History, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Hillary’s Press Conference

53 Comments

Asche Schow has eighteen questions.

They all seem pretty reasonable to me, assuming that she’s a presidential candidate.

Ron Fournier, on the other hand, only three questions (like the three rules of real estate, though with some others): “What are you hiding? What are you hiding? What are you hiding?”

Maybe, after all these decades of criminality and corruption, the media is finally turning on her.

[Update a few minutes later]

Voters have Hillary concerns.

As well they should.

[Update a couple minutes later]

The press conference threatens to be a media fiasco.

That’s probably the intent.

[Update after the big event]

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s a pretty good live blog of the trainwreck.

53 thoughts on “Hillary’s Press Conference”

  1. As I have said before, I am not in support of this particular attack. In my humble techno-libertarian opinion, every human being should have their own email server, on their own property, with strong encryption on all text.

    Information should only be available to the State upon presentation of a proper 4th amendment warrant, a piece of paper, physically signed by a judge and naming the specific items to be handed over to the local police.

    Baby. Bathwater.

    I stand for Liberty, even for people I don’t particularly care for.

    1. In my humble techno-libertarian opinion, every human being should have their own email server, on their own property, with strong encryption on all text.

      The issue is not that she had her own email server. The issue is that she used it for government business, with inadequate security and no accountability.

      1. That offense — using private email for government business, with inadequate security and no accountability — is one that other prominent government employees (including Colin Powell, Karl Rove, Jeb Bush and Scott Walker) have been guilty of, without major repercussions.

        1. Did they do it on their own private server, that only they controlled? Did they have classified information in the email traffic? Was their email under subpoena?

          You are pathetic.

          1. Why is it a big deal that the server was private? In some ways that’s better from security standpoint, in other respects it’s worse. Powell or even Rove’s email were as likely to contain classified information as Clinton’s. I don’t recall that anyone ever subpoena’d Clinton’s email account.

            You are pathetic.

            This sort of ad-hominem comment doesn’t improve your argument.

          3. “In some ways that’s better from security standpoint, in other respects it’s worse.”

            How the blazes do YOU know what security was on that server? How can you POSSIBLY say it was better or worse?

            You haven’t the faintest idea do you? No you don’t. And yet you talk as if you know something. Why do you insist upon making definitive pronouncements about things you have absolutely zero knowledge of?

            “This sort of ad-hominem comment doesn’t improve your argument.”

            Rand’s argument cannot be improved and the statement is correct (see above).

          4. As Gregg points out, in what ways does Hillary having her own server add security to US State Department emails? You make the claim, but provide nothing to support it, which in fact makes you pathetic.

          5. How the blazes do YOU know what security was on that server? How can you POSSIBLY say it was better or worse?

            I didn’t. I only observed that in general, having your own email server has some security advantages (e.g. no access by service provider employees) and some security disadvantages (e.g. typically less attentive system administration) vis-a-vis using a commercial provider.

          6. “I didn’t. I only observed that in general, having your own email server has some security advantages (e.g. no access by service provider employees) and some security disadvantages (e.g. typically less attentive system administration) vis-a-vis using a commercial provider.”

            As you do not know what security was on the server you cannot say anything about whether the security is betteer or worse than a government run and located server.

            You have ZERO idea who were the system managers and therefore had access tot he system.

            You know NOTHIGN about it, get it? nothing.

            Nice try at a weasel but that was….well….pathetic.

        3. …to add to Rand’s questions:

          Did they see to it that the agency had copies of everything they sent via a CC to their agency address or by printing it out and handing them over?

          We know she did not.

          1. Jeb Bush handed over the emails that he (or his staff) deemed government-related, just as Clinton did. Powell says that he didn’t turn over his emails, and that he doesn’t have them any more.

        4. Forgive me for being ignorant, but I thought that we still lived in a country where states had jurisdiction over their own laws. I know you want all states to be mere administrative districts to the grand, central state to which we all bow and fellate, but until that happens, Wisconsin and Florida can decide how their governor communicates.

          Colin Powell was Secretary over 12 years ago. I find it silly that you bring him up now. And, he didn’t have his own server.

          Thus making your argument a flat out lie, which is your standard procedure.

          As far as Rove goes, he sucks.

          1. Jon,

            I don’t know what Jim is referring, since as usual, he makes bold claims with little to no evidence or citations. In regards to Rove, Jim once claimed that Rove destroyed government emails and cited a Clinton funded non-profit that whined that Rove was sending RNC emails from within the White House. That is not the same as sending official emails on private servers. The issue was that they were using government property such as office space, government computers, electricity, to do non-official government business for the RNC. Why this may be improper and unethical (it was determined to be lawful), the issue is very different from Clinton’s.

            Clinton wasn’t just using her private server to manage her foundation. She was using it for convenience (her words at the press conference) to conduct official business, because she didn’t want to deal with multiple email devices (never mind that many devices can handle multiple accounts). This is the opposite of Rove. He used government property to conduct private business (that would be enough to terminate employment for government contractors) and she was using personal property to conduct government business (unlawful according to government archival laws).

            I note again that Jim didn’t mention Palin, who was sanctioned for using a private yahoo mail account. Palin claims, as did Rove, to use the account to conduct private and campaign work (as required by law), but others claimed she conducted official business on it, because she mentioned her title as governor and sent and received emails on her government provided computer at her government provided office. Mother Jones has a lengthy article in 2011 bitching about having to pay the state of Alaska for obtaining Sarah Palin’s private yahoo email via a FOIA request, which when you think about it is absurd to think Mother Jones or the State of Alaska had any right to Palin’s private email, beyond what might be residual on her government computer.

            Alas, this is the complaint of others talking about babies and privacy. We have no right to Clinton’s personal email. To that, I would agree. The problem is, Clinton had a responsibility to archive her work and communication as Secretary of State, and for convenience, she choose not to do this using the tools the government provided her to use. That alone is a waste of taxpayer dollars. Add in the additional cost of the secret service protecting the private server (a claim she made), the cost of providing her Internet access and tools to her private her email address (the complaint against Rove), the possibility that she conducted official business using the private email (something she admitted to and Sarah Palin was punished for doing), and then the potential for sending classified information over an unsecured system (a speculation made by many considering her official role and access to classified material); I think you have a major scandal that doesn’t go away because others may have done it. Murderers don’t get a reprieve simply because others have committed murder.

            Finally, there is the issue that she was supposed to have sent all communications regarding the Benghazi attacks to Congress, and now it seems she made no written communications at all about an attack that cost the lives of an Ambassasor and 3 Americans employed by her State Department. Can you imagine a CEO of a company having nothing to say in writing about the deaths of a critical employee and contractors? Not even a letter of condolence to the family?

            She’s lying.

          2. states had jurisdiction over their own laws

            Clinton isn’t charged with breaking federal laws, she’s accused of putting the public in the position of having to trust her about which emails she’s made available and which she hasn’t. Colin Powell and Jeb Bush did the same thing.

            Colin Powell was Secretary over 12 years ago.

            There was only 4 years between Powell’s use of private email as Secretary of State and Clinton’s.

            And, he didn’t have his own server.

            No, he used a server administered by people he had no relationship with, other than as a customer. There was nothing to prevent the system administrators of that server from reading his email traffic. What Clinton did was different, but not clearly worse.

          3. Clinton isn’t charged with breaking federal laws, she’s accused of putting the public in the position of having to trust her about which emails she’s made available and which she hasn’t.

            She has repeatedly demonstrated herself to be untrustworthy in such things, over decades. e.g., Rose billing records.

          5. Colin Powell used a .gov email.

            No, he’s stated that he used a private address for public business, just like Clinton.

            Colin Powell can explain how he complied with government archival laws.

            No, he can’t — unlike Clinton he didn’t even hand over the emails from his private account for archiving. He just assumed that they were archived by their recipients (many, but not all, of whom had .gov addresses). There’s no way you’d let Clinton get away with that excuse.

        5. I think you have a major scandal that doesn’t go away because others may have done it.

          You still have to justify why this is a major scandal, when Colin Powell’s private email use as Secretary of State wasn’t any sort of scandal at all. If this is a “major scandal” it’s because Clinton has political enemies who want it to be a major scandal, not because of the specifics of her actions.

          2. Nope, Colin Powell didn’t do what Hillary did. Hillary stated she didn’t want to use a .gov email for convenience. Colin Powell used a .gov email. Colin Powell can explain how he complied with government archival laws. Hillary cannot, other than after she was caught pretending that she somehow now has complied with the law now that she no longer is SecState. That’s the scandal that you pretend doesn’t exist by claiming she has [not yet] been charged with a violation of the law.

            There was a time when George Zimmermann wasn’t charged with a crime either, and Jim came here to argue it was a scandal.

          3. I see Jim, besides being an idiot on email, also doesn’t know how to comment on blogs. Alas, he didn’t read my comment properly, though for once he provided a source. I’m waiting for the sources that shows Clinton used a .gov email address, that she admitted she didn’t use.

          4. I should also note, that I would be happy to see Colin Powell go to jail if he did commit a crime. Go ahead and investigate if he sent classified information on his private email. AP is welcome to sue State for his emails too. That it wasn’t a scandal before is no more an excuse than Obama getting a pass for the disastrous rollout of Healthcare.gov

  2. All intended to bring in Fauxcohontas? That’s my major fear.

    This is definitely an Obama scandal. He must have received emails from her server.

    2. It may not be to usher forth the age of Lieawathia at all. It could be battlespace preparation for Michelle Obama.

  3. Maybe he’s already checked in and I missed it (have been busy with a lot of other things lately); but I’m wondering if Baghdad Jim will be rushing in with knee-jerk, party-line talking points in defense of Hillary, or if he only puts his Obamabot Baghdad-Jimness for Dear Leader and his minions..

    1. Well, it is a good thing he waited because if he came out right away parroting Obama that he never learned of this until it broke in the media, he would be eating crow the next day when Obama’s spokesperson came out and said Obama lied and knew about her email the whole time.

      Unfortunately for Jim, this exact same scenario happens very frequently.

    2. Clinton’s behavior is about what I would expect from her. I don’t doubt that a Hillary Clinton administration would be less transparent than Obama’s has been, and Clinton’s preference for secrecy was one of the reasons I supported Obama in 2007 and 2008.

      I think this story would hurt her with the Democratic primary electorate if she had a popular opponent, but she doesn’t. I don’t know whether it will make a difference in the general election; it isn’t as if it really tells us something new about her, and I’d be surprised if the GOP nominee makes transparency or good government a major focus of his campaign.

      1. You admit Obama lied on transparency. There’s hope for you yet.

        But you’ll still always vote the party line, because that’s what lefties do.

    3. It’s the day after I posted the above, and I’d say Baghdad Jim has answered my question. His Baghdad Jimness is obviously not exclusively in the service of Dear Leader, but selflessly offered to whoever the “liberal” Hive’s standard-bearer is, or will be.

  4. It’s 2 AM. Does the occupant of the White House remember where she left “the second e-mail device”?

  5. “I have multiple email accounts, I don’t want to carry multiple devices. I can’t figure out you can have multiple accounts on one device but I am qualified to be your next President! Vote for me!”

    Hillary

    1. White House speechwriter Jon Favreau claims that he and his colleagues couldn’t access both government and private email from the same device until 2011 or so, due to the way government email was set up. Clinton’s claim about the options she had in 2009 isn’t as ridiculous as it sounds today.

      That said, I don’t really care whether Hillary Clinton or any other Presidential candidate is capable of configuring a BlackBerry or iPhone for multiple email accounts. Bill Clinton supposedly has only sent two email messages in his life, but I think it’d be hard to argue that he would have been a better president if only he’d had more technical savvy.

      1. “That said, I don’t really care whether Hillary Clinton or any other Presidential candidate is capable of configuring a BlackBerry or iPhone for multiple email accounts. ”

        Nice strawman – Neither do we.

        What we care about is that she lied about it.

        1. Not a straw man. See “I can’t figure out you can have multiple accounts on one device but I am qualified to be your next President!” by M Puckett, above.

          1. Total straw man. You take a tongue in cheeck statement (snarky to be sure) and use it to create a straw man which you then put a match to.

            Pathetic is the word for that.

    2. That was my first thought as well. Multiple email accounts on the same device? Impossible.

      Hell, she could use different client software for each account so she doesn’t accidentally use the wrong account. (Which happens on Apple Mail.)

      1. “That was my first thought as well. Multiple email accounts on the same device? Impossible.

        Hell, she could use different client software for each account so she doesn’t accidentally use the wrong account. (Which happens on Apple Mail.)”

        You may or may not be surprised at how archaic and ludicrous some policies are when it comes to personal devices accessing corporate (or governmental) e-mail servers.

        From the private arena, many law firms require their associates to have a separate device not only for billing purposes but also because their IT departments can’t figure out how to configure their e-mail servers to use non-Blackberry/RiM devices (I wish I was kidding). Or, their IT departments are (rightfully so) worried about the chance of infection and/or document theft that violates client confidentiality.

        I’ve also seen government policies that require the end user/employee to provide root access to their personal device, provide a password to access the device, and/or otherwise have the user sign a waiver stating that the IT department has the right to not only quarantine the device if it gets infected, but also has the right to remotely (or locally) wipe the device to factory settings if it ever “goes rogue”.

        In the latter situation, as a former IT worker, I can’t see subjecting my personal device to the whims of IT employees. In the former, there is little or no choice short of hiring competent IT workers or reconfiguring the server or security (neither of which are things that smaller law firms have traditionally understood very well).

        Subtract 7 years of technological progress from today’s current situation (the iPhone had only been out for 18 months by the time she became SoS, didn’t even have 3G connection until 6 months before her confirmation, and RiM was still the major player in corporate phone/e-mail connectivity), and it doesn’t seem THAT far-fetched that she would have needed two separate devices, either from a policy or technological standpoint.

        I’m not saying this to excuse or agree with HRC’s actions, or to agree with her supporters, I’m just saying that it’s not a stretch to believe that our beloved Federal Government was clueless and/or reluctant to allow personal/public device sharing for their employees back in 2009 (which, let’s face it, may as well be the Dark Ages in technology as far as some are concerned).

  6. Don’t go too hard on Hillary about the emails. You want her to be the 2016 Dem nominee. You don’t want her to be replaced by Jim Webb or Joseph O’Malley.

  7. Clinton isn’t charged with breaking federal laws, she’s accused of putting the public in the position of having to trust her about which emails she’s made available and which she hasn’t. Colin Powell and Jeb Bush did the same thing.

    You simply cannot understand that there are different procedures and rules within our government. Quit trying to conflate the two. The Federal Records Act requires all Federal officials to keep records. Not state employees. Emails are federal records.

    1. Florida has sunshine laws that require its governors to release emails about government business. If you think that Clinton broke federal law by using a private email account and deciding for herself which emails to release, you have to also conclude that Bush broke Florida law by doing the same thing.

      Nobody thinks that either Clinton or Bush is going to be prosecuted. This is about voter perceptions of the candidates, which makes Bush’s actions just as relevant as Clinton’s.

      1. If you think that Clinton broke federal law by using a private email account and deciding for herself which emails to release, you have to also conclude that Bush broke Florida law by doing the same thing.

        That’s just one law she may have broke, and I think that is more a civil offense. Since Jim seems to big on scandal, perhaps he should consider the very recent Petraeus scandal where he mishandled classified material. Now perhaps the DoJ gave him a very nice plea bargain deal, so that assholes like Jim can go around saying “Petraeus got off with a wrist slap, why shouldn’t Clinton”, while the rest of us know that Petraeus got off way too easy and that men, who had far less important information and more accidentally exposed, it were sent to rot in jail.

        Maybe Colin Powell sent classified email with his private account as well, and if so, he should at least get as much as Petraeus and really both should spend time behind bars. But at least there’s a bit more assurance that Powell used a .gov account and probably for properly handling classified information. Clinton doesn’t have that argument going by her own words. We are just supposed to trust her that she hid information from the American people, but didnt go so far as to break criminal statutes while she wasted taxpayer dollars.

        The scandal is she can’t be trusted by word alone. Her words need to be tested. She doesn’t get a pass because she and Obama let others get a pass. They were wrong to do that as well. If others get in trouble for mishandling the data, then I have no problem with it. I don’t know what classified material Jeb may have had as governor, but if he sent it via a private email, go after him too. He should know better from his father and brother.

        What I find interesting is Jim’s “they did it too argument” given to a bunch of people who already believe they federal government is too large and needs to be limited and less powerful. If it wasn’t a big deal, why regulate it at all? Get rid of the regulations then and fire the unnecessary regulators.

        1. Leland,

          When they resort to the “other people did it too” ploy, they are trying to show hypocrisy in YOUR part. It’s an attack against you, and nor your argument.

          It is in no way, a defense of Hillary.

          Jim has no argument. So he attempts to side track us with straw men and silly 4th grade whines.

  8. “If you think that Clinton broke federal law by using a private email account and deciding for herself which emails to release, you have to also conclude that Bush broke Florida law by doing the same thing.”

    Go after Bush then. Present your evidence.

    What? you don’t have any evidence? Well then you are just like Harry Reid saying, in the well of the Senate that he “heard” Romney didn’t pay his taxes.

    Hillary is a known liar (e.g. The Lioness of Tuzla), and she lied during her recent press conference.

    Go dig up some evidence and then scream for prosecition of Bush.

    That matters zippo when it comes to defending Hillary.

  9. Oh dear:

    ” “Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, like all departing federal employees, was required to fill out and sign a separation statement affirming that she had turned over all classified and other government documents, including all emails dealing with official business. Fox News Megyn Kelly reported Wednesday evening on the requirement and that a spokesman for Clinton had not responded to a request for comment, including an explanation of when the former chief U.S. diplomat signed the mandatory separation agreement or, if she didn’t, why didn’t she. . . . Kelly also reported that State Department regulations in place when Clinton resigned as secretary required all departing employees to return all official documents, including emails, to ensure that the department would be able to respond to Freedom of Information Act and congressional requests, as well as subpoenas in litigation. Failure to do so carries with it both fines and possible jail time.””

    H/T Instaundit

    The other fact of all of this is that every government employee signs a statement saying they understand and agree that they have ZERO expectation of privacy should they use their work email for personal communication.

    1. “The other fact of all of this is that every government employee signs a statement saying they understand and agree that they have ZERO expectation of privacy should they use their work email for personal communication.”

      This, coupled with a policy stating that the government has the right to full access to any device on which your work e-mail resides, is a perfectly legitimate reason to carry two devices instead of co-mingling personal and work accounts on one device. And that makes the “I didn’t want to carry two devices” complaint perfectly valid against the “you can set up multiple e-mail accounts on one device, genius” arguments, especially back in 2009.

      Of course, it doesn’t excuse NOT carrying two devices, but the repeated complaints that “she’s too stupid to set up more than one e-mail account on a phone” are self-revealing, on some levels. She may, in fact, be too stupid to do that, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t legitimate reasons for wanting to keep separate devices, either.

      IMHO, YMMV, etc.

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