A group of U.S. intelligence veterans is calling on President Obama to expedite the FBI review of former Secretary of State Clinton’s alleged email security violations so the public can assess this issue in a timely fashion.
MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity
SUBJECT: Those “Damn Emails” – “Really a Concern”
Introduction
Last Wednesday Robert Gates, CIA Director under President Bush-41 and Defense Secretary under President Bush-43, publicly commented that Secretary Hillary Clinton’s “whole email thing … is really a concern in terms of her judgment,” adding, “I don’t know what originally prompted her to think that was a good idea.”
What originally prompted her does not matter. As your Secretary of State and your subordinate, she willfully violated laws designed to protect classified information from unauthorized disclosure. It may be somewhat difficult for those not as immersed in national security matters as we have been to appreciate the seriousness of the offense, including the harm done in compromising some of the most sensitive U.S. programs and activities. This is why we write.
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
Pundits and others are playing down the harm. A charitable interpretation is that they have no way to gauge what it means to expose so much to so many. We do know, and our overriding concern is to protect the national security of our country from further harm. It would be a huge help toward this end, if you would order Attorney General Loretta Lynch to instruct the FBI to stop slow-walking the email investigation and release its findings promptly.
If you choose, instead, to give precedence to politics over national security, the American people will be deprived of timely appreciation of the gravity of the harm done; national security officials who do follow the rules will be scandalized; FBI investigators will conclude that that their job is more political than professional; and the noxious impression will grow that powerful people cannot be held accountable when they break the law. Worse: if the results of the FBI investigation remain under lock and key, dangerous pressures are likely to be exerted on the most senior U.S. officials by those who have the key – as we explain below.
* * *
We the undersigned Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) have spent 400 years working with classified information – up to and including TOP SECRET, Codeword, and Special Access Programs (SAP). Given that experience, we believe that much of the commentary on the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton email controversy has been misplaced, focusing on extraneous issues having little or nothing to do with the overriding imperative to protect classified information.
As intelligence, military, and foreign service professionals, we are highly aware not only of that compelling need, but also of the accompanying necessity to hold accountable those whose actions compromise – whether for reasons of convenience or espionage – sensitive operations, programs and persons. In addition, we know that successful mutual cooperation with foreign intelligence services depends largely on what they see as our ability to keep secrets secret.
Background
Last August, Secretary Clinton handed over her private email server to the FBI, five months after she acknowledged she had used it for work-related emails as Secretary of State. She admitted to having deleted about 31,000 emails she described as personal. Media reports last fall, however, indicated that the FBI was able to recover the personal emails, and was reviewing them, as well as the 30,000 others she had described as work-related.
In January, the Department of State announced that, of the 30,000 work-related emails, at least 1,340 contained classified material. The Department retroactively classified 22 of those TOP SECRET and prevented their release. Among the 22 were some that, according to media reports, included information on highly sensitive Special Access Programs (SAP).
The White House has said it will do nothing to impede the FBI investigation and possible filing of charges against Clinton, if the facts should warrant that kind of action. Inasmuch as the outcome of the investigation is bound to have major political consequences, such White House assurances stretch credulity.
By all indications, the FBI is slow-walking the investigation and mainstream media are soft-pedaling the issue. As things now stand, most Americans remain unaware of the import of this industrial-scale compromise of very sensitive national security information in Secretary Clinton’s emails.
Our concern mounted in January when the Inspector General of the intelligence community wrote to the chairs of the congressional intelligence committees that he had received from one of the intelligence agencies two “sworn declarations” asserting that Secretary Clinton’s emails contained not only CONFIDENTIAL and SECRET information, but also information at the TOP SECRET/SAP level.
In 2009, you signed an Executive Order regarding SAP (Special Access Programs), so we assume you were briefed on their extremely high sensitivity and the consequent need to sharply limit the number of people allowed to be “read-in” on them. The mishandling of SAP information can neutralize intelligence programs costing billions of dollars, wreck liaison relationships assiduously cultivated for decades, and get a lot of people killed.
‘It Wasn’t That Bad’
All those directly or peripherally involved in the investigation of the Clinton email issue know very well that it could have a direct impact on who is likely to become the next President of the United States, and they will be making decisions with that reality in mind. They know that it is with you that “the buck stops,” and they are sensitive to signs of your preferences. Those were not difficult to discern in your commencement address at Howard University on May 7, in which you strongly advocated the same basic policy approaches as those espoused by one Democratic presidential candidate – Hillary Clinton.
Your White House has also made excuses for deliberate security violations by Secretary Clinton that would have gotten senior officials like us fired and probably indicted. We look with suspicion at what we see as contrasting and totally inappropriate attempts by the administration and media to play down the importance of Secretary Clinton’s deliberate disregard of basic security instructions and procedures.
It appears that the option chosen by the White House is using the declared need for “thoroughness” to soft-pedal and delay completion of the investigation for several more months, while the corporate media sleeps on. Four months have already gone by since the smoking-gun-type revelations in the intelligence community Inspector General’s letter to Congress, and it has been well over a year since Secretary Clinton first acknowledged using an insecure email server for official business.
Another claim emanating from your White House is that Clinton was careless in managing her emails and has admitted as much, but that she has not damaged American national security. She has called it a “mistake,” but security officials of the National Security Agency explicitly forewarned her against violating basic laws and regulations designed to prevent the compromise of classified information.
NSA, FBI Have Enough Evidence
Surely, enough time has passed, and enough material has been reviewed, to permit a preliminary damage assessment. The NSA has the necessary information and should, by now, have shared that information with the FBI. Secretary Clinton’s server in her house in Chappaqua, New York, was not a secured device. Her email address incorporated her initials, “hdr” (apparently for her maiden name, Hillary Diane Rodham). It also included the “clinton” server identity, so it was easy for a hacker to spot.
Anyone with the proper equipment, knowledge and motivation might have been able to obtain access. That is what hackers are able to do, with considerable success, against government servers that are far better protected than the private email server located in her New York State home.
In fact, there have been reports that Secretary Clinton’s emails were, indeed, hacked successfully by foreigners. The Romanian hacker who goes by the name Guccifer claimed earlier this month that he had repeatedly hacked her email server. He described the server as “like an open orchid on the Internet” and that “it was easy … easy for me, for everybody.” Guccifer has been extradited from Romania and is now in jail in Alexandria, Virginia, where the FBI is said to be questioning him on the emails. There have also been credible claims that Russian intelligence and other foreign services were able to hack the Secretary’s server.
FBI Director James Comey
Another argument being surfaced, in a transparent attempt to defend Secretary Clinton, has to do with intent. It is said that she did not intend to have classified information on her computer in New York and had no intention of handling secret material in a way that would be accessible to foreign intelligence or others lacking the proper security clearances and the need-to-know.
But while intent might be relevant in terms of punishment, it does not change the fact that as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, then Senator Clinton had clearances for classified information for years before becoming Secretary of State. She knew the rules and yet as Secretary she handled classified information carelessly after a deliberate decision to circumvent normal procedures for its safeguarding, thus making it vulnerable to foreign intelligence, as well as to criminal hackers.
Anyone who has ever handled classified material knows that there are a number of things that you do not do. You do not take it home with you, you do not copy it and share it with anyone who does not have a clearance and a need-to-know, you do not strip off the classification marks and treat it as unclassified, and you do not transfer it to another email account that is not protected by a government server.
If you have a secured government computer operating off of a secure server that means that what is on the computer stays on the computer. This is not a matter of debate or subject to interpretation. It is how one safeguards classified information, even if one believes that the material should not be classified, which is another argument that has been made in Clinton’s defense. Whether or not the classification is unnecessary is not your decision to make.
Apart from the guidelines for proper handling of classified information, outlined in Executive Order 13526 and 18 U.S.C Sec. 793(f) of the federal code, there is some evidence of a cover-up regarding what was compromised. This itself would be a violation of the 2009 Federal Records Act and the Freedom of Information Act.
Numerous messages both in New York and in Washington have reportedly been erased or simply cannot be found. In addition, the law cited above explicitly makes it a felony to cut and paste classified information removing its classification designation. Retaining such information on a private email system is also a felony. In one of Secretary Clinton’s emails, she instructed her staff simply to remove a classification and send the information to her on her server.
So the question is not whether Secretary Clinton broke the law. She did. If the laws are to be equally applied, she should face the same kind of consequences as others who have been found, often on the basis of much less convincing evidence, guilty of similar behavior.
Some More Equal Than Others
Secretary Clinton’ case invites comparison with what happened to former CIA case officer Jeffrey Sterling, now serving a three-and-a-half-year prison term for allegedly leaking information to New York Times journalist James Risen. Sterling first came to the media’s attention when in 2003 he blew the whistle on a botched CIA operation called Operation Merlin, telling the Senate Intelligence Committee staff that the operation had ended up revealing nuclear secrets to Iran. When in 2006 James Risen published a book that discussed, inter alia, this amateurish cowboy operation, the Department of Justice focused on Sterling as the suspected source.
Former CIA officer Jeffrey Sterling.
In court, the federal prosecutors relied almost entirely on Risen’s phone and email logs, which reportedly demonstrated that the two men had been in contact up until 2005. But the prosecutors did not provide the content of those communications even though the FBI was listening in on some of them. Risen has claimed that he had multiple sources on Operation Merlin, and Sterling has always denied being involved.
Jeffrey Sterling was not permitted to testify in the trial on his own behalf because he would have had to discuss Operation Merlin, which was and is still classified. He could not mention any details about it even if they were already publicly known through the Risen book. No evidence was ever produced in court demonstrating that any classified information ever passed between the two men, but Sterling, an African American, was nevertheless convicted by an all-white jury in Virginia based on “suspicion” and the presumption that “it had to be him.”
The contrast between the copious evidence – some of it self-admitted – of Secretary Clinton’s demonstrable infractions, on the one hand, and the very sketchy, circumstantial evidence used to convict and imprison Jeffrey Sterling, on the other, lend weight to the suspicion that there is one law for the rich and powerful in the United States and another for the rest of us.
Failing to take steps against a politically powerful presidential candidate and letting her off unscathed for crimes of her own making, while an institutionally unprotected Jeffrey Sterling sits in prison would be a travesty of justice not dissimilar to the gentle wrist-slap given Gen. David Petraeus for giving his mistress extremely sensitive information and then lying to the FBI about it.
Gen. David Petraeus in a photo with his biographer/mistress Paula Broadwell. (U.S. government photo)
Your order to then-Attorney General Eric Holder to let Gen. David Petraeus off easy created a noxious – and demoralizing – precedent in the national security community indicating that, whatever the pains taken at lower levels to prevent compromise of duly classified information, top officials are almost never held accountable for disregarding well-established rules. These are some of the reasons we are so concerned that this is precisely the direction in which you seem to be leaning on the Clinton email issue.
In our view, the sole legitimate reason for disclosing classified information springs from the only “oath” we all took – “to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic.” When, for example, Edward Snowden saw the U.S. government grossly violating our Fourth Amendment right to be “secure” against warrantless “searches and seizures,” he gave more weight to that oath (ethicists call it a supervening value) than to the promise he had made not to disclose information that could harm U.S. national security.
Possibly Still Worse Ahead
You might give some thought, Mr. President, to a potentially messy side of this. What is already known about NSA’s collect-it-all electronic practices over the past several years strongly suggests that NSA, and perhaps the FBI, already know chapter and verse. It is virtually certain they know what was in Secretary Clinton’s emails – including the ones she thought she had deleted. It is likely that they have also been able to determine which foreign intelligence agencies and other hackers were able to access the emails.
Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. (Photo credit: The Guardian)
One ignores this at one’s peril. Secretary Clinton’s security violations can have impact not only on whether she becomes your successor, but also on whether she would, in that case, be beholden to those who know what lies hidden from the rest of us – perhaps even from you.
Intelligence professionals (in contrast to the occasional political functionary) take the compromise of classified information with utmost seriousness. More important: this is for us a quintessentially nonpartisan issue. It has to do, first and foremost, with the national security of the United States.
We are all too familiar with what harm can come from blithe disregard of basic procedures designed to protect sensitive intelligence and other national security information. Yes, the lamentable unevenness in how such infractions are handled is also an important issue – but that is not our main focus in the present context.
The Truth Will Out
Not all workers at the NSA or the FBI are likely to keep their heads in the sand, as they watch very senior officials and politicians with their own agendas disregard laws to safeguard the nation’s security. We know what it is like to do the difficult, disciplined work of protecting information from being compromised by strictly abiding by what often seem to be cumbersome rules and regulations. We’ve been there; done that.
If you encourage the Department of Justice and the FBI to continue slow-walking the investigation, there is a good chance the truth will come out anyway. As you are aware, the Justice Department, the FBI, and NSA have all yielded recent patriots who, in such circumstances, decided that whistleblowing – rather than silence – was the only way to honor the oath we all swore – to support and defend the Constitution.
To sum up our concern regarding how all this plays out, if you order the Justice Department and FBI to pursue the investigation with “all deliberate speed,” so to speak, and Secretary Clinton becomes president, the juicy email secrets in the hidden hands of the NSA and FBI are likely to give those already powerful institutions a capacity for blackmail that would make J. Edgar Hoover’s mouth water. In addition, information hacked by foreign intelligence services or Guccifer-like hackers can also provide useful grist for leverage or blackmail.
Taking Care the Laws Are Faithfully Executed
We strongly urge you to order Attorney General Loretta Lynch to instruct FBI Director James Comey to wind up a preliminary investigation and tell the country now what they have learned. By now they – and U.S. intelligence agencies – have had enough time to do an early assessment of what classified data, programs and people have been compromised. Realistically speaking, a lengthier, comprehensive post-mortem-type evaluation – however interesting it might be, might never see the light of day under a new president.
We believe the American people are entitled to prompt and full disclosure, and respectfully suggest that you ensure that enforcement of laws protecting our national security does not play stepchild to political considerations on this key issue.
On April 10, you assured Chris Wallace, “I guarantee that there is no political influence in any investigation conducted by the Justice Department, or the FBI – not just in this [Clinton email] case, but in any case. Full stop. Period.”
We urge you to abide by that promise, and let the chips fall where they may. Full stop. Period.
For the Steering Group, Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
William Binney, Technical Director, NSA; co-founder, SIGINT Automation Research Center (ret.)
Thomas Drake, Senior Executive, NSA (former)
Philip Giraldi, CIA, Operations Officer (ret.)
Former Sen. Mike Gravel, D, Alaska; earlier, Adjutant, top secret control officer, Communications Intelligence Service, special agent the Counter Intelligence Corps.
Matthew Hoh, former Capt., USMC, Iraq & Foreign Service Officer, Afghanistan (associate VIPS)
Larry C. Johnson, CIA & State Department (ret.)
Michael S. Kearns, Captain, USAF Intelligence Agency (ret.), ex-Master SERE Instructor
John Kiriakou, Former CIA Counterterrorism Officer
Ray McGovern, former US Army infantry/intelligence officer & CIA analyst (ret.)
Elizabeth Murray, Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Middle East, CIA (ret.)
Todd Pierce, MAJ, US Army Judge Advocate (ret.)
Scott Ritter, former MAJ, USMC, former UN Weapon Inspector, Iraq
Diane Roark, DOE, DOD, NSC, & professional staff, House Intelligence Committee (ret.)
Robert David Steele, former CIA Operations Officer
Peter Van Buren, U.S. Department of State, Foreign Service Officer (ret.) (associate VIPS)
Kirk Wiebe, former Senior Analyst, SIGINT Automation Research Center, NSA, (ret.)
Ann Wright, U.S. Army Reserve Colonel (ret) and former U.S. Diplomat
The skirting of the Freedom of Information Act has been touched on throughout Clinton’s entire email debacle, but most attention has been focused on her regal dismal of security protocol.
But why did she employ this homebrew machine in the first place? Yes, federal government IT is notoriously clunky, not user-friendly, but it is used by, well, the government. That is, except those ‘above’ the inconvenience.
Or might the employment of a homebrew machine be more about how the bulk of a department’s day-to-day decision making / communications is kept in the shadows? This means accessibility to information on aspects of the department skirts FOIA laws easily because even personnel in said branch may be unaware of its existence.
If Clinton was flying solo in her years as Secretary of State, then one might believe ‘her mistake.’ But while Madame Secretary the Clinton Foundation saw enormous growth — in its coffers and ability to broker power. Shady monetary donations to the Clinton Foundation from foreign entities maybe did ‘just happen’. Or, more likely, came about from the State Department yielding soft power to give favors to those who paid off the Foundation? How much and which foreign countries / corporations did receive unfair advantage on a myriad of issues during her time in the post? What arms deals, trade agreements, laissez faire banking rules, cheap oil sales did ‘happen’ once a tycoon / minister / sultan paid their ‘tax deductible’ offering at the perfumed feet of Bill, Hill, Chels, and Sid??? If there isn’t a server maintained by a 3rd party, then thousands of communiques just ‘never happened.’
Backing me up on this ‘Fear of FOIA’ by the Clintons is some actual proof (per Wikipedia):
Secret e-mail accounts and abusive fees:
The AP uncovered several federal agencies where staff regularly use fictitious identities and secret or unlisted email accounts to conduct government business. Their use stymied FOIA requests. In some cases, the government demanded enormous (>$1 million) fees for records that appeals show should be available for minimal cost.
But much more damning…
The Center for Effective Government analyzed 15 federal agencies which receive the most FOIA requests in-depth. It concluded, that federal agencies are struggling to implement public disclosure rules.
In the latest analysis published in 2015 (using 2012 and 2013 data, the most recent years available). The Department of State earned an F. The State Department’s score (37 percent) was dismal due to its extremely low processing score of 23 percent, which was completely out of line with any other agency’s performance.
Guess Bill and Hillary are still expecting other departments, officials, journos to live by that old adage they created: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
I started an official petition to the White House to support this. Please sign and share it: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov//petition/order-attorney-general-tell-fbi-stop-slow-walking-clinton-email-investigation-and-release-its-findings-now
Hillary Clinton told employees of the State Department, she had consent to have a private email Server in her home. The OIG’s Report soundly disputed the statement by the former Secretary of State. Maybe, FBI Director Comey hasn’t deposed Hillary Clinton [e.g. the target] in the email investigation, because he would have to ask Hillary Clinton, “who” gave her consent to set-up the private email Server in her home, if, Hillary Clinton while under ‘oath’ says “no one’ then Hillary Clinton made a false statement/ representation to a federal agency violating 18 U.S.C. S 1001, sec. (a)(1-2), or FBI Director Comey hasn’t deposed Hillary Clinton because, if, she says she was given consent, Director Comey would have to ask the next logical question: “WHO gave you consent?” The only high ranking official in Washington, DC, who could have given her ‘consent’ would have been President Obama and FBI Director Comey would be opening up another can of worms, maybe that is why President Obama is hindering public disclosure of the FBI’s finding for the President’s own political survival and legacy!
My concern about the FBI “slow walking” their investigation and not releasing any information before the convention, could present a scenario where Hillary is nominated and then has to step down. I’m afraid that would completely nullify the primary and allow the party to appoint their choice for nominee. I think it would be Joe Biden, and the man who earned the nomination, and his millions of supporters would be left without a voice in the matter! That could be another recipe for disaster for the Democratic Party!
Wow, that’s what I was searching for, what a material! present here at this weblog, thanks admin of this website.|
Clinton’s email address was [email protected] which is obviously not a .gov address and obviously not a government secured address, yet she was using it, exclusively, for her email communications while she was Secretary of State. Everyone who received email messages from her would have received them from this address, including the president. Everyone, including the president, who sent her any email messages would have sent them to this address. This insecure email address.
Doesn’t this mean that everyone who knowingly sent classified messages to this insecure email address is guilty of violating the laws and rules regarding national security as related to email communication?
If Clinton is guilty, then so is everyone who knowingly sent classified email messages to her while she was Secretary of State.
It seems to me that this whole affair could get really, really messy for a lot of people. Is this a factor in the plodding progress of this investigation?
No one should be above the law. Release those findings NOW!!
So, did Secretary Clinton break the law? Or just break some ‘guidelines’, as the Guardian reports (with no room for public comment)?: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/may/25/hillary-clinton-private-email-state-department-guidelines.
Are we witnessing another airbrushing of lawbreaking, as with Patraeus, meant to soften the public for another ‘elites can’t go to prison’ ruling? Or is this all bluster by Hillary haters? (“Colin Powell did it, too!” is another refrain in the media surrounding this issues, repeated by Clinton’s camp frequently.)
One thing is for certain, at least: the U.S. citizen not born of – or willing to suck the boots of – privilege has no say whatsoever in the business of our government, and is surely governed by a different, far more punitive, set of laws. They want our votes and trust? Pish. Their not even playing on our team anymore. They deserve nothing from us.
Transparency
….R.I.P.
“In a breath-taking (but unsurprising) display of arrogance today, Hillary Clinton declared herself the unquestioned winner of the Democratic Party nomination stating it was was already DONE, and IN EFFECT. This is chilling, the theft of this election, the sleaze of this campaign, the lies manipulating the American public. Sane Progressive calls the election fraud, the smear, the spin, and speaks about how we turn this around NOW. If his campaign watches ANY of my videos, this is the one I would want them to see. The rules now are we aren’t PLAYING by their rigged rules ANYMORE,”
https://youtu.be/trNxwAsl-20
Hey Ted Apelt
I do not blame Hillary claiming the democratic party nomination ..
The technique of declaring it “already DONE, and IN EFFECT” has been used before to good effect.
Repeat something again and again and again, for a long enough period of time, and eventually everyone tumbles.
Forget the classified material aspect on Clinton’s home server for a moment. Aren’t the written communications created by Clinton and her correspondents engaged in official business really government property? If so, and she sequestered all of these communications on a personal server did these written communications not become stolen property?
This hits the main point. Is what she did illegal or not? It is a simple question which no one seems to want to answer. And the truth of it is hard to make out from media reports, including here.
The soft-pedaling of this whole affair and the length of time it is taking to determine if charges are to be brought add up to a kind of obstruction – in practical, if not legal terms. And why would they want to obstruct justice in this regard? To allow a fellow criminal a coronation, perhaps? One who knows where all the bodies are buried?
Russian authorities should release all of the information they may have to help reduce the threat of nuclear war which will ensue should the harpy gain power.
Memorial Day is every day. I doubt that you timed the sending of this memo, but I can’t help but think about its relevance to the coming of our “holiday,” or is it our holy day. Ah, one and the same after all. Let’s have none of that fake, official caring from the profiteers, but a remembrance of the loss of lives and the suffering of those who cannot forget their dead, loved ones, and the suffering of the wounded warriors, and the suffering of the wounded enemies, and the suffering of the wounded families, and the suffering of the wounded communities, and the wounded countries, and the ongoing suffering that never ends, because it is a simple holiday. It is the holy day of not forgetting. I hope your memo stops the next war.
Go V.I.P.S. et. al.!
Fantastic letter
Particularly impressive defense of Edward Snowden: “the sole legitimate reason for disclosing classified information springs from the only “oath” we all took – “to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic.” ”
Trump has promised to prosecute Hillary Clinton – I saw it in 4 separate videos of separate events. Maybe he also would pardon Snowden, which I could support.
You don’t defend the Constitution (or anything else, for that matter) by handing your enemies what you arrogantly and illegally obtain based on your singular interpretation of what is a “domestic enemy.” Just like Hillary, Snowden should stand trial and be judged by his peers, and not hide from the consequences of his actions.
Since the readers here may not also be readers of OpEdNews.com (where a copy of this article appeared), I hope they are aware of the important work of former assistant secretrary of the treasury Paul Craig Roberts, who posts regularly there, e.g., http://www.opednews.com/articles/1/Americans-A-Conquered-Peo-by-Paul-Craig-Roberts-Democracy_Loss-Of-Freedom_Propaganda_Terrorism-160523-524.html.
Wow, what an article!
Trump has promised to prosecute Hillary Clinton, multiple times. He says it “has to be done”.
Here are videos where he says it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtplitUp6Es&ab_channel=AR
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HY6XIyV8BQQ&ab_channel=WesternJournalism
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AIvvzC8kDLk&ab_channel=ZeroAlien
This is why I think Trump may be the right guy for the job.
http://www.unifiedpatriots.com/2016/01/11/raccoons-in-the-basement/
Powerful stuff. However, a quibble: the statement “disregard laws to safeguard the nation’s security” should be “disregard laws THAT WERE ENACTED to safeguard the nation’s security.”
Thank goodness for this. I can hardly wait until President Trump, from the heights of his impeccable moral and hight ethical standards, orders the Mitch McConnell-led DoJ to conduct a full-fledged investigation into the crimes of the Obama administration, including the former president’s attempts to cover up Secretary Clinton’s questionable actions and appalling lack of judgement. I’m sure his first SCOUS appointed-justice, Paul Ryan, will keep watch like a hawk to make sure the court’s majority is onboard to rewrite history, if needed. Pres. O. & Sec. HRC have demoralized and ruined the pristine reputation the U.S. enjoyed before 2008.
Such a winded and uninspired bad joke notwithstanding, though, it is sickening that this administration has gone after so many whistleblowers, slapping with career-terminating sentences, jail terms, and blatant attempts to soil their honor and service track, those who took great personal risk to reveal inconvenient truths. It all does remind us of the Anti-American Committee hearings. Even though President Obama’s integrity is not at issue here, he’s ultimately accountable for what has been done under his watch. Thanks
Sadly, President Obama’s integrity is always an issue – and detriment to justice.
“Pres. O. & Sec. HRC have demoralized and ruined the pristine reputation the U.S. enjoyed before 2008.”
Your Republican partisanship obscures the war crimes committed by the Bush/Cheney cabal. What a load of tripe! ‘pristine reputation the U.S. enjoyed before 2008’. LOL!
The only person who could save the United States is with Michael Bloomberg in the White House. However, the tremendous corruption in the US presidential campaign the new US president will be decided by the height of the bribes and the (super) delegates. That’s how US democracy works ‘Money is the name of the game’
After a disastrous 8 years by the first Black president in history, The American voters can only hope that there will be NOT another First and that is the first WOMAN president by the name of Hillary Clinton who by know should be in prison for her Benghazi e-mails and the fact that she is responsible for the murder of hundred’s of thousands civilians in Libya, Iraq and African countries. This warmonger is sponsored and financed by US defense industry, large banks and of course the neocon establishment in Washington. She and Bill Clinton have shown that they can be bought when the price is RIGHT.
Wow!!!
Thanks very much for publishing this excellent article. Clinton apparently compromised national security and then compounded her crime by obstructing justice. Do Americans really want a female Richard Nixon in the White House? Did she use her personal computer so she could easily destroy evidence in the event of a criminal investigation into her actions as Secretary of State? That would be par for the course with Hillary. This issue could be her undoing, and it would be great for all of us if Robert Parry could focus his investigative talents on it. Americans need to know the facts from a reliable, independent, source. Before Hillary is nominated if possible.
All irrelevant as Obama will surely grant pardons to the Clintons. The DNC will make sure that happens. Why?… the money trail leads through Congress and the White House and we certainly could not have those two powerhouses exposed for their actions.
The law is only applied to the law abiding as a placebo. For those with power. the law is merely a concept.
As a retired professional Intelligence Officer (28+ years in Air Force Intelligence) I wish I could sign this.
I sign this statement!
I was just 21 yr old and given the job of safeguarding classified info, had to do daily inventory on them. Just a young kid but knew the rules.
Contact Ray McGovern via his site and join VIPS.
If you’d like to get involved, Cary Strickland, in future VIPS memos, you can also contact us via the “Sam Adams Award” website: http://samadamsaward.ch/contact/.
BRAVO…. and thank you. There really can be no excuse for the amount of time it is taking for this investigation, unless they are scrubbing and evaluating all of the many tentacles and links related to quid pro quo agreements she may have negotiated while SOS. Connections have already been drawn with large increases in international donations to the Clinton Foundation and subsequent or contemporaneous arms sales/deals with them. Not to mention all of the military contracts signed under her term and the large donations from the recipients to her campaign and the Clinton Foundation. That is the only thing I can conceive of that could be taking this long.
I read this on OpEdNews and posted this comment there as well.
Beautiful, just beautiful, in the Keatsian sense (that truth is beauty)! VIPS almost gives me hope that the US govt may manage to salvage the apocalypse that will surely come if and when the truth about 9/11, JFK et al. ever really hits the fan (whatever that might mean!).
I just googled the title and got 767 results, NONE OF WHICH are mainstream outlets. One was a link to usgov.us but I couldn’t tell what kind of site that is, and furthermore, the article was not what I searched for but one about the “Vietnamese Communist Party Chief.” No reference or link to the VIPS memo occurs on the page. Not the first time this has happened, and I don’t understand why it does. Help? (Link is: http://govnews.us/id/16232805613/Vietnamese-Communist-Party-Chief-to-Obama-Respect-Sovereignty-Institutions-No-Interference-in-Internal-Affairs)
This should be enough to bury Clinton’s chances, and I trust Trump will read it.
I cannot think of a more convincing indictment of the entire ruling establishment, including the government and the media, not only in the US but globally, than the deliberate non-reaction to this and other memos produced by VIPS. If this is how they treat THEIR OWN PEOPLE, how can we possibly expect them to listen to us?
Michael,
Thanks very much.
Ray
GOOGLE “LETTER TO THE FBI FROM VIPS” AND IT WILL BE THE FIRST THING ON THE PAGE!
I guess the president doesn’t care about his legacy. This is shameful, this slow walking.
Walt
This is bullshit, since the Obama admin knew full well that Iran’s nuke program was no threat to Israel. Its propaganda, but intended for whose eyes? But it is code for intending to weaken Israel’s victims.
This is bullshit, since the Obama admin knew full well that Iran’s nuke program was no threat to Israel. Its propaganda, but intended for whose eyes? The Israeli’s? But it is code for expressing the desire to weaken Israel’s victims. The other beneficiary of such geopolitical maneuvering (the USA) is not mentioned, thereby giving weight to the ZION-RULES-US, wag the dog theory. I was trying to edit the above comment,but got cut off before I could finish.
Maybe they only sent her mis/disinformation to mislead the Russians, Chinese, & whomever. It really seems improbable that they would knowingly allow unauthorized persons & even enemies, or rivals hack into genuinely important classified info. How do you explain this? Is it that every other big power has the same ability as the NSA, & transnational corps., so why bother? Are gov’t servers not as secure as they’re purported to be?
I can only hope that President Obama pays attention to this and does the right thing rather than a politically motivated one. I have no idea what he agreed to back in ’08 by the National Convention, but I would hope that this covering of her blatant disregard for national security isn’t among it.
Sanders/Warren or Sanders/Stein 2016! And what a well-written letter, eh? Such good points.
I like your general sentiment but I had a good laugh at: “Just the following excerpt from her e-mails would be enough to get an indictment, if not a conviction at the Haig tribunal for planning a war of aggression against Syria” and not because of the misspelling of the name of the Dutch city.
The tribunals and courts in the Hague belong to the Hillary’s owners. If Assad does not end up on the pointed end of Hillary’s bayonette (that is, of one of hers and Obama’s “moderate” rebels), he will be lucky to make it to a Hague court for opposing the owners of Hillary and the World.
The New World Order tribunals and courts in the Hague are the prime example of how corrupted the “International Justice” really is. Have you ever considered who finances these tribunals and courts in the Hague? Justice is cheap, right!?
There have been several references to the very likelihood of hackers having access to Clinton’s private email server. If this is true then some people must surely be in possession of explosive information that could blow Hillary’s canoe out of the Potomac. Can it be that a few of Hillary’s (or America’s) many enemies are just waiting for the right moment to make waves of tsunami proportions?
If the penny ante hacker, Guccifer, has preserved any of Hilliarly’s emails on his hard drive, HC is finished. Stay the Course, Bernie!
We can’t know if they’ve already used it. Or that they have used or may use it in return for favor from her. That’s the egregious part of her actions.
Worse, we may not know, if they hacked her, whom they may have hacked through her correspondence.
There is a lot of attention given to a President’s ‘legacy’.
It appears that President Obama may feel that he owes the DNC and others something. I cannot imagine any debt that is worth allowing a criminal, saying she is sorry, and ‘it wasn’t marked classified’ to become president. Anyone with a clearance knows that you are responsible for all information, whether it is ‘marked’ or not. Such a ridiculous statement for someone who would be Commander in Chief to make. Can you say ‘passing the buck’?
I also question what could President Obama possibly owe anyone to allow the multiple and repeated acts of voter suppresion to go un questioned, allowed. All acts only hurting candidate Bernie Sanders and greatly benefitting Hillary Clinton, the apparent bias of the DNC and Ms. Wasserman-Shultz is unforgiveable.
President Obama you are set for life, you and your family have and will continue to live blessed lives.
Please have your legacy be that you stopped the corruption, you called it all out, HRC’s desire to evade the FOIA program, her failure to turn over all work product when she left office, her blatant disregard for our country’s international security, and the DNC’s failure to support our 2nd democratic candidate for president and to frauduently bias everything toward the coronation of HRC.
I don’t see anything that you would have to lose and I do see, with your actions, that The People would have their democracy returned from the oligarchy that has reigned for decades.
Once again Americans will need to take a deep breath, and swallow the double stand pill of American life, that there is one set of rules for the masses, and another kinder set of rules for the elitist of our nation. The only one who suffered from that time that First Lieutenant G.W. Bush went AWOL, was Dan Rather. Not even Rather’s descriptive support of that unbelievable one bullet theory saved him, from this elitist class of cheats. Better watch where you go, is what I take from this Bush/Rather story. Although, Sandy Berger must have known where to go. Let’s see a normal nobody get caught stuffing classified documents down their pants, and then see if they will be allowed to issue a guilty plea to a (ready for this) ‘Misdemeanor’. I guarantee you, your misdemeanor plea would not be so generously accepted, by the courts. Another State Department executive using unsecure communication lines, was Victoria Nuland. Who will ever forget Victoria talking to Geoffrey Pyatt. Their conversation was where Nuland made comments such as, ‘Yats is the guy’ and where she also declared to Pyatt ‘F#+k the EU’. Apparently our State Department employees don’t care or know the slightest thing about security. Here again, maybe their arrogant hubris gets ahead of them at times, and for this they can rely on that double standard rule for them, kicking in. Don’t try this at home folks, you could be prosecuted, and sent away for a very long time.
Oh I forgot to provide this link;
http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/tag/hillary-clinton-email-scandal/
Thanks for the link!
Judicial watch is a right wing organization with an agenda. I would not trust anything from them.
Bill I know all about Judicial Watch’s reputation, but inside of their articles concerning Hillary’s e mail use, are highlighted links providing information obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. As with any thing you may read, you will need to be vigilant of any, and all bias that maybe hidden inside of the articles messaging. Even without any more than what we already know, Hillary is guilty of not using secure government servers. Anyone other than her, and her class of government executives, would already by now be serving hard time for doing what she did. This isn’t a right or left issue, it is an issue of government security.
It’s hard to imagine that Robert Gates, Eric Holder, President Obama, The Joint Chiefs and a host of others didn’t have some inkling that Mrs. Clinton was using a clandestine email server. Or, that when she shared spicy tidbits provided in retroversion from Sidney (“Sid Vicious”) Blumenthal, they didn’t wonder where she was getting unvetted NSA type data. As Ray alludes, various intelligence agencies probably know the contents of those emails. They must suspect what may have been compromised, and can guess what may have been deleted. Of course…that begs the question: Did they let it happen on purpose (LIHOP)? It’s impossible for us mere mortals to know what’s really afoot. Certainly, anyone who has served in the military knows that every nation is exposed to hostile threats, and that subversive activity directed against the national defense is an ever-present danger. Secrecy is tantamount to preserving the strategic advantage afforded by “knowing” what they think we don’t “know”. Rumsfeld had a name for that. But other things which are “classified” in nature are simply classified in order to conceal illegal activity. Jeffrey Sterling’s objections to “Operation Merlin” would fall into that category. Despite the prohibition against operating domestically, our intelligence agencies are still “tickling the ivories” of the “Mighty Wurlitzer” and meddling in the scripted Hollywood and mainstream media versions of the truth. “Operation Mockingbird” never went away. So, a window on their activities is readily available to the “unwashed masses”…if you know where to look. Favorite playgrounds for tweaking public (mis)perception are Snopes and Wickipedia. Various agencies edit, moderate or otherwise inform such outlets, and it pays to know which pundits are married or financially related to which inside players. If you already have a pretty good handle on which laws Mrs. Clinton broke – let’s say you were in the military and you attended the annual, mandatory “Subversion and Espionage Directed against the United States” briefing twenty five or thirty times – and then you read the Wikipedia version of the scandal, you’ll note that they mention the relatively innocuous Title 18 Section 1924, but avoid the more applicable (and more punitive) Section 793. They also avoid the applicable statutes against embezzlement, obstruction of justice, perjury and a host of other felonies. The “takeaway message” is that this is all a matter of retroactive classification, over classification, interdepartmental squabbling over “turf” issues, and the like. In other words, “No big deal.” The truth is, if a “real” investigation were conducted, it could end up like Winnie the Pooh’s sweater when Eeyore unraveled the whole thing. Somebody would sooner or later have to ask…“What did The President know, and when did he know it?”
I don’t remember where I read it, but recently I read he knew about the server. Which is probably why he is downplaying it. There are emails between State Dept personnel and Uma Abedin regarding setting up the server in her house when it was first done. Clinton’s email address was [email protected] so anyone who emailed her had to know she was using a non- secure .gov email address, which is HIGHLY unusual when you handle classified information. If you ever had a security clearance, or if you didn’t and you worked where classified information was handled, you surely remember all the training courses and how many times it was drummed into your head how to handle classified info… and as the authors of this memorandum state above, “you do not take it home with you.” So we know what the president knew and when he knew it… apparently he was not in favor of it, but could not reign in Queen Hillary. So that is probably why he is downplaying the whole sordid affair. Just another example of the Clintons getting away with illegal activities. But this one, I hope, is the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Here’s the article I was referring to about Obama knowing she had her own personal server. It is quite long, but with some good info.
https://informedvote2016.wordpress.com/2016/03/18/do-i-really-need-to-worry-about-hillarys-emails-yes-she-will-be-indicted-full-form/
Cnico, thanks to you and others for posting helpful links on this affair that is growing long legs and razor-sharp teeth right before our eyes. This may turn out to be Hillary’s Waterloo(gate), and the more the public knows, the harder it will be for TPTB to drag their feet or stonewall us.
From your link:
Today at the Naked Capitalism site I saw a tidbit which makes me suspect Sanders was playing a deeper game.
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2016/05/200pm-water-cooler-5252016.html
He was deliberately laying low on all three of the issues which could really hurt Hillary. Sanders has been around the block a few times, and may have either known or suspected that the email issue would eventually blow up without the slightest bit of encouragement from him, so he could take the “high road”. If Hillary did get pushed out of the race by others, the resentment factor from her fans would be dissipated.
The whole question comes down to what Obama does. Given that he has handed Bush’s Torture Squad a free pass, and hasn’t prosecuted a single corrupt banker, I’m inclined to believe it will take some definite orders from whoever is yanking his chain for him to drop the hammer on Hillary. At this very moment the Power Elites in this nation are deciding which outcome would benefit them the most, or hurt them the least.
As an aside, can anybody imagine a hypothetical Secretary of State Donald Trump doing anything as damned stupid as this? Obviously I’m no fan of Trump, but it’s something beyond my imagination.
And it adds to the vindication for Drake, who was already a hero in the whistleblower’s pantheon for having endured a four-year persecution by the Justice Department that a judge called “unconscionable.” Excerpted from “Vindication for Edward Snowden From a New Player in NSA Whistleblowing Saga” by Jenna McLaughlin, Dan Froomkin – https://theintercept.com/2016/05/23/vindication-for-edward-snowden-from-a-new-player-in-nsa-whistleblowing-saga/
That is the same justice (sic) department that is now investigating Hillary’s emails. Different attorney general but same attorney-general-in-chief.
IMHO – If the FBI accelerates its slow-walk investigation to a double-time and releases their email findings promptly, the evidence-to-date against Hilliarly may be deemed insufficient to prosecute. Since Obama has declared the rogue server to have been an inadvertent mistake, Hilliarly is in the clear, unless she tried to cover up the matter by deleting critical email.
“to protect and defend the Constitution from enemies foreign and domestic ”
At what point does a corporate coup of our democracy spark a military coup to defend it?
Consider a congress with an approval rating of 9% and an executive branch beholden to Wall St. And now we are going to sell arms to Hanoi.
I concur completely with your assessment and recommendation. It beggars belief that so many people turn a blind eye to these well established facts and continue to support this person – even the President. I was astonished when, in the same interview with Chris Wallace the President said he didn’t think Hillay did anything to jeopardize national security. Seriously? That made it clear to me that despite his protestations he is playing politics with this very serious breach of security.
The blackmail is the FBI, Obama, doj… Can make sure they get what they want. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if the more crooked and more dirty a candidate is, the more likely they are wanted to hold an office. Let’s see if the FBI got the plea bargain with Guccifer to shut up and help coverup and block Judicial Watch rather than collect evidence against Hillary. The signatories of the letter have many intelligence whistleblowers. They know the NSA listens in on judges, senators, and congressmen. Just like Hoover did.
I can’t imagine Comey would participate in a cover up. It’s not his call to indict, only to make recommendations. It’s up to the DOJ to indict and the Administration to require blind justice.
Well, if we needed proof that the fix was in for Clinton to avoid being subjected to the rule of law and that Pres. Obama is the originator of that fix – we now have it.
Worried about your legacy Mr. President?
Keep going. It will be in the toilet.
Walt
Thank you for having our backs. It’s all of you, those unsung individuals, playing the most important roles behind the scenes, who make up the foundation of our country and protect us, and to whom we are indebted.
Millions of us have not been mislead by the media.
What no one has mentioned is a Pardon for Clinton by Obama. This would clear the decks for her to continue on as if nothing has happened.
Hillary is a crook and should be behind bars. So isn’t Obama for pardoning Bush and Cheney.
Thanks, Michael,
Was this from hrc at State? Or from one of the embassies? would you have a link to the original source?
Very interesting,
ray
If I had done one one hundredth of what Hillary had done, I would be in prison now and paying a substantial fine. i am a retired AF Intel officer who had TS/SCI clearance. I also retired from nuclear weapons lab and also had TS/SCI as well as Q clearance and was in several SAPs. She certainly should do some prison time.
Jim,
For a limited time only, VIPS is welcoming new members! Benefits are out of this world — literally. Can reach me via email address on my own website: raymcgovern.com.
Best,
ay
Why for a limited time only? What kind of BENEFITS? What are they needed for? By the way, the letter was well-written and I agree with the group’s position regarding HRC. I don’t know if your position is politically motivated or not, but it doesn’t matter because a crime is a crime.
I think it would be difficult to find a worse candidate than Hillary. Beholden to Israel even more than her predecessors, hater of Russia, like the others, when there is much more reason to work with Russia and Putin and stop the aggression of NATO, no longer needed twenty years after the supposed end of the Cold War.
Not being a Constitutional lawyer, I may be wrong but I believe Mrs. Clinton could NOT be impeached as President for what she did or did not do while she was Secretary of State. She can, however, still be impeached for her actions or failure to act according to the law when she was Secretary of State. And the Senate sitting in judgment of her as Secretary of State emerita, could, under the Congress’s impeachment/trial powers spelled out in the Constitution, impose as punishment blocking her from serving in future in any office of the United States, including that of the Presidency. So the ball is in Mr. Obama’s court – and the Sanders’ supporters should also be petitioning the current President to speed up the resolution of the investigation in this case. I think, however, as with many other things in the last eight years (except for using drones, taking out U.S. citizens and involving the US in other prima facie illegal actions overseas), Mr. Obama will delay and delay and delay.
This whole discussion appears to have gone off-rails. Congress to impeach a President for what she did as a Secretary of State!? Some people are kidding? If the Congress were what it should be and if the President will be what she should be …
How about the simple old “you do the crime, you do the time!”. What HRC did was not jaywalking, it was a criminal offence and her and Bill’s power and privilege are suppressing the law, as usual. The State Department and the FBI should have finished this investigation long time ago, not after HRC became a Democratic Party candidate and practically its nominee. Instead, the State Department bailed out whilst the FBI has been dragging its feet, the old work-slow bureaucratic trick.
Ultimately, I would rather see Trump squash her in an election, like a rotten tomato she is, then a little one of her many past crimes become her undoing and Democrats having to scramble to find a quick stand-in. They would lose the Presidential elections for this and they would blame FBI forever. But, if HRC does not become the President, then the whole investigation will be quickly forgotten and she will be able to comfortably enjoy the proceeds of her many crimes in retirement.
Sentencing HRC for busting the State Department secrecy would be just like sentencing Al Capone for tax evasion.
I thought this was a well written letter. I don’t know what political motivations are behind it but I think it stresses that this email investigation needs to be resolved quickly no matter whom you are voting for. I really do feel for people who are in the security services – I think they are getting a “slap in the face” in regards to the work they do.
I had not seen that excerpt before.
You don’t have to be an expert to realize that the subject matter is highly sensitive and should be classified (it probably was before getting on to the Clinton server!)
It is interesting that all of the signatories are ex-, former or ret. Current employees of the NSA, CIA, Army Intelligence, etc. were either not approached for their signatures or chose not to sign. Either way, we can deduce that the fear of or actual intimidation from the top played a part.
Having lived through the slow roll of Watergate, which did nothing to prevent Nixon’s re-election, I would not be too surprised if Hillary becomes President. However, Watergate also teaches us that scandals of this magnitude do no just fade away.
Hillary’s unpopularity number is just above 50%. I know some people who believe that “all politicians are crooks. At least Hillary has the experience to offset her crookedness.” Such a sentiment leaves me aghast. The difference between the US and most countries of the world is that when you get caught in the US, they throw the book at you. Mr President, don’t let this great country do anything different now.
The above letter is “FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity”
“Veteran” means they are *former* intelligence professionals; in other words, no longer actively serving as intelligence professionals.
“The difference between the US and most countries of the world is that when you get caught in the US, they throw the book at you. Mr President, don’t let this great country do anything different now.”
That is a false assertion.
George W Bush, Richard B Cheney, et. al. committed war crimes, including instigating a war of aggression against Iraq, torture in violation of international treaties, and more (911 …). They are presently above the law. President Obama has failed to indict and prosecute the whole cabal for their war crimes, making Obama an accessory to their war crimes. The Republican Congress (House and Senate) also refuses to act.
Contrary to the assertions of MSM, there is compelling evidence that Guccifer hacked Hillary’s server: the Bill Clinton doodles he released 3 years ago: https://thehornnews.com/secret-smoking-gun-proof-clinton-going-jail/
Whereas it was previously assumed that Guccifer had hacked the Clinton Library to get these doodles, that seems unlikely because A. the Library denies it has such doodles; B. the Library has a .gov email address that it hard to hack. But the doodles could have been on Hillary’s server, because Bill Clinton had purchased that server upon leaving office for his own Foundation work; HIllary only began to use it when she became SOS years later.
The investigative reporters at Consortium News could perform a great service by fleshing this story out and bringing it to wider attention.
I’m really hoping people step up on this and push for criminal prosecution. To me, what Hillary did seems like treason. As an it professional, I understand exactly what she did, it was intentional to avoid scrutiny and cover up Benghazi and other things. I think her prosecution is gonna rely on vets and others standing up and demanding she not be let off for one of the largest breaches in recent history. I don’t see how anyone can work for her or in intelligence with her at the helm. She has proven she can’t be trusted with classified material and that America comes last after her bragging, profiteering, and paying back favors to foreign nations and corporations. She is one of those people who cannot learn, cannot tell the truth, cannot follow laws or policies if her life depended on it. I would not hire someone like her to mpw my lawn. She is not qualified and I cannot support her. My family has fought for this country before it was one. I’m gonna be looking out and sharing stuff on this. I hope a group gets together and speaks out, when its not political, so she can’t say its a smear campaign. I think she has proven she is a real threat.
I don’t see how anyone can work for her or in intelligence with her at the helm.
HRC has been surrounded, aided and abetted by countless morally- and ethically-challenged people for years. She can count on more of the same if she becomes president. In Washington, the supply is always enough to meet the demand.
Really, as an IT professional you KNOW what her motives were, you KNOW she was covering up Benghazi. Wow, you are an awesome IT professional, without ever haven spoken to a single person you KNOW. What was covered up about Benghazi?
You hurled out a whole lot of accusations there, without a shred of evidence. Does that mean you can not be trusted, cannot tell the truth?
Jill Stein
Unfortunately, there are saboteurs in the Green Party. If that weren’t so, the Green Party would be much stronger. We have to establish a new party that takes no corporate money. — Wish it could be the Green Party, since the Green Party is so successful in other countries. Current “controllers” in the US are not good.
I was in the Green Party for a while, and could see the sabotage in my area.
Could you elaborate?
Can only wish I, as a once-member of State INR, could sign this.
Helen: If you’d like to join VIPS and/or our “Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence,” just send us an e-mail at http://samadamsaward.ch/contact/ and we’ll add you to our member list. We’re always looking for new members!
Ms. Rowley,
You are an American Hero. Thank you for your service.
Cool! Colleen Rowley, you are my hero.
They’re telling us we have to choose between two narcissistic egomaniacal lunatics for the most powerful position in the universe, and we can’t choose anyone else, only these two. It’s asking too much. I want someone else. Guess who.
“most powerful position in the universe,”
Tiny bit of hyperbole there. We aren’t power rangers. Can you think of any president with maybe the exception (which proves the rule) of Jimmy Carter who wasn’t egocentric and narcissistic? I think it takes that type of personality to win the white house.
#StillSanders
If Hillary does become president, a hostile Congress could take the evidence that is apparent and bring impeachment charges against her. Presumably, there is no statute of limitations on putting national security at risk.
It would be such a big luck for the world – Hillary as President means much more war and destruction.
The whole big lobby of war-mongerers stands behind her.
In an interview on CNN yesterday, former secretary of state George Schultz declined to criticize Hillary Clinton because he was a member of the former secretaries of states club. The same concept appears to apply to that ever more exclusive club – occupants and former occupants of the White House. Observers of President Obama’s standards on upholding the law will be astounded if he takes his thumb off the scales of justice in this instance and lives up to his oath of office. It should be more than apparent to anyone paying the slightest attention that the oaths of office taken by high-ranking officials – presidents and members of their administrations, and members of Congress, etc. – are meaningless
Has her friend Henry Kissinger criticized her at all???
Rosemerry, you are being facetious when you ask if Kissinger has criticized her, aren’t you??
Obama let his predecessors and their subalterns off the hook. He expects his successor to do the same for him and his subalterns. This is the way things are done.
I don’t think they’ll blackmail anyone. I would think they would expose the e-mails to force people they don’t like to resign from office.
Oh, I forgot. They’ll expose them rather than blackmail them because that they won’t be doing anything illegal – they’ll just be protecting national security if said e-mails endanger national security, and what other legal reason would they have to release the e-mails?