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What Hillary Tells Voters Isn't What She Told The FBI
Posted on: September 12, 2016 at 10:59:46 CT
Spanky KU
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http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/clinton-e-mail-scandal-kudos-to-matt-lauer-for-grilling-clinton-on-it/
No wonder the mainstream press is outraged at Matt Lauer's performance as moderator of NBC's "Commander in chief Forum." He asked questions about Hillary Clinton's email use that the rest of the media refuse to. And in doing so, Lauer exposed another aspect of her duplicitousness.
When Lauer asked Clinton about her judgment when it came to using an unsecured private email server to handle highly sensitive State Department communications, Clinton was emphatic that she was well versed in how to handle classified material.
"For all the viewers watching tonight, I have a lot of experience handling classified material starting when I was on the Senate Armed Services Committee going into the four years as secretary of state," she said.
"Classified material has a header that says Top Secret, Secret or Confidential. And nothing — and I will repeat this — none of the emails sent or received by me had such a header."
Lauer has been blasted by his colleagues for not hitting Donald Trump with tough follow-up questions and letting him get away with making false statements. But if he is to be criticized for anything, it's that he clearly let Clinton off the hook on this one.
Since her first news conference on the topic in March 2015, Clinton has claimed there was no classified material on her server. When classified information started turning up in abundance in her email chains, she modified her claim to say that none of the emails was marked classified. It's a claim she has made ever since.
But just because Clinton keeps saying something doesn't make it true. And in this case, what she's saying is intentionally misleading.
FBI Director James Comey made it clear that more than 100 emails that Clinton sent or received contained classified information "at the time they were sent or received." Eight contained Top Secret information.
Whether these emails were marked or not is entirely irrelevant, a point Comey reiterated in his statement on the case. "But even if information is not marked 'classified' in an email, participants who know or should know that the subject matter is classified are still obligated to protect it."
The fact that Clinton didn't take steps to protect this information can't be dismissed as a minor "mistake."
In addition, the Washington Post determined that Clinton herself wrote 104 emails that contained classified material. The only reason they weren't marked as such is because she didn't put the banner at the top.
It's worth noting that after Comey made his statement, the Post's own fact-checker gave Clinton "Four Pinocchios" — which is the worst rating possible — for her repeated claims about those markings.
What was most interesting in the NBC forum, however, was Clinton's claim about her vast experience handling classified information. That just happens to directly contradict her repeated pleas of ignorance when she was interviewed by the FBI. Examples:
When the FBI showed her emails with a "C" markings denoting confidential information, Clinton said she thought it meant the paragraphs were marked in alphabetical order.
She told the FBI that she couldn't recall any training or guidance provided by State, and required of her since she had "Original Classification Authority" on how to handle classified material.
The FBI said Clinton "could not give an example of how classification of a document was determined."
Clinton repeatedly told the FBI — at least eight times by our count — that she relied on the judgment of others to appropriately mark what was or wasn't classified, so as to absolve herself of responsibility.
Does that sound like someone who has "a lot of experience handling classified material"?
And on multiple occasions when the FBI showed Clinton an example of one of her emails that contained classified information, Clinton dismissed the email, saying she was "not concerned" about the classified material for one reason or another.
It is clear that most of the mainstream press has little interest in pursuing any of this because it might harm Clinton's chances in November. In fact, when Hillary Clinton held her first news conference in nine months Thursday morning, not one reporter brought the subject up. Instead, they lobbed such softballs as: "Do you think you're being treated differently because you're a woman?"
The fact that Matt Lauer was willing to ask Clinton tough questions shows he has more credibility as a journalist than any one of those criticizing him. What Lauer showed is that Clinton continues to lie to the public about what she did.
No wonder the mainstream press is outraged at Matt Lauer's performance as moderator of NBC's "Commander in chief Forum." He asked questions about Hillary Clinton's email use that the rest of the media refuse to. And in doing so, Lauer exposed another aspect of her duplicitousness.
When Lauer asked Clinton about her judgment when it came to using an unsecured private email server to handle highly sensitive State Department communications, Clinton was emphatic that she was well versed in how to handle classified material.
"For all the viewers watching tonight, I have a lot of experience handling classified material starting when I was on the Senate Armed Services Committee going into the four years as secretary of state," she said.
"Classified material has a header that says Top Secret, Secret or Confidential. And nothing — and I will repeat this — none of the emails sent or received by me had such a header."
Lauer has been blasted by his colleagues for not hitting Donald Trump with tough follow-up questions and letting him get away with making false statements. But if he is to be criticized for anything, it's that he clearly let Clinton off the hook on this one.
Since her first news conference on the topic in March 2015, Clinton has claimed there was no classified material on her server. When classified information started turning up in abundance in her email chains, she modified her claim to say that none of the emails was marked classified. It's a claim she has made ever since.
But just because Clinton keeps saying something doesn't make it true. And in this case, what she's saying is intentionally misleading.
FBI Director James Comey made it clear that more than 100 emails that Clinton sent or received contained classified information "at the time they were sent or received." Eight contained Top Secret information.
Whether these emails were marked or not is entirely irrelevant, a point Comey reiterated in his statement on the case. "But even if information is not marked 'classified' in an email, participants who know or should know that the subject matter is classified are still obligated to protect it."
The fact that Clinton didn't take steps to protect this information can't be dismissed as a minor "mistake."
In addition, the Washington Post determined that Clinton herself wrote 104 emails that contained classified material. The only reason they weren't marked as such is because she didn't put the banner at the top.
It's worth noting that after Comey made his statement, the Post's own fact-checker gave Clinton "Four Pinocchios" — which is the worst rating possible — for her repeated claims about those markings.
What was most interesting in the NBC forum, however, was Clinton's claim about her vast experience handling classified information. That just happens to directly contradict her repeated pleas of ignorance when she was interviewed by the FBI. Examples:
When the FBI showed her emails with a "C" markings denoting confidential information, Clinton said she thought it meant the paragraphs were marked in alphabetical order.
She told the FBI that she couldn't recall any training or guidance provided by State, and required of her since she had "Original Classification Authority" on how to handle classified material.
The FBI said Clinton "could not give an example of how classification of a document was determined."
Clinton repeatedly told the FBI — at least eight times by our count — that she relied on the judgment of others to appropriately mark what was or wasn't classified, so as to absolve herself of responsibility.
Does that sound like someone who has "a lot of experience handling classified material"?
And on multiple occasions when the FBI showed Clinton an example of one of her emails that contained classified information, Clinton dismissed the email, saying she was "not concerned" about the classified material for one reason or another.
It is clear that most of the mainstream press has little interest in pursuing any of this because it might harm Clinton's chances in November. In fact, when Hillary Clinton held her first news conference in nine months Thursday morning, not one reporter brought the subject up. Instead, they lobbed such softballs as: "Do you think you're being treated differently because you're a woman?"
The fact that Matt Lauer was willing to ask Clinton tough questions shows he has more credibility as a journalist than any one of those criticizing him. What Lauer showed is that Clinton continues to lie to the public about what she did.
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What Hillary Tells Voters Isn't What She Told The FBI - Spanky KU - 9/12 10:59:46