White House: Why, yes, we are conducting a criminal investigation of Hillary

This was a pretty rare, unguarded moment for Josh Earnest. All Democrats understand the absolute importance of message discipline, which always starts with the consistent use of words designed to support their narrative, no matter how absurd that narrative might be. That's why abortion is "choice" and tax hikes are "fairness" and being a Republican is "racism." You use the correct words, always, everywhere, and you don't waver. Nowhere is this more true than with the Hillary e-mail investigation, which Hillary keeps trying to label a "security inquiry" - a thing that doesn't even exist according to the FBI, but which nevertheless sounds a lot less nefarious than "criminal investigation," which is what's actually going on. Maybe Earnest didn't get his coffee this morning. I don't know. But he said it:

Perhaps it was an unguarded moment, but the White House has confirmed that the Justice Department is conducting a “criminal investigation” regarding Hillary Clinton’s personal email use – despite repeated and persistent claims from the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee that investigators are pursuing a mere “security inquiry.” Press Secretary Josh Earnest used the term at Thursday’s briefing, after being asked by Fox News about whether President Obama’s newly unveiled endorsement of Clinton might apply pressure to investigators assigned to the Clinton case. Earnest rejected the premise, saying the job of career prosecutors is to follow the evidence to its logical conclusion. “That's why the president, when discussing this issue in each stage, has reiterated his commitment to this principle that any criminal investigation should be conducted independent of any sort of political interference,” Earnest said.

Not that you needed to hear this from Earnest to know it was true. We've been talking about it for months.Everyone knows the FBI is gathering evidence of Hillary's lawbreaking, and the only question is whether the attorney general will follow through and convene a grand jury for the purpose of seeking an indictment, or whether she will follow the not-so-subtle lead of her president and protect the all-but-certain Democrat nominee. I would say that it will be difficult now for Hillary to keep insisting she is not under criminal investigation. But that would be stupid because it assumes Hillary will not lie when the lie is transparently obvious to everyone. We all know that's not the case. Hillary will tell any lie as long as she thinks she will pay no price for it, and that's usually the case because the media thinks it's not a story when she's lying and they know it. But the facts are what they are. The president yesterday endorsed a candidate to succeed him that, today, his own press secretary admitted is under criminal investigation. God bless the United States of America.

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