Connecting the dots on Hillary Clinton

[russ1945]

[h=2]Clinton Doesn’t Regret Six-Figure Goldman Sachs Speaking Fees: ‘That’s What They Offered’[/h]SHARE
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BY: David Rutz
February 3, 2016 11:09 pm

Hillary Clinton said Wednesday she did not regret getting $675,000 to give three speeches to Goldman Sachs, adding flippantly, “That’s what they offered.”
After Clinton gave a lengthy answer at a New Hampshire town hall that again sought to mitigate concerns she was beholden to Wall Street interests, CNN moderator Anderson Cooper brought up the enormous speaking fees.
“Was that a mistake? Was that a bad error in judgment?” Cooper asked.
“Look, I made speeches to lots of groups,” Clinton said. “I told them what I thought. I answered questions.”
“But did you have to be paid $675,000?” Cooper asked.
“Well, I don’t know. That’s what they offered,” Clinton said, drawing laughter from the audience. “Every secretary of state that I know has done that.”
Cooper pointed out other secretaries of state weren’t running for president, but Clinton claimed not to be initially sure if she would run for president once she left office in 2013.
“Anybody who knows me who thinks that they can influence me, name anything they’ve influenced me on,” Clinton said. “Just name one thing. I’m out here every day saying I’m going to shut them down, I’m going after them, I’m going to jail them if they should be jailed … They’re not giving me very much money now, I can tell you that much.”
The Washington Free Beacon reported last week on 31 past and future financial industry fundraising events for Hillary Clinton.
“So, just to be clear, that’s not something you regret, those three speeches?” Cooper asked.
“No,” she said. “I don’t, because I don’t feel that I pay any price for it, and I am very clear about what I will do, and they’re on notice.”

 

[russ1945]

[h=2]Hillary Clinton Denies Her Ties to Big Oil: ‘I Don’t Even Know’[/h]SHARE
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BY: Jenna Lifhits
February 3, 2016 3:47 pm

Hillary Clinton denied knowing anything about the more than $150,000 in campaign contributions she has received from Big Oil and gas companies at a campaign event in New Hampshire on Wednesday.
“You’ve also said that you support renewable energy in our country, but have taken over $150,000 dollars from the Big Oil and gas industries,” one woman said. “These are industries which are in direct conflict with your interest in renewable energies, and I’m wondering if you’d be willing to take one step further away from the Republicans and take a stand against any more campaign contributions from them?”
Clinton said that she did not know about the contributions that the woman was referring to and that she is no friend of Big Oil.
“Yeah, I don’t even know what you’re referring to, but Big Oil knows I’m not their friend,” Clinton said. “So I can’t imagine, they must’ve put it in the wrong envelope, because I’ve been very clear about that, and I want to take away all their subsidies, I’ve been public about that. We’re going to move those six billion dollars a year into clean, renewable energy.”
Clinton made a similar claim at a campaign stop in Iowa in December, when one voter asked her if she had ever taken money from the fossil fuel industry.
“Well, I don’t know that I ever have [accepted money from the oil industry],” Clinton said. “I’m not exactly one of their favorites.”
When the man asserted that Clinton had in fact taken money from the oil industry, she seemed similarly confused and told the man she would “check on” his claim.
“Have I?” Clinton said. “OK, well, I’ll check on that. They certainly haven’t made that much of an impression on me if I don’t even know it.”
Though Clinton consistently has trouble recalling whether she has received contributions from Big Oil, some of her biggest campaign financiers are oil lobbyists.

 

[russ1945]

The 4 articles I just now posted show that emails are just the tip of the iceburg. $650,000 for a speech at Goldman Sachs and shrugs it off....right.

An elitist who cannot even relate to common people, she lives in a world of her own. That is a world where she does not even drive her own car LOL.

So she does not even know when to speed up, when to slow down, when to yield the right of way, and I am sure she would be screaming through intersections with yellow lights. Can someone who cannot parallel park run a country...LOL.

 

[russ1945]

Now back to the emails:

[h=1]House Intelligence Committee Member: More Top Secret Hillary Clinton Emails Are Coming[/h]

22​

1​

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

by JOHN HAYWARD3 Feb 201645
[h=2]Rep. Chris Stewart (R-UT)

67%​

of the House Intelligence Committee said that more of Hillary Clinton’s emails would be classified Top Secret, and the information contained in these emails is every bit as damaging as early reports suggested.[/h]Noting that 22 “Top Secret” emails have been reported by the press so far, Stewart said, “there’s actually more than that” during an interview on Fox News on Wednesday.
These Clinton emails had to be heavily redacted before they could be released to the public, but Stewart, as a member of House Intelligence, has read them.
“I have never read anything that’s more sensitive than what these emails contained,” he said. “They do reveal classified methods. They do reveal classified sources, and they do reveal human assets. I can’t imagine how anyone could be familiar with these emails, whether they’re sending them or receiving them, and not realize that these are highly classified.”
That comment was a reference to Clinton’s defense that she didn’t realize much of the material passing through her email server was classified, because it wasn’t marked as such. (That may be a consequence of her aides stripping the classification markings away when they copied the material out of secure computer systems.) As Secretary of State, Clinton received training in how to spot classified information and was obliged to report mishandling of it.
Stewart didn’t think much of Clinton’s “nothing I sent or received was marked classified” defense.
“It’s a ridiculous assertion,” he said. “If I received an email saying, ‘Here’s the names and addresses and phone numbers of ten of our undercover agents in Pakistan,’ I would know that was classified. I wouldn’t look for a heading and go, ‘well, there’s no heading on there, therefore it’s unclassified.'” Stewart stressed this example of ten undercover agents in Pakistan was purely hypothetical, and none of Clinton’s emails actually listed that precise information.
Stewart said he was “shocked” when he saw exactly what was contained in the Clinton emails, although he allowed that he had a general idea of what they contained before viewing them.
Notably, Stewart flatly refuted Clinton’s assertion that she neither sent or received any of the classified emails. “They were her emails,” he said.
While waiting for a “legal process” to play out in the Clinton email case, Stewart said he thought the American people should ask themselves, “Did Hillary Clinton demonstrate the judgment, and the respect for protocol, that would allow her to protect national security?”
He found himself doubting Clinton’s judgment when he read those emails and saw “how she has exposed some of the most sensitive information, or potentially exposed that.”
“This isn’t some vast right-wing conspiracy,” said Stewart, parodying one of Clinton’s most famous phrases. “For Heaven’s sake, these were Obama Administration officials who have told us these emails were so classified they can’t be released. This wasn’t something that is coming from the Right, it’s coming from this current Administration. So her argument isn’t with me, it’s with the President and his Administration regarding that.”
Stewart did not offer an opinion on whether the case would lead to an indictment, noting he is not a lawyer.
“I don’t think that’s the primary consideration anyway,” he said. “The primary consideration is her judgment, not necessarily the legal outcome.”

 

[Acebb]

Her answer about the $650,000 speech was so stupid and tone deaf it is unbelievable.

She is one of the worst presidential candidates to ever run.

 

[russ1945]

Under the Radar

Josh Gerstein on the Courts, Transparency, & More

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Getty
Feds fight disclosure of Hillary Clinton Whitewater indictment drafts

By JOSH GERSTEIN
02/03/16 05:33 PM EST


The National Archives is fighting a lawsuit trying to force disclosure of several draft indictments of Hillary Clinton prepared by a Whitewater prosecutor in the 1990s.
In a brief filed late Tuesday, Justice Department lawyers and the Archives argue that disclosure of the draft indictments would lead to an unwarranted invasion of Clinton's privacy and violate a court rule protecting grand jury secrecy.
"Despite the role that Mrs. Clinton occupied as the First Lady during President Clinton's administration, Mrs. Clinton maintains a strong privacy interest in not having information about her from the files of the Independent Counsel disclosed," wrote Martha Wagner Murphy, chief of the Archives "special access" branch that stores records of former independent counsels. "As an uncharged person, Hillary Rodham Clinton retains a significant interest in her personal privacy despite any status as a public figure."
The conservative group Judicial Watch, which filed suit for the records in October under the Freedom of Information Act, is arguing that Clinton's ongoing bid for the presidency reinforces the public interest in records about her alleged misconduct.
"She's one of the most well-known women in the world, seeking the office of the presidency and her privacy interests outweigh the public interest in knowing what's in that indictment? It's absurd and it's shameful that the administration is proposing this," Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in an interview. "This is a political decision to protect her candidacy—because it is laughable, legally."
The Archives and Justice Department were dismissive about the impact of Clinton's presidential bid on public access to the records.
"While there may be a scintilla of public interest in these documents since Mrs. Clinton is presently a Democratic presidential candidate, that fact alone is not a cognizable public interest alone under FOIA, as disclosure of the draft indictments would not shed light on what the government is up to," Murphy wrote.
"Her interest in avoiding disclosure of the drafts is not diminished by the fact that she is a former public official who is running for President," Justice Department lawyers added in their brief.
Law enforcement records about living people who did not face charges in criminal investigations normally are not released under FOIA, or the names are sanitized from the records before they're published. However, sometimes judges have ordered the release of such records in cases involving public officials.
Despite the usual practice, though, the Archives has released fairly detailed information about the independent counsel's focus on Hillary Clinton. Just last week, Judicial Watch announced it had received 246 pages of records describing the crimes some prosecutors believed were committed in connection with the Whitewater land deal and related matters. Some of the memos are from the "HRC Team" in the counsel's office—apparently a team focused on Clinton. One discusses the jury appeal or lack thereof of a case based solely on circumstantial evidence. One prosecutor put the chance of a conviction for Clinton at 10 percent.
It's not clear from the government's court filings why the draft indictments would be more sensitive than that kind of analysis, but the new submissions do argue that the drafts are covered by grand jury secrecy. In its initial response to Judicial Watch, the Archives relied solely on Clinton's privacy (and that of others) and did not mention the grand jury secrecy issue. But the brief filed Tuesday contends the drafts would provide insight into the grand jury's activities by revealing the identities of witnesses and that they quote from grand jury testimony.
Fitton said that "if Mrs. Clinton was being truly transparent," she would provide a privacy waiver that could ease release of the records.
Spokesmen for the Clinton campaign did not respond to a request for comment on the legal filings.






Read more: http://www.politico.com/blogs/under...ewater-indictment-drafts-218681#ixzz3zE3ro3VH

 

[russ1945]

The State Department's Foreign Affairs Manual says "transmitting classified information over a communication channel that is unauthorized for the level of information being transmitted" is a "security violation." Such violations must be investigated by the State Department's own bureaus of human resources and diplomatic security. Punishment can vary from a letter of reprimand to loss of security clearance, according to the manual.
When asked about the status of Clinton's security clearance, State Department spokesman John Kirby said: "The State Department does not comment on individuals’ security clearance status. We will say, however, that generally speaking there is a long tradition of secretaries of state making themselves available to future secretaries and presidents. Secretaries are typically allowed to maintain their security clearance and access to their own records for use in writing their memoirs and the like.”
The Clinton campaign declined to comment.

 

[roadreeler57]

 

[russ1945]

[h=2]Factcheck: Do Past Secretaries of State Make as Much for Speeches as Hillary Clinton?[/h]Clinton's defense that 'every secretary of state' has done the same is called into question
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Photos via Wikimedia Commons, AP​

BY: Brent Scher
February 4, 2016 2:19 pm

When Hillary Clinton was asked by CNN’s Anderson Cooper to defend her high speaking fees, Clinton said that “every secretary of state that I know has done” the same and that she just took what was “offered.”
Clinton, however, was making more money on the lucrative speaking circuit after she left the State Department than her three predecessors combined. Not only was Clinton giving more speeches, but she was also paid for them more than Madeleine Albright, Colin Powell, and Condoleezza Rice.
Clinton has been targeted for the $675,000 she took from Goldman Sachs for three speeches, but her fees sometimes exceeded $300,000. For example, she was paid $325,000 by Cisco in August 2014. Later that year Qualcomm paid her $335,000 for a single speech.
Rice is the only former secretary of state that has come close to making as much as Clinton for speeches. She once received $150,000 for a speech at the University of Minnesota, but usually makes far less.
One group that brought in both Rice and Clinton in the year after they left the State Department illustrates just how different the two women’s approach to the speaking circuit has been.
Rice spoke at the Boys and Girls Club in 2009 for $60,000 and gave most of the money back to the charity. Clinton took $200,000 from the Boys and Girls Club for a 2014 speech. Clinton gave the money the Clinton Foundation.
A volunteer at the Boys and Girls Club who had a hand in setting up both speeches told Politico that the Clinton gig “felt more like a pay-to-play type thing” than Rice’s.
Powell and Albright do not come close to bringing in as much money as Clinton, who made more than $11 million in speeches in one 15 month span. Each is paid “in the $50,000 range” when brought in for a speech, according to a New York Times report, which is less than what Chelsea Clinton makes.
Although Cooper failed to point out that Clinton’s speaking fees far exceed what former secretaries of state brought in, he did point out that, unlike Clinton, they had no plans to run for office again.
The Washington Post‘s Chris Cillizza wrote that Clinton’s response that she is doing nothing more than her predecessors will “haunt” her for “some time to come.”

 

[russ1945]

[h=2]Morning Joe Panel Slams Hillary Clinton for Flippant Answer on Speaking Fees[/h]SHARE
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BY: Alyssa Canobbio
February 4, 2016 8:21 am

Thursday’s Morning Joe panel slammed Hillary Clinton for her flippant answer at Wednesday’s New Hampshire town hall to the question of why she had accepted exorbitant Wall Street speaking fees.
CNN’s Anderson Cooper asked Clinton why she had accepted $675,000 for three speaking engagements with the investment bank Goldman Sachs. Clinton was defensive and said that she made lots of speeches to different groups. Cooper asked again if she really needed to accept the large speaking fee.
“Well, I don’t know. Um, that’s what they offered,” Clinton said.
Her comment was met with laughter from the audience. Clinton again went on the defensive saying that she accepted the money because she did not think that she would be running for president.
Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough was dumbfounded.
“Well, I just don’t know where to begin, Mark Halperin. We can start with her suggesting she didn’t think that she was going to run for president. Secondly, saying that she could get $675,000 because everybody is doing it, as far as Secretary of States go. She said name one thing that anyone has bought with money paying me. [Former Clinton aide and current ABC anchor] George Stephanopoulos said access,” Scarborough said.
Bloomberg’s Mark Halperin agreed that the moment was easily her weakest moment in the forum.
“But that answer goes to the biggest contradiction in her campaign now that she faces off with Bernie Sanders, even as she continues to move to the left to try and keep him from having room on the left. She and her supporters suggest that Sanders is too left-wing to be elected president and that answer and all the problems in dealing with being more of an establishment candidate than Sanders revealed there. It clearly makes her uncomfortable,” Halperin said.
During Clinton’s campaign, she promised to break up the big banks, which would include Goldman Sachs.

 

[The Guesser]

Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice Staffers Also Handled Emails Later Deemed Classified on Private Accounts, Officials Say

• By JUSTIN FISHEL

Feb 4, 2016, 4:19 PM ET

STEPHEN JAFFE/AFP/Getty Images​

WATCH A Whole Lot of Paper: Hillary Clinton’s 55,000 Pages of Emails

• 
  [*=center]5KSHARES
• Email​

The State Department is now saying that Hillary Clinton wasn't the only former Secretary of State or their staff to handle classified information on a private email account, a Congressman told ABC News.
Colin Powell and the immediate staff of Condoleezza Rice, both of whom served under President George W. Bush, also had information that was later deemed classified on non-State Department email accounts, according to a new memo from the State Department's Inspector General, described to ABC News by Rep. Elijah Cummings.
That memo, dated Feb. 3 and addressed to Under Secretary of State for Management, Patrick Kennedy, was shared with Cummings, the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform. ABC News has not seen the memo.
Cummings, who has long been critical of the many Republican-led investigations into Clinton's email use, says this is just further evidence they are out to derail her campaign for President.
“Based on this new revelation, it is clear that the Republican investigations are nothing more than a transparent political attempt to use taxpayer funds to target the Democratic candidate for President,” Cummings said in a statement.
Cummings also sent a letter to current Secretary of State John Kerry requesting, among other things, copies of the emails. His letter described the Inspector General's findings.
State Dept. Deems 22 Clinton Emails Top Secret, Refuses to Release Them
Clinton 'Surprised' by Staffer Using Private Email, New Docs Show
"According to the memo, on December 29, 2015, the Department advised the OIG [Office of Inspector General] that 12 of these emails contain classified national security information, two of which were sent to the personal email account of Secretary Powell and ten of which were sent to the personal email accounts of Secretary Rice's immediate staff," the letter from Cummings reads.
According to Cummings, the OIG memo says those emails were sent between February 2003 and June 2008 and that none of them were marked classified at the time they were sent.
In a statement to ABC News, a representative for Rice reiterated that the Secretary never used a private email account during her tenure and that the focus here was on her staff. The statement said the emails in question were sent to her assistant and covered diplomatic conversations, not intelligence information.
Powell strongly disputed the Inspector General's findings, explaining first that the messages originated with two U.S. ambassadors and were forwarded to him from his executive assistant.
"I have reviewed the messages and I do not see what makes them classified," Powell said in a statement to ABC News. "The Ambassadors did not believe the contents were Confidential at the time and they were sent as unclassified. That is a fact. While they have not yet clarified this point, the State Department cannot now say they were classified then because they weren’t. If the Department wishes to say a dozen years later they should have been classified that is an opinion of the Department that I do not share."
The State Department's Inspector General's office would not comment on the memo and the State Department's spokesman, John Kirby, would only acknowledge the Department is in receipt of the memo.
Last week the State Department said that upon recommendation from the Intelligence Community it would withhold from public release 22 of Secretary Clinton's private emails because they had been upgraded to "top secret," a reference to the highest level of classification.
Clinton's campaign has accused the intelligence community of conspiring with Republicans onCapitol Hill to misrepresent her emails in an effort to damage her presidential campaign.
Her campaign spokesman, John Podesta, issued a statement late today saying Clinton and Powell are in agreement that the government is unnecessarily classifying these documents.
"This announcement about Secretary Powell's emails shows just how routine it is for government bureaucrats to go overboard when it comes to judging whether information is too sensitive for the public to see,” Podesta said in a statement. “Hillary Clinton agrees with her predecessor that his emails, like hers, are being inappropriately subjected to over-classification. She joins his call for these emails to be released so that the public can view the contents for itself."

 

[Acebb]

You have to love the left now going to the "everybody does it" defense of Hillary.

Get back to us when you find Powell’s unauthorized, personal home-brew email server with its own domain.

1. Hillary didn't have any classified information.
2. Powell and Rice had classified information
3. "So you admit Hillary lied?"
4. DERP



These people are so fucking dumb it is comical.

 

[ScottL]

^^^Also, probably a lot more understood about how information gets compromised or hacked in 2010 than 2003. In 2003 the US had less knowledge about the level of security we needed. Likewise those likely to attempt to hack this info had less capabilities. What we do know full well is that Hillary had no clue about these threats when she should have been taking precautions.

 

[Dave007inVegas]

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s longstanding national lead over Sen. Bernie Sanders has just about entirely evaporated, according to a new poll by Quinnipiac University.


According to the poll, Clinton is supported by 44 percent of likely Democratic primary voters, while Sanders has the backing of 42 percent. Clinton’s small lead is inside the poll’s 4.5 percent margin of error and it’s the smallest she’s ever had in the entire race, based on polls recorded by Real Clear Politics.


Notably, the latest result wipes out a massive 31 point lead Clinton had the last time Quinnipiac polled the race in late December, suggesting her narrow and controversial victory in the Iowa caucuses could have tremendously sapped her momentum.

 

[SheriffJoe]

The Democrat Santa Claus base is definitely "feeling the Bern." Bad news for the Hildabeast not so much because the wide-eyed socialist is a threat to ruin her coronation (although you never know in this volatile political climate), but because his defeat will deflate the grassroots balloon and millions of disappointed real progressives will throw in the towel on 2016.

 

[Acebb]

Clinton blasts Wall Street, but still draws millions in contributions

Through the end of December, donors at hedge funds, banks, insurance companies and other financial services firms had given at least $21.4 million to support Clinton’s 2016 presidential run — more than 10 percent of the $157.8 million contributed to back her bid, according to an analysis of Federal Election Commission filings by The Washington Post.

The contributions helped Clinton reach a fundraising milestone: By the end of 2015, she had brought in more money from the financial sector during her four federal campaigns than her husband did during his quarter-century political career.

ointer:

 

[Dave007inVegas]

The Democrat Santa Claus base is definitely "feeling the Bern." Bad news for the Hildabeast not so much because the wide-eyed socialist is a threat to ruin her coronation (although you never know in this volatile political climate), but because his defeat will deflate the grassroots balloon and millions of disappointed real progressives will throw in the towel on 2016.

That just goes to show you how fucked up in the head the Democratic voters, the Granny and the entire party is when a 74 year old self proclaimed socialist is making this kind of impact.


Absolutely fucking amazing.

 

[superbeets]

[h=2]Double the Bern! Sanders confirms he WILL make an appearance on SNL alongside comedian Larry David[/h] Bernie Sanders (left), 74, might make a pit stop in New York for an appearance on SNL alongside comedian, Larry David (right), 68, who has been impersonating Sanders throughout his campaign. The appearance could be a boost for Sanders, who is expected to take the New Hampshire primary in a few days.

 

[superbeets]

[h=2]Now Bernie gets a nationwide boost in poll which shows him almost neck-and-neck with Hillary and able to beat Trump in a match-up [/h] Democrats are feeling the Bern so much that the Vermont senator is practically tied with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a new nationwide poll.

 

[superbeets]

[h=2]Spend! Spend! Spend! Hillary splashes out more on polling than every Republican combined - despite questions over its value[/h] In the financial quarter before that she spent even more - $1.9 million - suggesting she's preparing for a slugfest with Bernie Sanders. Republic