Clinton defence of personal email server fails to placate critics Hillary Clinton's admission that she was perhaps unwise to make exclusive use of a personal email account while serving as US Secretary of State has failed to placate critics, some of whom are trying to use the affair to derail her expected challenge for the White House next year. Clinton has issued a minimal mea-culpa stating …
What seems odd to me here, is the baseline assumption that everything a high official does in office should be a matter of public record.
The US Freedom of Information Act became law in 1966. Since then, who hasn't had at least one "scandal" that centres on "the top dogs trying, often clumsily, to keep their laundry private"?
- Nixon - 'nuff said
- Ford, Carter - actually these two were pretty clean, and much good it did them.
- Reagan, Bush - Iran/Contra
- Clinton - Whitewater, Lewinsky
- Bush - misrepresentations leading to the Iraq war. See also "Snowden, E."
- Obama - Snowden
The US hasn't had a decent president since 1960. If the purpose of the FoIA is to improve governance, it's clearly not only "not working", but actually counterproductive. Just repeal it already and give the executive branch their privacy back. (That is to say, let them work under the same rules that Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt and Eisenhower worked under.) We'll all be better off if we don't have to spend months at a time fixating on this kind of crap.
Go back... and re-check history. Just about every President had things to hide or things that today would get them on the front page of a scandal rag. 3 of 4 examples you gave had mistresses plus other scandals that came out after the fact.
A bigger question in all this... are any of us perfect? We always, always, always do the right thing? If you, me, or anyone else on this forum ran for a high office, could we stand the scrutiny of the press and the opposing party? Politics is dirty and corrupting. I'm not defending her, but just pointing out that so far, no one at the top of the various piles in the country have been what some would call a saint.
President Clinton did not lie to Congress under oath. He lied under oath to a grand jury investigating sexual harassment in the Clinton administration of Arkansas. Congress impeached him for perjury before a grand jury and obstruction of justice. If he HAD admitted his "sexual relations with that woman, Ms Lewinksy", then his Republican opponents wouldn't have had criminal grounds to impeach. Mr Clinton lied under oath about a blowjob. He was impeached for lying under oath, not the blowjob.
On a different topic, but related to secrets and perjury by high government officials, where is the indictment of James Clapper for perjury for his "least untruthful" answers to Congress while under oath?
You should re-read your timeline again. You say the last decent president was in 1960 (do you mean Ike, or JFK?) but FOIA became law in 1966. Maybe the reason you think the last decent president was in 1960 was because all his dirty laundry was never aired? If FOIA had become law in 1866 you might be saying the last good president was Lincoln :)
We can rule the 60s right out as among other things JFK had the Bay of Pigs and carried the lit torch for LBJ to stoke the fires of Vietnam. Likewise I'm sure the same can be done turning back every decade and President. The nice thing about FOIA is that it can be used to pull historical records as long as they haven't been sealed for "national security" reasons and there is likely plenty of dirt on all of them if anyone can be bothered to look but as they're all dead there isn't much point and slinging mud now just looks petty. Besides, a lot of the bigger cockups were hard if not impossible to conceal.
But it does feed the old "The Clintons will attempt any legal/verbal dodge" archetype. And it even has been used to vindicate Sarah Palin some, as a picture of her juggling 2 smartphones and her infant grandson has been circulated by Republican supporters in response to Hillary's bit about the difficulty of "using two devices"
(So yes, Hillary, it would have been more intelligent to have two accounts.)
Clinton added that she deleted all of her personal emails from her private account of the more than 60,000 emails in total that were sent and received. About half of them were personal emails, she said. Some of those emails pertained to her daughter Chelsea’s wedding, her mother’s funeral arrangements, and her yoga routine.
http://washington.cbslocal.com/2015/03/10/clinton-i-opted-for-convenience-only-having-private-email-account/
Hillary Clinton is defending her use of a private email address, hosted at ClintonEmail.com, to conduct official State Department business by claiming that her emails were captured by official @state.gov accounts that other agency employees were instructed to use to contact her. But according to a knowledgeable source, at least two other top Clinton aides also used private email accounts to conduct government business—placing their official communications outside the scope of federal record-keeping regulations.
http://gawker.com/source-top-clinton-aides-used-secret-email-accounts-at-1689246408
Yes, it was illegal. No, like her husband raping women and creating what would otherwise be deemed a "hostile work environment" by feminazis, I doubt we'll get a conviction.
You see the real reason for using Gmail was so that her communist bosses could send her orders disguised as spam. Of COURSE she won't remember to reveal her spam, no matter how many times the patriotic neo-GOP politicians investigate her! What a cover up!
Need proof? Why do you think the google is so spam friendly? Why is their anti-spam webform such a sick joke? Hillery's orders! She wants lots of spam to disguise her secret communications!
Most of the reporting on this revolves around the question of whether Ms. Clinton "possibly" violated the Federal Records Act. However, systems that store and process government records also are governed by the Federal Information Security Management Act, enacted in 2002, which establishes standards that these systems must satisfy. FISMA requires documentation of such things as
- System Security Plan
- Configuration Management Plan
- Contingency Plan covering various system failure possibilities
- Incident Response Plan covering potential breaches
- Rules of Behavior under which the system is operated
- Security Controls Assessment.
It is augmented by a number of NIST publications and additional regulations within each department or agency that specify the requirements in exhaustive detail. Obtaining FISMA certification and accreditation is a time consuming laborious process in most cases.
Nobody speaking for either the Department of State or Ms. Clinton has issued a statement that the system she and others used for official State Department email during her tenure as Secretary of State was certified for FISMA compliance and accredited by the responsible State Department officer. Given the ease of doing so if the system was approved, we may reasonably conclude that it was not.
On the other hand, Ms. Clinton was the top level department manager, responsible for ensuring that her department followed and enforced the applicable laws.
The facts as known might reasonably be taken to call into question her judgment and suitability for another public trust position under the United States, or for election to a public office.
Heard at least one report about the email system that was used and it was basically the same setup as her husband used while he was president. It was installed under orders from the state department.
It was not illegal to use private emails systems (virtually everyone was using the official network as little as possible) both democratic and Republican.
All the law required at that time was that all work related emails were logged onto the official system if they ware not using official channels. The law requiring everyone to only use official email system can't into effect 18 months after she left.
@Bill Cumming: "All the law required at that time was that all work related emails were logged onto the official system..."
So all that was required of her was to never forget to Bcc: clinton@foggybottom.gov on non-personal emails sent? Did I get it right? And a set of procmail rules (or other filters) to forward every non-personal mail received, of course. Separate accounts seem much easier to set up, frankly.
Government work, generally speaking, is and was required to be done using systems approved by the government for the purpose. That is why I and others who had to work remotely on occasion were issued government owned and configured laptops with provision for VPN connectivity to the agency. Ms. Clinton almost certainly would have been issued such a laptop, and probably of considerably higher spec than mine.
There were exceptions, but it was understood that they were to be rare. Toward 2010 and forward, live Linux images tailored for specific agencies were available that could run securely on private hardware and be certified for connection to DoD networks and mitigate the need to issue laptops. It was not possible to access the agency's Exchange server except from government issued computer or Blackberry. While this was in a DoD agency, none of the data was classified higher than Personally Identifiable Information and the standards for the Department of State should have been at least as strict.
Use of a private system, as against a private commercial email account, raises a large number of security and compliance issues completely aside from the Federal Records Act. Much more is required in this case than simply Bcc to a government department account.
FISMA does not supplant FRA, it supplements it. She still had to comply with both. Given
“Her top staffers used those Clinton email addresses” at the agency, said the source, who has worked with Clinton in the past. The source named two staffers in particular, Philippe Reines and Huma Abedin, who are said to have used private email addresses in the course of their agency duties. Reines served as deputy assistant secretary of state, and Abedin as Clinton’s deputy chief of staff. Both rank among Clinton’s most loyal confidantes, in and out of the State Department.
http://gawker.com/source-top-clinton-aides-used-secret-email-accounts-at-1689246408
there's a higher likelihood I will win both lotteries (Mega Millions and Lotto tickets) I bought this morning than that she didn't violate FRA.
Hillary Clinton's admission ...has failed to placate critics, some of whom are trying to use the affair to derail her expected challenge for the White House next year.
I see what you did there. She has actually stayed within the letter of the law on this and has admitted that even if it was legal, it was not a well-thought out plan. Not good, but better then most pols. The biggest legal issue in this is the preservation of the official record, so she is stuck in trying to prove a negative. This will probably not go away until after the next election cycle or if it comes out that most of her opponents have seriously misused e-mail as well.
There is only a remote possibility that Ms. Clinton was within the letter of the law. It was not only not well thought out, but an unbelievably dumb and self-centered thing to do.
On the other hand, she could go a fair distance toward defusing it by delivering the computer equipment that supported clintonemail.com and all backups (assuming there are some that haven't been degaussed) to the State Department without further delay. Rather than asking them, and us, to trust her judgment about what is government and what is personal, she should trust Secretary Kerry to ensure that the proper decisions are made.
Her defence seems to be that it was convenient to use a single device rather than separate devices for official and personal emails. Why separate accounts could not be used on a single device? Any particular security considerations would also apply to running official business through one's personal account, I imagine. Frankly, it sounds like a "get off my back already" bullshit response from an arrogant powerful politician.
Honestly I'm a little sympathetic with the idea that she might not have considered this, since understanding of this kind of thing can be a toss up outside tech fields. What I *am* wondering about though is why the hell nobody in her office told her not to pull this shit because it'll cause trouble down the line for her, and why there wasn't an official email already created for her which she was supposed to use.
I don't understand the downvotes; they seem fair questions, and one that the appropriate Senate and House oversight committees might well consider asking them in due course. The thing is, someone in State Department IT probably did tell her what the rules are, and her admin assistant probably provided her the computer access request form that would have resulted in creation of hilary.clinton@state.gov or similar. Those would be the SOP for any new employee, even the new head of department.
It does not matter much if she didn't pay attention, didn't submit the form, or simply went about establishing and using her private setup. It could well have gone unnoticed that the internal email account went unused unless it grew too large, whereupon her admin assistant would be told to ask for a larger quota. Those accustomed to receiving email from her would have grown accustomed to the unusual address and gone about their business. Security awareness is as unusual among executives, or more, than among the general run of non-IT employees.
The Secret Service (Department of Homeland Security) was responsible for securing and maintaining the server. She used her husband's (former President) e-mail server. She also asked if it was allowed and she was told that it was. Now maybe that's bad information, but it isn't like she was secretly using it or was blatantly disregarding what she was told.
Colin Powell did the same thing when he was Secretary of State. Nobody in D.C. knows what the hell they're doing, this is just another example of it.
At first I thought it was a huge deal, but the more I read about it the less worried I get. I still wish she hadn't used that private e-mail account, but the NSA probably has an archive of all those e-mails anyway.
"She also asked if it was allowed and she was told that it was. "
Funny. I live in a condo and its against the rules for anyone to rent their units for less than 6 months, they have to present a lease to the building management and perform a background check on the potential tenant. Which makes it against the rules to allow someone to post their unit up on AirBnB.
We had so far two residents that we caught doing this claimed that they were told that it was ok to do this.
The point is that its very easy to have selective hearing. Especially if you're a lawyer.
Lawyer Question: " Can I do X? "
Answer: " Yes, but only in extreme emergencies and you have to report it."
Lawyer: " Ok, so I can do it. "
5 years later... Lawyer: " But they said I *could* do it."
And actually it is a huge deal.
She's obstructed several investigations. Most importantly the ones in to the happenings around Benghazi.
From the Washington Post: "During Clinton’s term as secretary, regulations were tightened concerning the preservation of e-mail records, and concerns were raised about the use of personal e-mail accounts for official business. But the legal requirement to immediately preserve e-mails from nongovernment e-mail accounts was not made mandatory until nearly two years after she stepped down."
You may have concerns about Clinton's judgement or intent, but for those who are hyperventilating that OMG NOTHING IS ILLEGAL FOR HIGH GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS: what she did was not actually illegal. Clueless, maybe, but not illegal.
The OFFICIAL link below was from a Whitehouse blogger in 2009 and covers this scandal like no other.
The Presidential Records Act was instituted in 1978 and it's now 2015.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/Reality-Check-The-Presidential-Records-Act
It covered all electronic communications. Most assume that includes email. Avoidance of these rules was illegal.
This link below is regarding the actual rules and regulation as well as others.
http://www.archives.gov/records-mgmt/email-mgmt.html
These newer rules specifically mention Email now.
The FRA covered it back in 1950 and still applies.
Every time there's a new scandal, instead of punishing the guilty parties under existing law, they get excused and Congress passes a new law (1978 would be fall out from Nixon) which fixes nothing.
What "critics" are those, now? The same folks who sent a felonious, and quite possibly treasonous, letter the Grand Ayatollah Whatzisface of Iran stating, in effect: Don't pay any attention to the President, 'cus he's blaaack, and you can't trust him? Those critics??? Those racist, sexist, homophobic, plutocratic brain-dead, disrespectful, and oh yes, completely ignorant of the Constitution they are so willing to wave in your face just like Mao's sycophants used to do with his li'l red book?
Hillary should take it as a badge of honor that their undies are in a wad.
(By the way, the correct response to all this manufactured indignation is: Secretary of State Colin Powell. It is left as an exercise to the reader as to why that is.)
And the correct response to you is TROLL.
Hilary was out there soliciting bribes, sorry, contributions to "The Clinton Foundation" from foreign governments while secretary of state, and we have no records of anything that she said while soliciting those, but gosh, I'm sure we can take your word that she did nothing illegal and only deleted "personal" emails.
Plainly put, she's unfit to be president, and about the only reason people put forward that she is suited is because "lady parts".
And the letter, try Nancy Pelosi visiting Syria, Obama assuring the mullahs that once he was president he's be easier to deal with, democratic senators going to visit Saddam Hussein....fair bit of deliberate treason there one could say. But an open letter, setting out the constitutional position that treaties have to be ratified to be binding, nope, not even close.
"...try Nancy Pelosi visiting Syria, Obama assuring the mullahs that once he was president he's be easier to deal with, democratic senators going to visit Saddam Hussein....fair bit of deliberate treason there one could say."
Nice try, but horsehockey, nonetheless.
And the letter, try Nancy Pelosi visiting Syria, Obama assuring the mullahs that once he was president he's be easier to deal with, democratic senators going to visit Saddam Hussein....fair bit of deliberate treason there one could say.
You know, you can have your own opinion, but you cannot have your own facts. Since you insist on living in a world devoid of the latter, let me help you. Nancy Pelosi's trip to Iraq was:
1) authorized by the President (a feller named Bush)
2) Was a bipartizan trip (excuse me, I shouldn't use such big words..you will not understand them. This was a trip that had both Democratic and Republican members of Congress on it.)
Now that you've been exposed to something other than the blather, tripe, and outright lies spewed by Rush, Bill-o, and Fox Noise, I'll stand back and wait for your head to explode.
jeezus, I've been in IT for 25 years and I don't think I've sent that many emails, period. Irrespective of politics (both parties are a bunch of fking criminals), as a state department employee, don't you think someone would at least question an email coming from hillary21@clinton.com? Seriously? As much security (lol) that the state department has implemented, you can't tell me they didn't know she had her own mail server.
Just about every government agency (fed, state, county & local) has a very strict policy that expressly forbids the use of personal email for official business. She may have been the secretary of state, but she clearly broke the law.
This is all very interesting if you have a vote in the 2016 election. But what analogous horrors are unfolding in secret in the boardroom of 2015?
Occasionally I see a presentation by a member of senior management who drops out of full-screen. I have never seen this happen without glimpsing evidence of an infosec risk of some kind. A personal mail tab open in Firefox is the least alarming; they aren't using Dropbox, Evernote and Skype just for personal stuff. They will typically have a raft of other unknown crapware running, with telltale icons, and presumably some without. This goes for Mac and Windows users. Their hard disks are encrypted, but they'll often be running a presentation off a random FAT drive.
All of these people would advance exactly the Hillary argument in their defence, if they even knew there was an issue.
Nobody's doing anything about it; this battle has been lost. However let's remind ourselves where the war is:
Your least sophisticated users (execs) have access to the most valuable information and are the most publicly visible.
People who aren't publicly known now publish a spearphishing kit on social media.
The security of modern business comms depends ostensibly on SSL alone as traffic migrates to http. The eventual compromise of SLL will have interesting implications. But no scheme will help you if you're just encrypting malicious traffic.
If you're worried about deliberate sharing, Dropboxes can be shared. That evidence can be discovered, at some cost, because the parties can be made to divulge it.
If everyone's using Dropbox, from the boardroom on down, a compromised client can simply siphon data to a Dropboxalike and the traffic looks benign. There is no evidence to discover because the traffic was encrypted and the parties unknown.
Assume this has already happened. Still worried about email?
This stupid woman clearly doesn't even understand basic concepts like email security or even the need for it over her own convenience..... Its VERY scary that she wants to be the president, a person that will regularly handle the most classified material and have significant input into complex issues like net neutrality. She has clearly demonstrated serious failure to grasp basic issues even in her current role.
In all honesty, there are others far more lacking in intelligence that are running for any state and federal office.
Politicians that think the world is less than 6,000 years old, think evolution isn't valid, think the U.S. is founded on christianity (in spite of the fact that the Constitution violates quite a few commandments) or want to establish christianity as the defacto religion of the U.S., think that environmental laws hurt our country, think that labor laws hurt our country, think that businesses will reward hard work (OMG... that one is funny), think that corporations should have more rights than people, think that religion should have the right to interfere with the rights of others, think that school text books should only show a conservative view of America (the David Barton made-up variety)...
Hillary did something stupid, but she's far more intelligent than Bush v2.
"Judicial Watch"
LOL! Completely irrelevant corporate folly. Just like "Citizens United". Bullshit.
Put down the puppets and step away from our civilization.
*****
I can't believe anyone hasn't yet suggested that she was letting people "hack" her systems just so NSA could follow the trail of those who would be so arrogant to believe they could do so without being *watched. Do I sense naivety?
*****
veti - We've been here before. Don't put Snowden under Obama just because it happened to be revealed during his time. Those *revelations are about way before him.
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