It could very easily been a response to various hypothetical questions
exactly. I think it proves how desperate that certain Demo[n][c,R]ats like Booker and Kamala are. Consider also how certain Demo[n][c,R]ats literally invited disruptive protesters to the hearings (it's the only way they could have gotten in; and 50 or so arrests were made as I recall)
Now they apparently have in their hands a "gotcha" e-mail [that isn't, but they're claiming it is], because they want to do what an aggressive prosecutor would do to someone using a "process crime" sting, i.e. trap someone into "lying" under oath ('I did not do this', followed by the paper copy 'evidence' and the subsequent 'process crime' arrest) in order to coerce a guilty plea to some low-level process crime, and THEN get that person to 'sing' or 'compose' against someone else, etc. to stay out of prison [what they sometimes do to members of organized crime syndicates, for example].
In any case, reading the El Reg article is the first I've heard of it. I think if it were a big deal, a big deal would've been made of this by now. [it's still interesting info, but not compelling]
Apparently the e-mail is real. That deserves an explanation [not fingers pointing and accusations]. However, I can't remember what I e-mailed last year, let alone 2001, and we don't even know what the context is! And without the context, you really don't have a "lie" if, as in the title, it was a response to various hypothetical questions.
icon, because, facepalm all of this. Booker and Kamala are way out in 'cloud cuckooland' as far as I'm concerned. Anything they say or do is tainted, by definition.