By Dan Calabrese ——Bio and Archives--August 26, 2015
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I've never had a very high regard for the State Department, mostly due to its tendency - regardless of who is president - to treat every issue that comes up as merely an imperative to spew diplomatic platitudes and do little else. It never occurred to me that the State Department was bereft with complete incompetence at every turn, but upon further reflection it explains a lot.
And that certainly appears to be the case, as evidence by the clumsy joint effort of the John Kerry-led State Department and the Hillary for President campaign to cover up Hillary's obvious use of her private e-mail server to illegally trade in classified material. The latest stumble sees State publicly releasing information that was and still is classified, and that State had no authority to de-classify and release because, according to Obama's own rules via executive order, nothing can be de-classified by anyone except the agency that classified it in the first place.One of the two emails that sparked the FBI probe was an April 2011 email from Clinton confidant Huma Abedin that, Fox News has learned, contained intelligence from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the National Security Agency (NSA), and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), which oversees aerial imagery, including satellites. Despite this fact and despite the executive order, the State Department publicly released the email and its intelligence -- which was not theirs to declassify -- onto its website in May as part of the initial release of documents on the 2012 Benghazi attack. Fox News is told that in late spring, all three agencies confirmed to the intelligence community inspector general that the intelligence was classified when it was sent four years ago by Abedin to Clinton's private account, and remains classified to this day. Clinton's campaign and the State Department have maintained that the email was not classified and have framed the issue as a difference of opinion. "What you're seeing now is a disagreement between agencies saying, 'You know what, they should've.' And the other saying, 'No they shouldn't.' That has nothing to do with me," Clinton told reporters last week. The State Department spokesman also said last Wednesday they are seeking a second opinion on the classification of some emails from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, who leads the intelligence community.
Despite her campaign's claims that Clinton was simply a "passive recipient" of classified information, a review of her emails indicates she wrote messages that are now classified. For example, in July 2009, she discussed relations with Russia and Afghanistan with then-Deputy Secretary William Burns in an email that has been partially classified. She also discussed her travel plans with Burns over the private network. Other classified conversations involved one of Clinton's present Democratic challengers for president: then-Sen. Jim Webb. As Webb traveled through southeast Asia in August 2009, Clinton and Sullivan sent each other a series of emails that are now classified before deciding they should contact the Virginia senator at Clinton's request. Another chain indicates Mills forwarded to Clinton's private address a classified summary of Webb's meeting with Aung San Suu Kyi, an opposition leader in Burma. Some emails indicate foreign leaders may have been aware of the private email system Clinton had established. In November 2009, an aide to David Miliband, Clinton's British counterpart, sent from his "home account" a classified note from Miliband to Abedin in the hopes of it reaching Clinton's eyes only. Abedin later passed the note to Clinton and indicated it was information Miliband "doesn't want to send through the system."The Hillary people are trying to say the classified markings are a matter of opinion among squabbling internal bureaucrats. They're not. When an agency marks a piece of information classified, it's classified. That's not a matter of debate. And contrary to what her campaign is trying to imply, there is no appeal process by which you can go back to someone and ask for that classification marking to be undone as if it never happened. Let's make sure we're clear on a couple things here. First, Hillary clearly and obviously lied when she claimed she never sent nor received classified material on her non-secure homebrew server. That isn't even up for debate anymore, and no one but the most shameless Hillary shill could try to claim it is at this point. Second, this is not just a matter of internal technicalities, which is the Hillary basis for thinking the public doesn't and shouldn't care about this. She was blatantly putting very sensitive information at risk of exposure because she didn't want to use the official e-mail system, and the reason for that is that she didn't want anything she was doing subject to public review via congressional subpoena or the Freedom of Information Act. That was a great plan. Not only did she jeopardize classified information, but she utterly failed in her attempt to hide her own activities, which are now on display for everyone - with a big assist from her old department and her successor, who is every bit as clueless and inept as she is. Tell me again the rationale for why this woman should be our next president? I would seriously be fascinated to hear anyone try to offer one.
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Dan Calabrese’s column is distributed by HermanCain.com, which can be found at HermanCain
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