I watched Hillary Clinton’s press conference today about her email. I’m not at all impressed that it took her eight — eight! — days to start answering questions about it. Eight days to come up with the explanation that she simply opted for convenience. She didn’t use government email for her official correspondence because it would have been inconvenient to carry a second device (in addition to her personal Blackberry). Really? Carrying a second cell phone would have posed an unacceptable inconvenience?
Oh, and the personal server that all her email was stored on? No problem. It’s the server that was set up for Pres. Clinton to use, and it’s on property guarded by the Secret Service (like that will stop hackers) at the Clinton home in Chappaqua, NY. See? All perfectly safe.
And besides, she never sent any “Classified” material in her emails. (Psst, trust her, she’s from the government.)
And furthermore, all her emails went to government employees and therefore were saved on their government servers. (Where I come from that’s called passing the buck.) It’s not their responsibility to save her email, but it does ensure that her emails are scattered across who knows how many government servers. Oh snap, sorry ’bout that.
Reporters were still shouting questions (so many questions … ) when she left the room. So we still don’t know why we should believe that she and her staff provided copies of all her email to the government. They picked and chose what to provide. Wouldn’t want to bother the gubmint with inconsequential personal stuff like Chelsea’s wedding plans. (So they obligingly deleted all the “personal” emails. How thoughtful.) Of course, we have only her word that she provided all the email. Ah, but of course she did. All 55,000 pages, printed pages, not digital files. Printed pages that cannot easily be electronically searched, that cannot easily be stored on a computer. Seriously? How long did it take to print 55,000 pages compared to simply making a digital copy? And why on earth, in the 21st Century, would someone do that? Didn’t have an extra thumb drive? Staples was sold out? Surely it wasn’t the old lawyer’s trick of providing a lot of information in order to obscure a little information …
All the questions would be answered, of course, if she’d just give the server (yes, the one the government is guarding) to the government and let a third party go through all the email. But for whatever reason, she’s refused to do that. (Maybe she doesn’t trust the government? No honor among thieves?)
All this from the only candidate so far (from any party), that I thought I might possibly vote for next year. Oy vey.
I was scared for a moment, I got this as an email and my name is Hillary, so I was like “what don’t you believe? ” . Glad it’s all cleared up
Sorry about that. In my circles there’s only one Hillary, and her last name is Clinton.
After listening to The former Secretary of State several thoughts come to mind. Could a lesser government official do what she did and receive the same consequences? If the voting public is satisfied with her answer,we could very well be looking at the NEXT government official who believes she is above the petty laws here in America!
I don’t know if she’s broken any laws or if she’s just tiptoeing on the fringes in a way that looks suspicious. The only way she’s going to allay all suspicion is to give the government full access to her server so there can be confirmation from a third party. And the sooner she does it, the better. She’s expected to officially announce her candidacy in a couple of weeks and she needs to get this behind her.
There’s something I’ve been wondering about since this whole brouhaha began: Considering the numbers of people who have an opinion to give on this – many of whom strike me as having been in a position where they might have exchanged emails with her, how is it that no one seems to have known, or cared for that matter, that she was using this “unapproved” system before now. I mean, don’t “official” government email addresses have a .gov extension or something? Why is this such a big deal now, so long after the fact?
The addresses do have the .gov extension and I’ve wondered the same thing. Surely some people she corresponded with would have noticed. Apparently to those who noticed, it didn’t matter. Which may be the best indication that what she was doing was acceptable. But to me her handling still looks kind of shady and evasive and I’m not yet comfortable with the explanations we’re getting.
Well one thing’s for sure, she’s provided her enemies with plenty of ammunition to use against her. Reminds me of the old joke about the war between W. V. and Ohio, where the W. Va. folks kept throwing all that dynamite across the river only to have the Ohio folks light the sticks and throw them back! 😉
😀
If Democrats want to win in 2016, this email flap is just the tip of the Clinton iceberg. Too much baggage. The secrecy thing appears to derive from hubris, seems to me. I suggest we look at Martin O’Malley.
It’s a cinch the GOP won’t let this red meat go. And yes, I think hubris has a lot to do with it. She’s a Clinton, doncha know. A former First Lady. She shouldn’t even have to campaign; the presidency should be hers for the asking. Meantime, at your suggestion, I’m beginning to watch O’Malley.
This whole thing, from the original decision to use personal e-mail, to the current clumsy defense of that decision, is just politically dumb. HC ought to have known from the start how this could affect the Presidential ambitions that we know she harbored even then.
It may not derail her route to the nomination, but it will certainly provide grist for her opponent in the election. One factor that can’t be assessed yet is the degree to which voters will see the constant efforts to grind her down as unfair, or ganging up. That has yet to be assessed when the candidate is a woman, though I recall some such blowback involving both Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah Palin.
She and Bill have had presidential aspirations since they left Arkansas. And looking back at everything she said during her 2008 bid, it’s pretty obvious she thinks she’s the heir apparent for the first female presidency. I agree her handling of her email was inexcusably clumsy for someone with her eye on the White House. It’s evidence, perhaps, that she’s not as astute a politician as she thinks she is. You’d think that well before 2008 she’d have had every action, every word, every decision, carefully choreographed to look presidential. But the clumsiness continues. And it does not inspire confidence.
It’s hard to imagine her looking ganged up on. And she’s already made it clear she’s not going to play the demure housewife at home baking cookies. It will be interesting to see how it all plays out.
I don’t think anything she did was intentional nor covert. Bad decisions, yes, which never would be brought to light if she wasn’t going to run for President. But I don’t think she purposely set anything up with future plans to “hide” anything.
I will disagree with her not wanting to carry two phones — it’s a pain in the ass. With as much traveling as she does, all the documents I would see in front of her, any way to cut back any any additional items helps. There’s a saying I used to use when I guided backpack trips…. ounces add up to pounds.
I also recall, when Obama was first elected, he declared that he was not going to give up his Blackberry. Although he had to have different phones with his position, I think Hillary just thought to herself, “it may just be easier if I just keep the one phone and one email.”
I don’t think she was passing the buck when she said the the recipients would be on the government server. I interpreted it as, “if you don’t believe me and the 50-some thousand emails I turned in, then feel free to search for something covert on the ‘other’ side of the email.” It just came out wrong because she was disgusted at how the GOP has blown this completely out of the water as well as the media.
Yes, she should have answered right away. Not sure what she was trying to accomplish by holding off.
I did notice that she conveniently decided to discuss this when the GOP was in the news about their idiotic letter to Iran. I’m sure purposely in hopes that the media would pay more attention to the GOP’s mail. But they didn’t — and that infuriates me!
I don’t care who is president. It can be Reagan and Bush again for all I care. Congress, especially when it is one-sided, should not be undermining the president by sending Iran a letter such as that – or ANY letter for that matter. Then they looked even more idiotic when they information they included was wrong. This move made our government look like the buffoons they’ve turned into, not to mention cause potential problems with the discussions. I wouldn’t go as far as to say a security risk like Biden said, but there was nothing positive to be gained from that move, other than getting their tantrum over. Plus, I read that letter as a threat that they were saying no matter what agreement they come to with Obama and all the other countries, when Obama leaves, they’re going to get rid of it. That is a threat.
Anyway, my point is the media focused on Hillary’s stupid email and not on the letter the GOP sent to Iran. I’m so mad I could spit nails. I was all over some of the news’ Facebook pages last night telling them they better get their priorities in line when it comes to news. But then, they are all paid by right-wingers………
Whether or not she’s hiding anything, she’s handled the whole thing very ham-handedly. The optics are bad. She has aides around her constantly who can carry her phones along with everything else. I just don’t buy that excuse. Yes, ounces count in hiking, but when you have aides to carry everything …
The media can almost be counted on to focus on the wrong thing. I’m furious too about that GOP letter to Iran. Damn bunch of clowns. And right on top of the Netanyahu stunt which still has me boiling. I, too, used to think it didn’t matter much who was president because Congress wielded the power, wrote the legislation, etc. But with the circus we have now in Congress, the president is our last resort to enforce some sanity.
I’m just so sick and tired of all the hubbub over an email account. If there was something to back up all this concern, that’d be different. The GOP is determined to find some deep, dark secret about Benghazi.
Benghazi is ancient history. I don’t think this has much of anything to do with Benghazi. But I do think there is reason to be concerned about every single piece of email from a Sec. of State for 4 years being in a private account to which the government has zero access. It’s not just a GOP witch hunt. Plenty of Dems are concerned about it too.
Benghazi isn’t going to die until the GOP has a Republican’t as the big chief. I would think that if there was something “improper” that was going on with Hillary that could be found going through her emails, then whatever it is would have surfaced by now. So far the worst thing is this stupid hubbub about her email account. Every email can be traced and found. If it goes out onto the net, it is there. May take some work and some skilled people, but it’s all there. Besides, if she was doing something that wasn’t kosher, she’s too smart and would know not to put anything in an email.
I’m not a big Hillary fan. There are things I like about her and things I don’t. She’s a bit too conservative for my taste, but her work as Sec of State gave her so much experience and knowledge. Plus, she’s a women all for equal pay.
My point is I’m not “siding” with Hillary like some groupies do with their idol politician. I just really do not think she did anything worth getting our panties in a bunch over.
And I’m not saying she did anything wrong. But what she did do is raise a lot of unnecessary questions that could have been avoided if she’d followed protocol. And if she’d been more forthcoming in the aftermath. It looks bad to a lot of people, including a lot of Democrats, and it has given the GOP way too much ammunition. Needlessly. She’ll be wasting a lot of time and effort dodging bullets of her own making.
Expressing my thinking perfectly, this from the Washington Post:
(Ann Telnaes/Washington Post)[/caption]
[caption id="attachment_44437" align="aligncenter" width="600"]
I read her biography years ago, and my recollection is there was no hint she aspired to the presidency. More than technical glitches such as the current e-mail thing, I believe HC has a personality problem when courting voters. She simply does not come across as a sincere altruistic person interested only in leading her country on to greater things. To borrow from an Obama bit, she just not seem to be the sort of person one would want to sit down with and have a beer.
“Sparkling personality” is not a prerequisite for the presidency, luckily for her. She’s got more than a year to win me over, but in her long political career to date, she’s been unable to do so. I’m not optimistic.
Why isn’t anyone who receives email from more than one email address on ONE CELLPHONE pointing out that HC’s excuse is pure BS? I have more than two email addresses and use an ordinary android cellphone that’s over two years old. Her pant suit pants are on fire.
People who believe HC is honest aren’t going to change their opinions, so none of this matters.
I’ve wondered the same thing. But then I remember the big deal about security on Obama’s Blackberry after he became president. I think the government provides some sort of specially encrypted Blackberries for secure government communication … or something like that. Yes, Blackberries are a bit outdated, but so is most government hardware and methodology. And yes, Hillary has plenty of aides around at all times who could carry that oh-so-burdensome extra phone for her.
Knowing that a lot of business people carry two phones, I finally went looking (just now) for an explanation of why and immediately came up with a Wall Street Journal article that explains in detail how and why one phone is for work and one is for personal use. The work phone can be left behind when people don’t want to mix work with leisure time (or be contacted by the office). Furthermore, many employers have access to employees’ work phones, necessitating a second phone to ensure personal activities are kept private. Makes sense when you read it.
The New York Times has published a video of the entire Hillary Clinton press conference.
Never sent “classified documents”? OK. Never discussed those by emails either?(and what all was going on during this time period? Hint: it wasn’t a video that caused it like you told the parents either, Hillary)
I’d like a woman for president – one with honor, is trustworthy and is honest – without arrogance. One that’s worthy. Scandals have followed Hillary since Little Rock. Might have considered her one time, but now? Need fresh faces.
(and one that understands complex technology situations – obviously Hillary doesn’t…that’s a real issue for me)
You might enjoy reading this on the same subject
I did enjoy it. And yes, it IS a big deal. And of course she sent classified material; almost everything she did as Sec. of State short of Chelsea’s wedding would have been classified.
I’ve nothing against a woman running, and I’d like a woman president — if she’s the best candidate running. Make that “admirable person.” Hillary’s better that the current crop of GOP hopefuls, but that’s not saying much. And I refuse to vote for a woman just because she’s a woman. In 2008 the media seemed to think all women were Hillary’s “natural constituency.” Wrong!
I’m not seeing anyone on either side. Rather unsettling. May be time for limiting all elected officials and the president to one term of office – break up the political power structure.
Of course, there is a more logical option. Limiting your voting choices to candidates of either of the two most corrupt, self serving, overspending, control freak parties is going to get you exactly what you deserve.
Yeah, I thought about you last week and those other parties you’re so fond of mentioning. I haven’t changed my mind. I want to vote for (or, if necessary) against a serious contender. If such a candidate rises from the ranks of third parties, I might consider voting for him or her. But it would have to be a strong candidate with the right views.
That is the problem alright. So long as a majority of voters compromise their beliefs in order to support someone they believe has a chance of winning or to prevent someone else they believe has a chance of winning we aren’t going to get someone who isn’t the beneficiary of party and media bankrolls and who won’t further compromise their own beliefs once elected in order to retain support of their particular lobbyists.
And… those “other” parties amount to just one. The only party that won’t compromise it’s belief that the initiation of aggression is never moral – is the Libertarian Party. On the other hand, some of their recent candidates didn’t qualify either. So I’ll take your point in advance that some kind of compromise is nearly always necessary. But I hate it.
The sad fact is our system is broken. The best candidates in the country won’t get elected without money and the attendant obligations and compromises. Hell, the best candidates/people don’t even run. Politics is a dirty, corrupt business that most people want no part of.
Uh, not party driven or party captive.
Friendly not to jump to conclusions/assume
Sorry, but you inferred an implication I didn’t intend. Mea Culpa Maxima.
Always difficult to tell on screens
Ron Paul was our rep. Not always agreed with everything he said – like horse slaughterhouses – but he always responded ASAP – personally – with logic and reasoning. Smart guy. A real statesman. If he had only been movie star pretty so the rest of the voters would have given him a glance.
All this pre-election noise is of no importance. Like basketball, all that counts is the final quarter – we’ll see who the candidates of all parties are then and what chance they have. Voting is getting like gambling. Third parties have happened before. It may be time again.
Appreciate you responding
Depressing, isn’t it? And with the 1% buying all the candidates now, I don’t see anything changing. I’d love to see term limits, but you know who has to pass the legislation to get that done. Not gonna happen.