The evidence shows she isn’t, at least in this case. I watched the press conference live. Comey spent the first 15 minutes explaining how she broke the law, and the last 2 minutes saying it would be tough to prosecute, so we won’t. She clearly committed far worse than what Patreus did, and yet he was prosecuted by the same DoJ that will now decide not to prosecute her. There’s no justice here, only politics as usual.
If nothing else the law in this case also allows for prosecution for negligence, which at the very least is all over this, from the ignoring of govt. protocol and policies, violating the rules in place to maintain secrecy and what not. No criminal intent is required for this, although that’s provable too because she was warned about her system and ignored it, Yet they’re not pursuing it.
You know something of the need for secrecy, and the requirements placed on those receiving and sending such. In your experience, what do you think would happen to the average individual in govt were they to share top-secret info on an unapproved personal email account with people not cleared to receive it? You know the outcome would be much different than this. At a minimum, they’d be disqualified from further career advancement and stripped of any future access. At a minimum, that should of happened here as well.
The only compliment that should be extended to Comey is that he gave a very detailed report on the lies Hillary told, and how ridiculously incompetent she was in handling sensitive national security info classified at the highest levels, some of which was marked as such. It shoots the lies Hillary has been telling right out of the water. I think there was more involved in his decision not to refer for prosecution… too many highly unusual and improper things happened just prior to this announcement. He split hairs on differentiating careless and gross negligence – that is troubling, and seems to have been influenced by something still unknown.
At any rate, someone who is “extremely careless” shouldn’t be able to get anywhere near the presidency…
Rudy G. hit the nail on the head today when he said that if the FBI had been interviewing Hillary for a security clearance, she would have not been granted the clearance. It’s a real shame that average Joe’s who serve in the military have a higher clearance then our elected politicians.
I don’t understand how the director of the FBI can stand there and say since there was no intent at wrongdoing, there are no charges. The statues in question clearly say intent is irrelevant. Once again, the Obama admin is ignoring a law they don’t like.
“There is no way of getting around this: According to Director James Comey (disclosure: a former colleague and longtime friend of mine), Hillary Clinton checked every box required for a felony violation of Section 793(f) of the federal penal code (Title 18): With lawful access to highly classified information she acted with gross negligence in removing and causing it to be removed it from its proper place of custody, and she transmitted it and caused it to be transmitted to others not authorized to have it, in patent violation of her trust. Director Comey even conceded that former Secretary Clinton was “extremely careless” and strongly suggested that her recklessness very likely led to communications (her own and those she corresponded with) being intercepted by foreign intelligence services.
Yet, Director Comey recommended against prosecution of the law violations he clearly found on the ground that there was no intent to harm the United States.
In essence, in order to give Mrs. Clinton a pass, the FBI rewrote the statute, inserting an intent element that Congress did not require. The added intent element, moreover, makes no sense: The point of having a statute that criminalizes gross negligence is to underscore that government officials have a special obligation to safeguard national defense secrets; when they fail to carry out that obligation due to gross negligence, they are guilty of serious wrongdoing. The lack of intent to harm our country is irrelevant. People never intend the bad things that happen due to gross negligence.
I would point out, moreover, that there are other statutes that criminalize unlawfully removing and transmitting highly classified information with intent to harm the United States. Being not guilty (and, indeed, not even accused) of Offense B does not absolve a person of guilt on Offense A, which she has committed. It is a common tactic of defense lawyers in criminal trials to set up a straw-man for the jury: a crime the defendant has not committed. The idea is that by knocking down a crime the prosecution does not allege and cannot prove, the defense may confuse the jury into believing the defendant is not guilty of the crime charged. Judges generally do not allow such sleight-of-hand because innocence on an uncharged crime is irrelevant to the consideration of the crimes that actually have been charged.
It seems to me that this is what the FBI has done today. It has told the public that because Mrs. Clinton did not have intent to harm the United States we should not prosecute her on a felony that does not require proof of intent to harm the United States. Meanwhile, although there may have been profound harm to national security caused by her grossly negligent mishandling of classified information, we’ve decided she shouldn’t be prosecuted for grossly negligent mishandling of classified information.
I think highly of Jim Comey personally and professionally, but this makes no sense to me.”
Wandering Views 
As we suspected, no charges for Hillary. What a shock…. Not.
They admit she broke the law and procedures and policies, yet no charges.
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😦
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Shocked.
But it almost makes it look even worse for her (not to mention Loretta Lynch).
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What if she really has been innocent all these times?
Don’t feed the seed root of bitterness. God wins in the sorry end.
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Michelle,
The evidence shows she isn’t, at least in this case. I watched the press conference live. Comey spent the first 15 minutes explaining how she broke the law, and the last 2 minutes saying it would be tough to prosecute, so we won’t. She clearly committed far worse than what Patreus did, and yet he was prosecuted by the same DoJ that will now decide not to prosecute her. There’s no justice here, only politics as usual.
LikeLike
If nothing else the law in this case also allows for prosecution for negligence, which at the very least is all over this, from the ignoring of govt. protocol and policies, violating the rules in place to maintain secrecy and what not. No criminal intent is required for this, although that’s provable too because she was warned about her system and ignored it, Yet they’re not pursuing it.
You know something of the need for secrecy, and the requirements placed on those receiving and sending such. In your experience, what do you think would happen to the average individual in govt were they to share top-secret info on an unapproved personal email account with people not cleared to receive it? You know the outcome would be much different than this. At a minimum, they’d be disqualified from further career advancement and stripped of any future access. At a minimum, that should of happened here as well.
LikeLike
The only compliment that should be extended to Comey is that he gave a very detailed report on the lies Hillary told, and how ridiculously incompetent she was in handling sensitive national security info classified at the highest levels, some of which was marked as such. It shoots the lies Hillary has been telling right out of the water. I think there was more involved in his decision not to refer for prosecution… too many highly unusual and improper things happened just prior to this announcement. He split hairs on differentiating careless and gross negligence – that is troubling, and seems to have been influenced by something still unknown.
At any rate, someone who is “extremely careless” shouldn’t be able to get anywhere near the presidency…
LikeLike
Rudy G. hit the nail on the head today when he said that if the FBI had been interviewing Hillary for a security clearance, she would have not been granted the clearance. It’s a real shame that average Joe’s who serve in the military have a higher clearance then our elected politicians.
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Why are you people talking about what the law says.
The law does not apply to the Clintons.
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From Jonah Goldberg @JonahNRO
“I think it was right after Comey’s statement and that Obama-Clinton rally I started cutting myself.” –Excerpt from my future memoirs.
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I don’t understand how the director of the FBI can stand there and say since there was no intent at wrongdoing, there are no charges. The statues in question clearly say intent is irrelevant. Once again, the Obama admin is ignoring a law they don’t like.
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/437479/fbi-rewrites-federal-law-let-hillary-hook
“There is no way of getting around this: According to Director James Comey (disclosure: a former colleague and longtime friend of mine), Hillary Clinton checked every box required for a felony violation of Section 793(f) of the federal penal code (Title 18): With lawful access to highly classified information she acted with gross negligence in removing and causing it to be removed it from its proper place of custody, and she transmitted it and caused it to be transmitted to others not authorized to have it, in patent violation of her trust. Director Comey even conceded that former Secretary Clinton was “extremely careless” and strongly suggested that her recklessness very likely led to communications (her own and those she corresponded with) being intercepted by foreign intelligence services.
Yet, Director Comey recommended against prosecution of the law violations he clearly found on the ground that there was no intent to harm the United States.
In essence, in order to give Mrs. Clinton a pass, the FBI rewrote the statute, inserting an intent element that Congress did not require. The added intent element, moreover, makes no sense: The point of having a statute that criminalizes gross negligence is to underscore that government officials have a special obligation to safeguard national defense secrets; when they fail to carry out that obligation due to gross negligence, they are guilty of serious wrongdoing. The lack of intent to harm our country is irrelevant. People never intend the bad things that happen due to gross negligence.
I would point out, moreover, that there are other statutes that criminalize unlawfully removing and transmitting highly classified information with intent to harm the United States. Being not guilty (and, indeed, not even accused) of Offense B does not absolve a person of guilt on Offense A, which she has committed. It is a common tactic of defense lawyers in criminal trials to set up a straw-man for the jury: a crime the defendant has not committed. The idea is that by knocking down a crime the prosecution does not allege and cannot prove, the defense may confuse the jury into believing the defendant is not guilty of the crime charged. Judges generally do not allow such sleight-of-hand because innocence on an uncharged crime is irrelevant to the consideration of the crimes that actually have been charged.
It seems to me that this is what the FBI has done today. It has told the public that because Mrs. Clinton did not have intent to harm the United States we should not prosecute her on a felony that does not require proof of intent to harm the United States. Meanwhile, although there may have been profound harm to national security caused by her grossly negligent mishandling of classified information, we’ve decided she shouldn’t be prosecuted for grossly negligent mishandling of classified information.
I think highly of Jim Comey personally and professionally, but this makes no sense to me.”
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“Not all reporters are bad.” — Donald J. Trump
Waiting for the T-Shirt.
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