Smoking Gun Email Found: Hillary Instructed Aide to Strip Markings Before Sending Classified Data

Last August, when it became known that emails from the intelligence community were somehow making it onto her personal server, more than a few of us wondered, Did Someone in Hillary’s Inner Circle Strip Classified Markings From Her Emails?

That question has been answered thanks to the belated State Department document dump that was executed in the middle of the night.

Among this latest tranche of Hillary’s emails, Fox News picked up on a significant exchange that is –let’s just say — highly problematic.

The latest batch of emails released from Hillary Clinton’s personal account from her tenure as secretary of state includes 66 messages deemed classified at some level, the State Department said early Friday. In one email, Clinton even seemed to coach a top adviser on how to send secure information outside secure channels. Clinton, the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, has repeatedly maintained that she did not send or receive classified material on her personal account. The State Department claims none of the emails now marked classified were labled as such at the time they were sent. However, one email thread from June 2011 appears to include Clinton telling her top adviser Jake Sullivan to send secure information through insecure means. In response to Clinton’s request for a set of since-redacted talking points, Sullivan writes, “They say they’ve had issues sending secure fax. They’re working on it.” Clinton responds “If they can’t, turn into nonpaper [with] no identifying heading and send nonsecure.” Ironically, an email thread from four months earlier shows Clinton saying she was “surprised” that a diplomatic officer named John Godfrey used a personal email account to send a memo on Libya policy after the fall of Muammar Qaddafi.

Hillary, of course, as Secretary of State, had been  explicitly instructed by the State Department on the correct procedures for disseminating secure information.

As Guy Benson notes at Townhall, “State sanctioned at least one top diplomat for disregarding those rules.”

 Mrs. Clinton may have been especially “surprised” at Godfrey’s actions because they came after she’d been issued a dire warning that foreign entities were aggressively targeting State Department officials’ personal, unsecure email accounts. But lest you need reminding, Hillary Clinton exclusively used such accounts to conduct all of her official business — via an improper, unsecure, private server — before and after this urgent red flag was brought to her attention.

(2) “Clinton…has repeatedly maintained that she did not send or receive classified material on her personal account.”  This assertion has been disproven by the more than 1,000 classified emails discovered on her private server, including 66 additions from this batch alone.  Her myriad excuses for this have been debunked piece by piece.

(3) Her final justification — which is legally irrelevant, as Hillary herself has personally attested — is that none of the sensitive material that she wrongfully transmitted through her unsecure server was “marked classified” at the time.  Again, this is meaningless, especially when it comes to highly secret material that she was obligated to recognize and protect as soon as it was produced.  But the email chain referenced above includes an instruction from Hillary Clinton to a State Department aide (who now works on her campaign) to strip classified information — it remains redacted to this day — of its classified markings [“identifying heading”] and “send nonsecure.”

 Only one such email was found, but note her “matter-of-fact” attitude. This has all the appearance of standard operating procedure for her.

Hillary is so busted.

The only questions now are whether Comey’s recommendation to indict will be heeded by Loretta Lynch, and whether she will continue running even if indicted. There are different opinions on that.

 

 

 

 

Advertisement

Deal or No Deal?: Iranian Supreme Leader Says No Deal With “Devilish” US

Although the White House has been touting a nuclear framework “deal” with Iran, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the other sides of the talks – the Iranians and the Europeans — do not share their enthusiasm. 

Yesterday, an Iranian Defense Minister accused the Obama administration of lying because key elements in the White House Fact sheet were not agreed upon.

Iran’s Defense Minister Brigadier General Hossein Dehqan categorically rejected as a “lie” a Guardian report alleging that Tehran has granted access to its military facilities under the recent framework agreement with the world powers.

“No such agreement has been made; principally speaking, visit to military centers is among our redlines and no such visit will be accepted,” Gen. Dehqan stressed on Wednesday, rejecting “the report by foreign media outlets, such as the Guardian” as “untruthful allegations”…

Today, Iranian “Supreme Leader” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said he neither backed nor rejected the deal, but “demanded all sanctions be lifted immediately once a final agreement was concluded.”

He added in a televised speech that the details of the accord would be decisive, and the publication of a US fact sheet showing terms that were at variance with the Iranian view of the agreement showed “devilish” US intentions…

“The White House put out a statement just a few hours after our negotiators finished their talks…this statement, which they called a ‘fact sheet’, was wrong on most of the issues.”

The official explanation does little to quell suspicions that the White House is deliberately misrepresenting what Iran promised in order to make the deal more palatable to Americans. In fact, it seems to confirm those suspicions.

American officials acknowledge that they did not inform the Iranians in advance of all the “parameters” the United States would make public in an effort to lock in progress made so far, as well as to strengthen the White House’s case against any move by members of Congress to impose more sanctions against Iran.

“We talked to them and told them that we would have to say some things,” said a senior administration official who could not be identified under the protocol for briefing reporters. “We didn’t show them the paper. We didn’t show them the whole list.”

The official acknowledged that it was “understood that we had different narratives, but we wouldn’t contradict each other.”

Well, it turns out that the Obama Regime’s “narrative” was so outside the perimeters of what was agreed upon, the Iranians couldn’t play along. And “Iran’s Supreme Leader”, Ayatollah Khamenei doesn’t appreciate being Grubered by these American shysters.

And via Legal Insurrection,  Khamenei, took to Twitter to call the Obama administration a bunch of untrustworthy liars.”

Hours after the #talks, Americans offered a fact sheet that most of it was contrary to what was agreed.They always deceive &breach promises.

— Khamenei.ir (@khamenei_ir) April 9, 2015

So once again – we’re confronted with the spectacle of an Alinsky-trained, ends justify the means, Community Organizing president engaging in what we have taken to calling “Gruberism” –  that is – lying one’s ass off to further an agenda. Only this time it’s on an international stage – for everyone in the world to see.

And Americans are forced into the awkward position of having to agree with the mad Mullahs – “Yeah, the devilish Obama administration is lying again. You really can’t trust them.”

Somebody wake me up when this nightmare is over.

TSG: So When Does Lying FBI Informant Al Sharpton Get His Unpaid Suspension?

Now that Lyin’ Brian Williams has been thrown under the bus by NBC News for lying to its viewers, the Smoking Gun is asking why the lying “Rev. Al” is still clinging to the bumper.

Now that the media conglomerate has delineated that bright line, when does the Rev. Al Sharpton’s suspension without pay begin?

In the wake of last year’s lengthy TSG report about Sharpton’s secret work as a paid FBI Mafia informant, the MSNBC host sought to blunt the story’s disclosures with a series of lies told at a pair of press conferences, on his nightly “Politics Nation” program, and in a report on Williams’s own NBC Nightly News (which was rebroadcast on NBC’s Today show).

Sharpton, 60, cast himself as a victim who first ran into the FBI’s warm embrace when a scary gangster purportedly threatened his life. He was “an American citizen with every right to call law enforcement” for protection, Sharpton told his MSNBC audience. His sole motivation was to “try to protect myself and others.”

He needed the FBI’s help, Sharpton claimed, because his relentless advocacy on behalf of African-American concert promoters had angered wiseguys with hooks in the music business. “I did the right thing working with the authorities,” Sharpton assured viewers. As for being branded an informant, that was a label for others to worry about. “I didn’t consider myself, quote, an informant. Wasn’t told I was that,” said Sharpton.

These claims, broadcast by NBC Universal, were demonstrably false.

Read on here for the whole sordid story.

Meanwhile, Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren has been wondering why tax cheat Sharpton gets a free pass from the IRS.

Why should Reverend Al Sharpton getting a pass from the IRS and the White House? (and the NYC Mayor!)

1. Why hasn’t the IRS garnished Reverend Al Sharpton’s MS/NBC pay for all his back taxes? Reports are that he owes more than 4 million dollars in back state and federal taxes.

2. And why does the Obama Administration continue to invite him to the White House for his advice while he has outstanding this reported (New York Times) tax debt? Why not make him pay up, and then invite him?

I have read article after article that Reverend Al Sharpton owes lots and lots of back taxes — that means he owes you. And, to the extent he is not paying his taxes, you are picking up the tab.

The IRS and state revenue divisions need to be garnishing his wages (like it does to others who owe taxes.) Reverend Sharpton gets paid a hefty salary at MS/NBC and the IRS and state revenue divisions can find MS/NBC…it is just not that hard. (Try googling its address!)

And until he gets current in his debt to the taxpayer, he should not have “most favored nation” status with President Obama and the White House.

There is just a tiny conflict of interest, there. It’s nice that there are at least SOME members of the media willing to point these things out.

Obama On Lower Gas Prices: “You’re Welcome” (Video)

President Awesome gave a talk Friday on his kick-ass economy at Ivy Tech Community College in Indianapolis, Indiana where he congratulated himself for lower gas prices at the pump.

“A lot of families are saving a lot of money at the gas pump. That is putting some miles on some folks cars,” Obama said. “And — [laughter] You’re welcome. [Applause]. Although I was telling someone the other day, at some point they will go back up. Don’t start–you know, going out there and ignoring the mileage when you’re buying a new car. You have to keep looking for those savings.”

This guy….

Video via Got News

He’s trolling us, you know. Obama’s trolling everyone in this country who’s figured him out… He hates us, and is now doing things like using his pen to pass to bypass Congress to pass crap we don’t want, throwing insulting and offensive lines in his prayer breakfast speech, and taking credit for stuff he knows we know happened despite his best efforts – just to rub our noses in it.

What Obama’s lofo college-aged audience apparently doesn’t know is that the Saudis are keeping prices low in an effort to collapse shale oil business.

And the increase in production is happening on private lands in spite Obama’s hostility toward the oil industry.

Via AEI, last summer:

 It would be easy to look at the dramatic 35% increase in America’s oil and natural gas production since President Obama took office and think the administration deserves much of the credit. (Not for anyone who has been paying attention -ed.) But the energy boom has happened in spite of him.

Production could have been even greater if the administration embraced America’s new energy superpower status instead of being so hostile to the development of our fossil fuel resources.

Since Obama took office, oil and gas production has soared on private and state land, for which he deserves little or no credit. Meanwhile, production on federal lands has dropped sharply due to a cutback in leasing of deepwater areas for energy development.

The U.S. government leases less than 2.2% of the energy-rich Outer Continental Shelf, and less than 6% of federal onshore lands. Offshore leasing is at half the level recorded during the Clinton administration, and its decline is indicative of Obama’s hostility toward the oil and gas industry.

Nevertheless, thanks to drilling on private and state land, U.S. oil production is on pace to break a 42-year-old record next year.

Want the opposite of a palette cleanser? With apologies in advance – this will almost surely be the dumbest thing you will hear all week:

 

Good Gad, no wonder PMSNBC is dead last in the ratings.

Report: Tom Brokaw Wants Brian Williams Fired

This corroborates yesterday’s report from Variety that there have been voices within NBC who have told Williams to stop telling the chopper whopper.

According to the  NY Post Tom Brokaw “is out for blood.”

NBC’s most revered journalist is furious that Brian Williams is still in the anchor chair after he sheepishly admitted he hadn’t traveled on a helicopter hit by enemy fire.

“Brokaw wants Williams’ head on a platter,” an NBC source said. “He is making a lot of noise at NBC that a lesser journalist or producer would have been immediately fired or suspended for a false report.”

Brokaw, 74, was still the “Nightly News” anchor when Williams came back from his Iraq expedition — and an insider said he knew the story Williams later spouted was bunk.

“Tom Brokaw and [former NBC News President] Steve Capus knew this was a false story for a long time and have been extremely uncomfortable with it,” the source said.

NBC News execs had counseled him to stop telling the tale.

Even though NBC News execs are thus far standing by Williams – who in December signed his newest $10 million-per-year, five-year contract – this is looking increasingly bad for him.

Now there are reports that he made up some aspects of his Katrina coverage – including his contention that he caught dysentery by drinking flood water, and saw a body float by his hotel in the French Quarter.

Again, via the New York Post:

However, the The New Orleans Advocate noted that the French Quarter was not flooded and quoted a local health expert who did not recall anyone getting such a stomach ailment.

Williams recalled his bout with the bug in an interview with Tom Brokaw last year, when he said: “I accidentally ingested some of the floodwater. I became very sick with dysentery.”

The Advocate said a public health official never heard of people getting things like dysentery after the storm.

I consulted Wikipedia, and found this:

On September 6, E. coli was detected in the water supply. According to the CDC, five people died from bacterial infections caused by the toxic waters. The deaths appear to have been caused by Vibrio vulnificus bacteria, of the Cholera family.^[90]

So that dysentery story does not seem far fetched to me. It could have happened.

Williams said also during an interview in 2006 that he saw dead bodies float past his window in the French Quarter.

“When you look out of your hotel window in the French Quarter and watch a man float by face down, when you see bodies that you last saw in Banda Aceh, Indonesia, and swore to yourself that you would never see in your country,” Williams said in 2006.

This was approximately one year after Katrina that he spoke of seeing a body floating by his hotel window.

Numerous sources say the French Quarter dodged the massive flooding that was experienced in other areas. Williams may have heard the story of floating bodies from Mayor Ray Nagin, who told CNN during the flooding:

“There are dead bodies floating in some of the water,” Nagin said. “The rescuers would basically push them aside as they were trying to save individuals.”

Nagin said that as of late Tuesday “a significant amount of water” is flowing into the bowl-shaped city and sections of the city now dry could be under 9 or 10 feet of water within hours.

80% of the city was flooded. CNN reported that the water was 20 feet deep in some places, and linked to video (no longer there) of “knee-deep and rising water in the French Quarter.”

You need at least 18 inches of water for a body to float …

Via The Hayride, here’s a pic of Williams standing in the French Quarter in his “waders” which seems like overkill given the amount of water he was standing in. There may have been some low dips in the road that filled up with a foot of water.

But he saw bodies floating in that?

The problem for Williams and NBC  is – after the chopper-whopper – everything the anchor has said in the past and will say in the future will be forever scrutinized. The man has a huge credibility problem.

Hat tip: Weasel Zippers for both of those stories.

More:

Oh wow….

Via Sooper Mexican: ANOTHER Brian Williams Katrina Fabrication in 2 Videos: Says He SAW a Suicide He Later Says He Only HEARD About:

 

 

Report: NBC Warned Brian Williams To Stop Telling Chopper Whopper

By now, you’ve surely heard about the Brian Williams’ “Chopper Whopper” story which has been dominating the news for the past 24 hours.

I think I may be the only blogger who hasn’t written about it, yet.

NBC Anchor Brian Williams has been telling people his helicopter was shot down in Iraq for several years and now he’s recanting, saying he “misremembered” the event.

Here is his original Dateline report from 2003 – which is apparently the accurate version. Some of the soldiers who were there, claim they didn’t see Williams during the “two harrowing nights” he claims he and his crew were stranded during the sand storm – but that doesn’t mean they weren’t there.

Somewhere along the line, his story morphed into something altogether else.

CNN has a timeline of how the story has changed over the years.

Stars and Stripes reporter Travis Tritten  broke the story after being contacted by annoyed soldiers who were there and know the truth.

NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams admitted Wednesday he was not aboard a helicopter hit and forced down by RPG fire during the invasion of Iraq in 2003, a false claim that has been repeated by the network for years.

Williams repeated the claim Friday during NBC’s coverage of a public tribute at a New York Rangers hockey game for a retired soldier that had provided ground security for the grounded helicopters, a game to which Williams accompanied him. In an interview with Stars and Stripes, he said he had misremembered the events and was sorry.

Ace tried to explain Williams’ confusion:

Let me help you out here, Brian. You conflated one aircraft — one you were in — with another aircraft — one you were not in — not due to a “mistake” but due to an age-old reportorial practice called lying to advance an agenda.

The agenda here was dressing up a soft, delicate little boy into a the sort of iron-stubbled man who looks like he belongs on a battlefield.

So you lied. You claimed you were on one of the helicopters that took fire; no human being could ever confuse “Me” or “Not Me.”

Steven Wright makes just that joke — “The other day I was — wait, no, that was someone else.”

See, Brian, it’s funny because we know that confusion about “Me” versus “Not Me” is not possible, except in the insane.

So you lied, and over the years you’ve lied and lied again

Via Variety – it gets even worse for Williams.

“I would not have chosen to make this mistake,” Williams said in the interview with the military newspaper.  “I don’t know what screwed up in my mind that caused me to conflate one aircraft with another.” He also posted an apology on his Facebook page and offered similar sentiments during Wednesday night’s broadcast of “Nightly News.” The Iraqi incident took place before Williams took over the “Nightly News” anchor desk from Tom Brokaw in 2004.

What makes Williams’ admission worse, according to one person familiar with the situation, is that he had been counseled in the past by senior NBC News executives to stop telling the story in public. The advice, this person said, was not heeded.  One person familiar with current NBC News operations disputed that information.

Williams’ version of the story has never been allowed in NBC News programs, according to three people familiar with the unit. Indeed, in a March, 2003, episode of “Dateline,” Williams described the helicopter trip accurately. “On the ground, we learned the Chinook ahead of us was almost blown out of the sky,” he said while narrating a report.

Even sympathetic reporters admit that this story has done major damage to Williams’ credibility and his one minute, totally inadequate apology last night did little to repair the damage. Will Brian Williams still have a job at NBC after this weekend?