpretation wasn't "spin"; it was in fact spot on:

"The question I always look at is, is there evidence that would establish beyond a reasonable doubt that somebody engaged in conduct that violated a criminal statute. And my judgment here is there is not," Comey said.

http://in.reuters.com/article/usa-elect ... NKCN0ZN1NO

Although there is evidence of potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information, our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.

What Comey is doing there, is drawing on his long (and very impressive) experience as a US Attorney, in evaluating whether or not he believed a winnable case could be brought that would meet the standard of "beyond a reasonable doubt"...

He's clearly saying that there's evidence that crimes (that's what "violations of the statutes" are; "crimes") were committed, but then he says that in his judgement no prosecutor would bring the case.

And when do prosecutors who believe that crimes have been committed not bring the case? When they don't believe that they have sufficient evidence to win the case; ie, meet the burden of "beyond a reasonable doubt"...

That was the judgement call that Comey made, as he clearly indicates in the passage I quoted...

Not a bit of "spin"... just facts based on what the man himself said

So Sue, would you like to concede that my interpretation of Comey's reasoning was correct now, or would you prefer to make that admission at a later date?

[Long Run]

One of the interesting takes that this story and others illustrate is that HRC may be elected president, but she is more of a lead weight rather than a support to down ticket Dems. People may resign themselves to voting for her, but they are not doing so with any enthusiasm, and that negative view will spill over to the D's who support her as they run for lower offices. In contrast, it is a well-covered story whether or not Trump will hurt the chances of R's running for lower office, especially since so many of them have either actively opposed him or publicly and repeatedly criticized him. The forecast is for more divided government, for better or worse.

[Guinevere]

I completely disagree, but nice try at the spin. HRC is raising money for down ticket Dems (unlike Sanders who refused to do so) , locals are out and campaigning, and there is a good chance to take back the Senate. Dems will turn out, unlike Republicans, many of whom will stay home and vomit on Election Day.

[Burning Petard]

Did she lie? Or did the various listeners hear what they wanted to hear? I listened to the entire hearing on C-Span yesterday (so I would not be distracted by the talking heads telling me what I just saw/heard the way these things are covered by the tv networks.)

Over and over again the person down at the table said that some of the e-mails contained classified information. The GOP questioners up on the (what do you call it--the balcony, the viewing box?) re-phrased the answer to be the classified e-mails. Damn near zero percent of the email messages were actually classified. And you would not know the message was classified until you read it all and got to the footer down at the bottom that began with a lower case C. There were less than ten of these actually classified messages.

"Classified" what does that actually mean? There are many levels of classification, I think beginning with 'Confidential' which is almost meaningless. The DC phone book when it gets into a desk drawer at the Pentagon, is probably classified Confidential. It goes up from there to stuff that can never be removed from special isolation chambers. A Dem made passing reference to this, but never did I hear anybody say just what the classification was for the 'classified material' in the unclassified messages, or the level of classification for the actually classified messages. Maybe they did. I admit I was not fully attentive to the whole thing.

Was her private server hacked? The experts say possibly by individual or group that was so good they left no traces. What we do know is that the official 'classified' systems she was supposed to use were hacked or simply leaked over and over again.

Did she lie, did she mislead, did she spin? [note those three verbs all mean the same thing] Of course she did. To what harm? Does 'the people' actually have a right to know everything? Especially given the "loyal Opposition" whose primary goal and driving agenda is to always make Obama look bad.



(((((snailgate)))))

[Lord Jim]

many of whom will stay home and vomit on Election Day.

That certainly sounds a lot more appealing then voting for Hillary Clinton but I'm going to do it anyway...

Then I'll go and get drunk...

And then I'll go home and vomit...

[rubato]

One of the interesting takes that this story and others illustrate is that HRC may be elected president, but she is more of a lead weight rather than a support to down ticket Dems. People may resign themselves to voting for her, but they are not doing so with any enthusiasm, and that negative view will spill over to the D's who support her as they run for lower offices. In contrast, it is a well-covered story whether or not Trump will hurt the chances of R's running for lower office, especially since so many of them have either actively opposed him or publicly and repeatedly criticized him. The forecast is for more divided government, for better or worse.

7 1/2 years of your GOP spinning the "hate Obama he's a Moslem" machine and he is more respected today than any Republican who ran in the primary and has far higher approval numbers than Reagan did at the end of his second term (so did Clinton BTW) and he is more powerful.

The lying appears not to be as effective long-term.


Hilary's record as Secretary of State was excellent (exaggerated bullshit aside) and she will govern as a rather boring centrist without a great deal of 'vision'. It is increasingly likely that the Congress and senate are going to see a significant re-balancing so we may get rid of the Republican "do-nothing except contradict Obama" congress.


yrs,
rubato

[BoSoxGal]

Did she lie? Or did the various listeners hear what they wanted to hear? I listened to the entire hearing on C-Span yesterday (so I would not be distracted by the talking heads telling me what I just saw/heard the way these things are covered by the tv networks.)

Over and over again the person down at the table said that some of the e-mails contained classified information. The GOP questioners up on the (what do you call it--the balcony, the viewing box?) re-phrased the answer to be the classified e-mails. Damn near zero percent of the email messages were actually classified. And you would not know the message was classified until you read it all and got to the footer down at the bottom that began with a lower case C. There were less than ten of these actually classified messages.

"Classified" what does that actually mean? There are many levels of classification, I think beginning with 'Confidential' which is almost meaningless. The DC phone book when it gets into a desk drawer at the Pentagon, is probably classified Confidential. It goes up from there to stuff that can never be removed from special isolation chambers. A Dem made passing reference to this, but never did I hear anybody say just what the classification was for the 'classified material' in the unclassified messages, or the level of classification for the actually classified messages. Maybe they did. I admit I was not fully attentive to the whole thing.

Was her private server hacked? The experts say possibly by individual or group that was so good they left no traces. What we do know is that the official 'classified' systems she was supposed to use were hacked or simply leaked over and over again.

Did she lie, did she mislead, did she spin? [note those three verbs all mean the same thing] Of course she did. To what harm? Does 'the people' actually have a right to know everything? Especially given the "loyal Opposition" whose primary goal and driving agenda is to always make Obama look bad.



(((((snailgate)))))

This.

[Lord Jim]

Did she lie?

Now that's an easy one:

Lie, Lie, Lie, Lie, Lie, Lie, Lie, Lie: The Quick List of Clinton’s Eight E-mail Lies

Here are those eight lies, debunked.

1. Lie: She didn’t send or receive any e-mails that were classified “at the time.”

Clinton told this to reporters at a press conference March 10, 2015. She repeated it at an Iowa Democratic fundraiser July 25 and at a Democratic debate February 4, 2016.

Once the investigation into Clinton’s e-mails began, the FBI began retroactively classifying some of the work-related e-mails she had released. So Clinton probably opted to dodge the issue by qualifying her statement, saying that no e-mails she sent were classified “at the time.”

Truth: Comey said that the FBI found at least 110 e-mails that were classified at the time Clinton sent or received them — 52 e-mail chains in all, including eight Top Secret (the highest classification level) chains.

2. Lie: She didn’t send or receive any e-mails “marked classified” at the time.

Clinton made this claim most recently July 3, 2016, on Meet the Press. She first made the claim August 26, 2015, at an Iowa news conference. She repeated it at Fox News town hall March 7, 2016; at a Democratic debate March 9; at a New York news conference March 1; and on Face the Nation May 8.

Clinton again appeared to spin the facts emerging in the investigation. This time, she suggested that even if the FBI were now classifying some of her e-mails, she couldn’t be held responsible since the e-mails lacked any mark of classification at the time they were sent or received. Some wondered what she even meant by “marked” classified, while others pointed out that lack of markings was no defense for mishandling the information — which the secretary of state, of all people, should have judged to be sensitive.

Truth: Comey confirmed suspicions about Clinton’s claim by noting that a “small number” of the e-mails were, in fact, marked classified. Moreover, he added: “Even if information is not marked ‘classified’ in an e-mail, participants who know or should know that the subject matter is classified are still obligated to protect it.”

3. Lie: She turned over all of her work-related e-mails.

Clinton said this on MSNBC September 4, 2015; at a Fox News town hall March 7, 2016; and at a New York press conference March 10.

It’s important to remember that Clinton made this claim about the 30,000 e-mails she and her attorneys chose to provide to the State Department. After turning over paper copies of these 30,000, she and her attorneys then unilaterally deleted another 32,000 that they deemed personal.

Truth: The FBI found “thousands” of work-related e-mails other than those Clinton had provided; they were in various officials’ mailboxes and in the server’s slack space. Clinton’s attorneys “did not individually read the content of all of her e-mails,” Comey said. “Instead, they relied on header information and used search terms to try to find all work-related e-mails among the reportedly more than 60,000 total e-mails remaining on Secretary Clinton’s personal system in 2014.”

Though Comey denied he saw evidence of ill intent, he said: It is highly likely their search terms missed some work-related e-mails, and that we later found them. . . . It is also likely that there are other work-related e-mails that they did not produce to State and that we did not find elsewhere, and that are now gone because they deleted all e-mails they did not return to State, and the lawyers cleaned their devices in such a way as to preclude complete forensic recovery. (Remember the “server-wipe” speculation?)

4. Lie: She wanted to use a personal e-mail account for convenience and simplicity, streamlining to one device.

Clinton said she used one device on CNN July 7, 2015, and at a New York press conference March 10.

Truth: Clinton used multiple servers, administrators, and mobile devices, including an iPad and a Blackberry, to access her e-mail on her personal domain. “As new servers and equipment were employed, older servers were taken out of service, stored, and decommissioned in various ways,” Comey explained. “Piecing all of that back together — to gain as full an understanding as possible of the ways in which personal e-mail was used for government work — has been a painstaking undertaking, requiring thousands of hours of effort.”

5. Lie: Clinton’s use of a private server and e-mail domain was permitted by law and regulation.

Clinton made this claim in an interview on CNN July 7, 2015; in a campaign statement in July 2015; and at the Democratic primary debates in Las Vegas on October 13, 2015.

Truth: No: A May report issued by the State Department’s inspector general found that it has been department policy since 2005 that work communication be restricted to government servers. While the IG allowed for occasional use of personal e-mail in emergencies, Clinton used her personal e-mail exclusively for all work communication.

6. Lie: All of Clinton’s e-mails were immediately captured by @.gov addresses.

Clinton made this claim at a New York press conference May 10, 2015.

Crucially, Clinton told reporters that she exclusively used her personal e-mail because she thought her messages were always saved in the e-mail threads of senior department officials who used @.gov accounts.

Truth: The State Department did not begin automatically capturing and preserving e-mails until February 2015, two years after Clinton left the State Department.

7. Lie: There were numerous safeguards against security breaches and “no evidence” of hacking.

Clinton made the “safeguards” claim at a New York press conference March 10, 2015, and her former tech aide made the “no evidence” claim March 3, 2016.

Truth: Among the “safeguards” of Clinton’s server were Secret Service members — but this is no safeguard at all where the Internet is concerned.

Further, Comey noted:

None of these e-mails should have been on any kind of unclassified system, but their presence is especially concerning because all of these e-mails were housed on unclassified personal servers not even supported by full-time security staff, like those found at Departments and Agencies of the U.S. Government — or even with a commercial service like Gmail.

Which is to say: Your Gmail account is more secure than Hillary’s personal e-mail.

There is some evidence of a possible breach.

Comey said:

Hostile actors gained access to the private commercial e-mail accounts of people with whom Secretary Clinton was in regular contact from her personal account. We also assess that Secretary Clinton’s use of a personal e-mail domain was both known by a large number of people and readily apparent. She also used her personal e-mail extensively while outside the United States, including sending and receiving work-related e-mails in the territory of sophisticated adversaries. Given that combination of factors, we assess it is possible that hostile actors gained access to Secretary Clinton’s personal e-mail account. Clinton’s “no evidence” claim is less of a bald lie than a concealment of strong possibility.

She also failed to report several hacking attempts.

8. Lie: Clinton was never served a subpoena on her e-mail use.

Clinton said this in a CNN interview July 7, 2015.

Truth: The next day, July 8, the chair of the House Select Committee on Benghazi, Trey Gowdy, accused Clinton of lying about not receiving a subpoena. Gowdy said in a statement:

“The committee has issued several subpoenas, but I have not sought to make them public. I would not make this one public now, but after Secretary Clinton falsely claimed the committee did not subpoena her, I have no choice in order to correct the inaccuracy.”

[RayThom]

Hey, at least she's trying... very trying.

[Lord Jim]

Just caught this bit of butt-yank misinformation from our resident butt-yank misinformation factory:

has far higher approval numbers than Reagan did at the end of his second term

President Obama Job Approval:

Gallup 7/6 - 7/8 1500 A 51 45 +6

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls ... -1044.html

If you follow the link, you'll see that Obama's approval rating has varied between 45-51 in the month of July.

By contrast, Mr. Reagan in the last poll at the end of his second term:

1988 Dec. 27-29 Ronald Reagan 63 29 8

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/final_approval.php

So either he has a really shitty source for his "information" or he doesn't know that 63 is higher than 51...

Based on his track record, in his case either is possible...

Oh yeah, he also said this:

(so did Clinton BTW)

2001 Jan. 10-14 William J. Clinton 66 29 5

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/data/final_approval.php

So Clinton's final approval rating number before leaving Office wasn't "far higher" than Mr. Reagan's, but instead a within-the-margin-of-error 3 points higher...

And their disapproval ratings were identical...

As you said earlier today in another thread:

The truth matters.

Yes, indeed it does rube, I couldn't agree more.

Which is why I'm always happy to correct the numerous falsehoods you regularly post around here.

[BoSoxGal]

[Lord Jim]

If I were advising Hillary on how to handle this, I would advise her to stick to the statement issued by her campaign right after Comey announced the FBI findings:

“We are pleased that the career officials handling this case have determined that no further action by the Department is appropriate,” spokesman Brian Fallon said in a statement.

“As the secretary has long said, it was a mistake to use her personal email and she would not do it again. We are glad this matter is now resolved,”

That should be her story, and she should stick to it... no claims of exoneration, no admissions, and no attempts to parse...

She should simply refuse to answer any further questions on the subject, and just refer back to that statement...and then change the subject...

It's an ugly win but it's still a win...you didn't get indicted...Just take the win and move on...

But apparently much like her opponent, she just doesn't know when to keep her mouth shut:

Hillary Clinton Rejects F.B.I. Claim That She Was ‘Careless’ With Emails

By ALAN RAPPEPORT JULY 8, 2016

Hillary Clinton on Friday rejected the F.B.I.’s assertion that she had been “extremely careless” with classified material as secretary of state, offering her first public comments on the matter since the Justice Department closed its inquiry without bringing charges against her this week.

In interviews on CNN and MSNBC, Mrs. Clinton tried to put the controversy surrounding her use of a private email server to rest, brushing off a rebuke from James Comey, the F.B.I. director, who had criticized her for being negligent.

Although Mr. Comey, in a congressional hearing on Thursday, pointed out several contradictions between what Mrs. Clinton had said publicly about her email use and what she said in sworn testimony, Mrs. Clinton insisted Friday that she did not intentionally send or receive any classified information through her private account.[Okay, so she's going with, "I didn't do it intentionally; I was just so ignorant of the rules regarding the handling of classified information that I did it unintentionally"] She also appeared to be spreading the responsibility to her State Department staff.

“I think there are about 300 people in the government, mostly in the State Department, but in other high positions in the government with whom I emailed over the course of four years — they, I believe, did not believe they were sending any material that was classified,” Mrs. Clinton said on CNN. “They were pursuing their responsibilities. I do not think they were careless.”

She added, “And as I have said many times, I certainly did not believe that I received or sent any material that was classified.”

Mrs. Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, has been under fire from Republicans this week after Mr. Comey announced on Tuesday that while she did not violate any laws, she did mismanage classified material. Mr. Comey said that there was evidence that Mrs. Clinton and her team “were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/09/us/po ... .html?_r=0

This is a really bad strategy...

Or at least it would be if she were running against anyone other than Donald Trump, who is not just the only politician in America who is a more prolific and brazen liar than she is, but who will also helpfully take the focus off her mendacity with his own outrageousness on a regular basis...

Thanks to Donald Trump, (and also to the terrible shooting in Dallas, which has understandably focused great media attention ) how many people even know that Hillary is trying to discredit the Comey Report?

[RayThom]

"If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging." Hillary seems to have fallen in love with her shovels.

This election is for her to lose and she seems to be doing her damnedest to do exactly that. (Imagine her losing to Drumpf? She'd never forgive the people around her that she wouldn't listen to.) Her salvation will be with her VP choice who should keep her focused without dimming her much needed spotlight. Julian Castro may well be a risky dark horse but I feel he's the second best qualified, right behind Elizabeth Warren. However, two women on the ballot would be the riskier of of both scenarios and Hillary knows it. Warren will do best as Senate Majority leader.

Coming soon to a convention center near me -- The HRC Show.

[Lord Jim]

This election is for her to lose and she seems to be doing her damnedest to do exactly that.

With everything that's come out now, if she were running against Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio, she'd be down in the polls by 10 points...

If she were running against Kasich, she'd be down by 15...

But she has been blessed with the gift of running against Donald Trump...

And she might even make that race a near thing...

Afterall, this is the person who with all her money and history, and political power, managed to figure out a way to have an elderly, fringe Socialist crank gadfly who wasn't even a member of the Democratic Party give her a serious run for The Democratic Nomination...

It would be a mistake to underestimate Hilary's ability to blow the election...

Even against Drumpf...

Christmas has come early to Chappaqua...

Lets see if she can still win it...

[Lord Jim]

Bottom line, here's how it works:

As awful as he is, Trump is almost guaranteed to get 45% of the vote....in large part because of Hillary's negatives...(Hell, even Walter Mondale, George McGovern and Barry Goldwater managed to get about 40% of the vote)

So that means that between the 45% that hate Hillary so much they'll vote for Trump no matter what, and the 45% that hate Trump so much they will vote for Hillary no matter what...

That leaves about 10% of the electorate that is "persuadable"...

And it is who gets the bigger portion of that 10%, that will win the election...

Trust me when I tell you, that this 10% is not going to be persuaded by "feel good" commercials showing how much Hillary Clinton has loved children over the past 20-30 years...

You move that 10%, with this message:

"Whatever you may think about my honesty or integrity, at least I'm not as crazy as a shit house rat like Donald Trump"....

She has to punt this whole idea about, "I'm going to win by making people who don't like me start to like me"...

That's not going to happen...

Everybody who likes her is already supporting her, and that's not going to get her to 50%...(it never has)

(Especially since shes so fundamentally unlikable; she can't possibly get past 45% running on that....)

No, every day and in every way, she has to go at Trump....

She has to get a majority of the 10% of persuadables to not think about her, but instead focus on the fundamental unacceptability of Donald Trump...

Fortunately, she can count on The Donald to help her do that...which gives her the edge...

If this election is about Donald Trump, she wins...she'll get the majority of that 10% persuadable vote...

But if this election becomes about Hillary Clinton, she could very well lose....