Tag Archives: FBI

media news, national news, political news

VP used his private e-mail server? Why, I never …

Do you mean to say that Vice President Mike Pence, when he was governor of Indiana, used his private e-mail account to conduct public business?

Moreover, do you assert that then-Gov. Pence’s private server was hacked and that some sensitive material might have gotten out, possibly into the wrong hands?

OK. Where are the calls to “Lock him up!” Do you hear them? Neither do I. Nor do I expect to hear them.

Still, this is pretty serious stuff. If it was serious enough for those on the right to chant “Lock her up!” when it involved Hillary Rodham Clinton’s use of a private server while she was secretary of state, then does the former governor of one of our 50 states deserve to be roughed up in such a manner?

The Indianapolis Star first reported it.

Pence’s office said other Indiana governors had used their private servers as well. I guess that means it was OK for Pence to do it. Indiana law doesn’t prohibit such an occurrence. For that matter, there’s no federal law that prohibits secretaries of state from doing so, either. Indeed, Clinton said previous secretaries had used personal e-mail accounts.

I do not yet know to what extent the Indiana governor’s office produces material that would jeopardize national security. As for Clinton, her use of a private account was scrutinized thoroughly by the FBI, which determined — not once, but twice — that she didn’t do anything illegal.

This matter involving the vice president, though, does interest a lot of us because he was so very vocal during the 2016 presidential campaign about Clinton’s e-mail habits.

Karma can bite one right in the rear end.

national news

Trump continues to promote a lie

The president of the United States is perpetuating another lie … allegedly.

This one involves the phony charge that as many as 5 million “illegal immigrants” cast ballots in the 2016 presidential election — all of them for Hillary Rodham Clinton.

It was those votes, Donald J. Trump insists, that cost him the popular vote margin over his challenger.

This is as ridiculous an assertion as anyone can hear from a newly sworn in president of the United States.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-won%E2%80%99t-back-down-from-his-voting-fraud-lie-here-are-the-facts/ar-AAmbXBM?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartandhp

White House press spokesman said today — again! — that the president believes it to be true. He hasn’t cited a single provable fact to back any of it up. Trump hasn’t provided a scintilla of evidence of a single vote cast by someone who is in this country illegally.

But this is Trump’s modus operandi: You say something enough and you demonize the target of your falsehood sufficiently to provide a shadow of a doubt. Sound familiar? It should. It was the same kind of shameful/shameless tactic he used to keep alive the lie about President Barack Obama’s place of birth. To this day, polls are showing that most Republican voters actually believe the former president was not qualified constitutionally to hold the office he held for two successful terms. That is Trump’s work.

Here’s an idea for the president to consider.

Why not launch a Justice Department investigation to prove the claims the president is making. Heck, the president has the power to turn the DOJ hounds loose. He should do so. Now!

He’s got a pal running the FBI. James Comey’s letter to Congress casting doubt on those “damn e-mails” from Clinton while she was secretary of state is considered a possible turning point in the election outcome. Sic the FBI boss loose on this caper, Mr. President.

The president continues to make a mockery of our electoral process with this specious allegation about “millions of illegal immigrants” casting ballots.

Oh, wait! We also have that Russian hacking thing, too.

First things first. Either put up, Mr. President, or shut up!

national news, political news

IG takes aim at FBI boss

2 Comments

James Comey is under the microscope yet again.

The Justice Department’s inspector general is launching an investigation into the FBI director’s conduct in the days immediately preceding the 2016 presidential election.

At issue is whether Comey’s 11th-hour letter to Congress about Hillary Rodham Clinton’s e-mail controversy had a direct impact on the election outcome.

Clinton believes it did. Donald Trump, who won, is dismissing the impact of the letter. Wow! Imagine that.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/dems-outraged-with-comey-after-house-briefing/ar-AAlQa9c?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartandhp

What gives this upcoming probe its legs is that the IG works also for the Justice Department, the same agency that employs the FBI director.

Comey’s letter is believed by many to have stalled Clinton’s momentum in the final days of the campaign. Trump’s team contends that their guy was gaining momentum anyway and would have won with our without Comey’s intervention.

Of course, it should be noted that Comey said a few days after announcing he had sent the letter to Congress that his agency determined — as it had done in the summer of 2016 — that Clinton didn’t commit a crime in her handling of the e-mails.

The Clinton team, though, believes the damage had been done.

Comey has drawn intense and angry fire from congressional Democrats who believe his letter — which he revealed 11 days before the election — was directly responsible for Trump’s victory.

My hope for this probe is that Trump will let it go forward. If he calls off the DOJ dogs — or fires Comey — after he takes office, the president-elect will unleash yet another storm of suspicion that he has something to hide.

Let’s answer the question: Did the FBI director act improperly when he injected himself and his agency directly into an intense campaign for the presidency of the United States?

This inquiring mind wants to know. I am quite certain I am not alone.

national news, political news

Enough of the excuses … Hillary lost!

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I am growing weary of the constant blame-gaming that’s going on among those who wanted Hillary Rodham Clinton to become president of the United States.

By all means, I preferred her over the candidate who won. I’ve already stipulated as much — many times! — on this blog.

She didn’t win. She lost. Hillary was thought to be the prohibitive favorite to become the next president. She didn’t get there.

And yet, we keep hearing that FBI James Comey’s 11th-hour letter to Congress about those pesky e-mails doomed Clinton’s campaign. Now we hear that the Russian hackers might have tilted the election in Donald J. Trump’s favor.

On the first matter, there’s nothing anyone can prove about Comey’s last-minute intervention. On the second matter, there ought to be a special commission convened — independent of Congress — to examine what the Russkies did, how they did it and recommend ways to protect us from future hackers. Hey, we convened such a commission after the 9/11 attacks.

Former President Bill Clinton, one of New York’s presidential electors, chimed in today about Comey and the Russians.

A lot of things went wrong with the former president’s wife’s campaign. If anyone needs to take the hickey on this stunning loss, it ought to be folks such as Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and campaign manager Robby Mook.

Hillary Clinton should have put herself miles ahead of Trump by the time Comey’s letter came out. She fell short.

Who gets the blame? Hillary Clinton and her team need to look inward.

national news, political news

FBI joins CIA in fingering Russian hackers

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What do you know about that?

FBI Director James Comey has concluded that the CIA analysis is correct, that the Russians hacked into our nation’s electoral process and might have helped Donald J. Trump win the election over Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Oh, the irony is amazing.

Just to be clear, I am not going to suggest that Comey’s conduct near the end of the presidential campaign cost Clinton the victory most of us thought she would win. The letter to Congress about those e-mails may have contributed some to Hillary’s defeat. Was it decisive? Did it doom her campaign by itself? I don’t believe so.

But now we have the FBI climbing aboard the CIA hay wagon, endorsing the spook agency’s findings that the Russians sought to do the very thing Comey has been accused of doing.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/fbi-backs-cia-view-that-russia-intervened-to-help-trump-win-election/ar-AAlEvfm?li=BBnb7Kz

I don’t know all the facts about how the FBI works. I damn sure know even less about the CIA and the work its agents and analysts do to compile intelligence information. I probably don’t want to know.

When two pre-eminent intelligence and law enforcement agencies draw the same conclusion, though, that’s a huge deal.

If only the president-elect would exhibit some respect for the work these professionals do every day, rather than dissing them while denigrating their findings.

Indeed, the candidate who himself questioned the integrity of the electoral process — remember how the president-elect proclaimed the system to be “rigged” against him? — ought to be among the loudest voices demanding a full accounting of what the Russians have done … allegedly.

national news, political news

Time to admit real reason Hillary lost

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Harry Reid isn’t long for the U.S. Senate. He’s retiring in a few weeks from his role as Democratic leader, but he’s going out with a bang.

I believe it’s time that Reid and his fellow Democrats realize what some of us out here — yours truly included — are beginning to understand.

Hillary Rodham Clinton lost the presidential election because Donald J. Trump outhustled her in the waning days of a bitter campaign. FBI Director James Comey’s 11th-hour letter to Congress declaring he was looking into more e-mails might have had some effect on the outcome. However, I do not believe he fired the kill shot at her campaign. Reid blames Comey almost entirely for Clinton’s loss.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/reid-blames-comey-for-hillary-clintons-loss/ar-AAlsVPy?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp

Trump took the fight to Clinton in those so-called “swing states” and grabbed them from Clinton’s column. Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan should have voted for Clinton. Voters there went the other way because she didn’t pay enough attention to them at the end of the campaign.

It’s called “retail politics,” which describes how candidates show up to shake hands, kiss babies, eat rotten “food” at fairgrounds. In other words, voters like to believe the candidate feels for them.

She didn’t do that.

As for Trump, well, he had those yuuuuge rallies that got all kinds of air time and newspaper print space.

Does any of this mean the better person won the presidency this past month? It only means the better candidate did.

I will not accept that Trump is suited temperamentally — or any other way, for that matter — for the office he is about to assume. However, I am willing to accept that he and his campaign team outsmarted their opponents down the stretch.

Trump, therefore, delivered the final shock to many of us in a campaign full of shocking moments.

national news, political news

Imagine the surprise: Hillary’s foes will keep looking

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clinton-chaffetz

Let me see a show of hands.

Who is surprised that congressional Republicans are going to keep looking for something — anything! — to hang around Hillary Rodham Clinton’s neck?

I didn’t think so. No one, yes?

U.S. House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said he’s going to pursue an investigation into whether Clinton committed perjury to Congress while testifying about her use of a personal e-mail server while she was secretary of state.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/clinton-opponents-vow-to-continue-their-pursuit/ar-AAl87tn?li=BBnb7Kz

Let’s see how this goes. The FBI investigated Clinton thoroughly and determined she didn’t commit any crimes. Did the feds determine she lied under oath to Congress? Umm, no. Did they find any other criminality? Again, no.

That won’t prevent Chaffetz and other GOP lawmakers from continuing to search for someone with which to charge the defeated Democratic presidential nominee.

As The Hill reports: “‘A political election does not extinguish the need for transparency, truth and justice,’ he told Fox News this week.” The Hill adds that Judicial Watch, a conservative watchdog group, also plans to stay on the hunt. Hmm. Imagine that.

I get that Chairman Chaffetz doesn’t want an election by itself to spell the end of a congressional probe. What I don’t get is why Chaffetz wants to keep scouring after the FBI has made its determination that “no reasonable prosecutor” would seek an indictment alleging criminality against Clinton.

If he had the goods on Clinton, surely he could have produced it long ago.

What’s more, Donald J. Trump, who’s about to become president, has said he no longer wants to pursue a probe of Clinton.

None of that, however, is likely to stop Chaffetz and other GOP zealots from continuing their incessant march into more dead ends.

Enough, already!

national news

Trump must really believe he’s the smartest man on Earth

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Donald J. Trump told us he knows “more about ISIS than the generals. Believe me.”

I thought the president-elect was just offering us another example of rhetorical bluster on the campaign trail.

Silly me. I think he now actually believes such nonsense.

The Washington Post is reporting that Trump is forgoing the usual flood of intelligence briefings set aside for the president-elect to keep him apprised of ongoing national security threats.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-turning-away-intelligence-briefers-since-election-win/ar-AAkGkkf?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartandhp

The National Security Agency, the Central Intelligence Agency, the FBI, the Defense Intelligence Agency — all of ’em — have helped prepare a team of briefers ready to get the next president up to speed.

He’s forgoing most of it.

The vice president-elect, Mike Pence, however, is soaking it all in. He’s meeting almost daily with briefers, getting tons of intelligence on those threats.

Maybe this is what Trump meant when he was asked during the campaign about Pence’s duties. The Republican presidential candidate said he’d assign Pence some of the nuts and bolts of governance while  concentrates on “making America great again.”

Well, I actually would prefer that the president-elect devote himself as well to some of the nitty-gritty. I mean, the guy has had zero exposure to government policymaking. He has relied on his business acumen and he managed to persuade enough voters during the campaign of that moxie to enable him to win an Electoral College victory over Hillary Rodham Clinton.

As the Post reported: “Officials involved in the Trump transition team cautioned against assigning any significance to the briefing schedule that the president-elect has set so far, noting that he has been immersed in the work of forming his administration, and has made filling key national security posts his top priority.

“But others have interpreted Trump’s limited engagement with his briefing team as an additional sign of indifference from a president-elect who has no meaningful experience on national security issues and was dismissive of U.S. intelligence agencies’ capabilities and findings during the campaign.”

I believe the president-elect should get up to speed.

Now!

legal news

Trump gets ahead of himself over Clinton inquiry

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Donald J. Trump perhaps thought he was being magnanimous in declaring he wouldn’t seek a special prosecutor to examine whether Hillary Rodham Clinton broke any laws while she served as secretary of state.

Except for one thing … or so I understand.

The president-elect has no actual authority to make such a ruling.

That process starts and stops with the Justice Department and the FBI. Moreover, I am pretty sure the feds have determined already that Clinton didn’t commit any crimes while she used a personal e-mail server.

The FBI actually has made that declaration twice.

FBI Director James Comey said in July that “no reasonable prosecutor” would bring charges against Clinton. Eleven days before the election, Comey then said he was examining some newly discovered e-mails to see if they contained any new information. Nine days after that, Comey said his initial conclusion stood.

Of course, that didn’t stop the future president-elect from convicting Clinton of crimes she didn’t commit. He vowed to pick a special prosecutor.

Now he says he won’t.

That’s not his call to make.

national news, political news

Comey deserves some blame, however …

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Hillary Rodham Clinton’s shocking loss to Donald J. Trump in the 2016 presidential election can be laid at the feet of many culprits.

Clinton has chosen to single out, though, the director of the FBI. James Comey’s letter to Congress just 11 days before Election Day informing lawmakers that he had more information to examine regarding those “damn e-mails” stole the Clinton campaign’s “momentum,” she said. By the time Comey said nine days later that the information wouldn’t result in any further action, the damage had been done, Clinton told campaign donors.

Let’s hold on a second.

I don’t doubt that Comey’s 11th-hour intervention had some effect on the campaign outcome. However, I believe a bit more introspection is required of the defeated candidate before we start writing the final history of what no doubt will be logged in as the strangest presidential campaign in U.S. history.

Hillary Clinton should have iced this campaign long before the Comey letter became known.

Think about a few factors here … and bear with me.

Clinton is eminently qualified to become president of the United States: former first lady, U.S. senator and secretary of state. Boom! Right there, she has a dossier that commends her for the top job. Trump is not qualified: reality TV celebrity, commercial real estate developer, thrice-married rich guy with zero public service commitment on his lengthy record in private business. The endless litany of insults and hideous proclamations that poured out of Trump’s mouth throughout the campaign are too numerous to mention. You know what he said. It didn’t matter to the Trumpkins who backed him to the hilt.

It is true that Clinton’s enemies made a huge story out of something that had been declared dead and buried — the e-mail controversy — which gave life to the corpse near the end of an insult-driven campaign.

Clinton’s qualifications, her knowledge of world affairs and her contacts around the globe made her an excellent — if not perfect — choice to lead the greatest nation on Earth. Many observers — me included — considered it possible that Clinton would roll up a historic election victory that could have eclipsed, say, the Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon or Ronald Reagan landslides of 1964, 1972 and 1984, respectively.

If only, though, she could have demonstrated some innate quality of authenticity that could have fired up her base. She didn’t. Clinton was unable to light the fire that burned brightly when Barack Obama ran twice successfully for the presidency.

She was a flawed candidate who brought much more to the table than she was able — or perhaps willing — to reveal.

Comey did his part, for sure, to run the Clinton campaign over the cliff. The FBI boss wasn’t the sole reason. The candidate herself deserves much –indeed most — of the blame for what transpired on Election Day.