"People should and do trust me" - Hillary Clinton

[41chevy]

13 hours ago, m16ty said:

A little known fact in the report that is very damaging. Hillary's personal server went down and she was unable to send or receive emails on her Blackberry. She was offered a State Department Blackberry but refused, stating she didn't want any of her emails to be part of public record. Instead she just went on a email blackout until her server was back on line.

All this is backed up in her recovered emails. This shows a deliberate attempt to keep her official emails out of public record. This shows motive to hide her emails from public record, all the while foreign governments were getting them all from her unsecured server.

If they want to find all the missing emails, they should just make a deal with Russia, I'm sure they have them all.

 

Nothing will come from all this, Obamas and Clintons people will delay and block everything until after the election and / or spin it into the "poor persecuted woman" issue.   Paul

Edited May 26, 2016 by 41chevy

[kscarbel2]

Hillary Clinton's former chief of staff discussed the Democratic hopeful's secret email server with the IT aide who set the system up, but claims she can't talk about it because she's now [conveniently] Clinton's lawyer. 

Aide-turned-attorney Cheryl Mills testified for five hours on Friday as part of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit launched by the conservative group Judicial Watch, which has been trying to get access to Clinton's emails during her tenure as secretary of state.

But Mills' attorney Beth Wilkinson shut lines of questioning down from Judicial Watch's lawyer Ramona Cotca, arguing that something the former chief of staff learned after the fact as an attorney is not in the legal case's scope [good luck selling that].

In her testimony, Mills talked about serving in the Clinton White House, and later working for Clinton when the New York senator was running for the White House in 2008. 

When Clinton became secretary of state, she asked Mills to serve as chief of staff, and also a counsel to Clinton (allegedly just policy work, not for legal representation). 

Mills became Clinton’s lawyer after she left the State Department.

Mills claims it was then that she found out about Clinton’s secret server. 

Mills was asked about her familiarity with Bryan Pagliano, a former Clinton IT aide who has immunity [why?] in the ongoing investigation into Clinton's emails by the FBI, which is separate from the Judicial Watch civil case. 

“I know I spoke with Mr. Pagliano about the setup of the server during the period in which I was representing Secretary Clinton, which would have been two thousand – which would have been post her departure from the State Department. At least that's my best recollection,” Mills said. 

Cotca asked if that would have been post-February of 2013, when Clinton handed the reins over to the current Secretary of State John Kerry. 

“Yes,” Mills replied. 

“Was he working for the Clintons at the time that you spoke to him about the about the setup of the server?” the Judicial Watch attorney continued. 

At that point, Wilkinson – wife of former 'Meet the Press' host David Gregory –stepped in with an 'objection.'

Mills testified that she didn't have a 'technological background' and thus wouldn't have had conversations about the server “until the time period where I was representing Secretary Clinton.” 

That, Mills lawyer argued, meant that the information was privileged. 

'I'm representing Ms. Mills, as we know, and she represents Hillary Clinton as her personal lawyer,' Wilkinson argued. 'And you are now asking about work she has done for Hillary Clinton as her lawyer.' 

'And it is beyond the scope of permissible discovery, and so I am instructing her not to answer,' Wilkinson said. 

And with that, Mills didn't answer the question. 

Wilkinson refused to allow Mills to answer 15 lines of questioning. 

Mills also pointed to the highly controversial Benghazi attack, on Sept. 11, 2012, as a reason for why some of the public records requests were a mess. 

There was “a lot going on,” said Mills. “The secretary was not only transitioning, there had been a – we had lost our first ambassador in quite some time, and we were stepping through the sets of issues associated with that. And she, too, had fallen ill, and there – and there had been a period of time where we were obviously navigating a whole set of issues in that space.” 

“So I don't know that this was something that I focused on, and certainly I wish I had.”

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Hillary Clinton aide moves to block release of deposition audio/video

Politico  /  May 25, 2016

Hillary Clinton's former chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, is asking a federal judge to order a conservative group not to release audio or video recordings of a deposition Mills is scheduled to give Friday about Clinton's use of a private email server during her tenure as secretary of state.

Mills' attorneys filed a motion Wednesday afternoon saying they fear that the group that sought Mills' deposition in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, Judicial Watch, will use any recording to distort Mills' testimony and advance the group's anti-Clinton agenda.

"We are concerned that snippets or soundbites of the deposition may be publicized in a way that exploits Ms. Mills’ image and voice in an unfair and misleading manner," attorneys Beth Wilkinson and Alexandra Walsh wrote in the motion submitted to U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan.

"Ms. Mills is not a party to this action. She is a private citizen appearing voluntarily to assist in providing the limited discovery the Court has permitted. ... Judicial Watch should not be allowed to manipulate [???] Ms. Mills’ testimony, and invade her personal privacy, to advance a partisan agenda that should have nothing to do with this litigation."

The motion says Mills has no objection to releasing the transcript of her testimony, although............the State Department has said it may object if the testimony strays into areas that are supposed to be off-limits according to the judge's order permitting the deposition.

Mills' filing asserts that audio or video clips would be more easily taken out of context than a transcript but does not make entirely clear why written quotes could not be similarly distorted.

Sullivan issued an order shortly after the motion was filed giving the conservative group until noon Thursday to offer a formal response to the motion.

A spokeswoman for Judicial Watch said the group is evaluating the motion and will respond by the judge's deadline.

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Judicial Watch fights block on video of Clinton aide's deposition

Politico  /  May 26, 2016

A conservative group using a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit to explore Hillary Clinton's use of a personal email account during her tenure as secretary of state is fighting an attempt by one of Clinton's closest aides to block release of video of a deposition scheduled for Friday.

Judicial Watch submitted a formal opposition Thursday to former Clinton chief of staff Cheryl Mills' request to a federal judge to prevent the group from making public audio or video of her testimony.

In a motion filed Wednesday with U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan, Mills' attorneys said they feared that the conservative group would use clips from the video in an unfair and misleading manner to carry out a "partisan attack" against Clinton, the leading candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

"Ms. Mills’ characterizations of Plaintiff’s actions are both unfair and inaccurate, and the concerns she raises are baseless," Judicial Watch attorney Michael Bekesha said in the group's reply. "Plaintiff has no intention of publicizing 'snippets or soundbites' of her videotaped deposition. If it is released, the videotaped deposition will be released in full on Plaintiff’s website so that all interested persons can watch and assess Ms. Mills’ entire testimony for themselves."

Judicial Watch, an avowedly conservative group that has bought scores of lawsuits over alleged misconduct by Clinton, her husband President Bill Clinton, and their allies, also insisted in the filing that it has no partisan motives.

"Far from being partisan, Plaintiff has been a vigorous advocate for transparency in government for decades and across several administrations," Bekesha wrote. "Had Mrs. Clinton not created and used her extraordinary and exclusive email system, and had the State Department not seemingly condoned and abetted its use, Plaintiff would not have filed 16 lawsuits over the past year. The lawsuits are not attacks on Mrs. Clinton; they are attempts to compel the State Department to comply with basic FOIA obligations."

The conservative group's filing also argues that Mills unreasonably delayed her motion by filing it less than 48 hours before the deposition was to begin.

Mills indicated she was only available on one day during the eight-week period Sullivan set for discovery in the case — Friday, the day before the Memorial Day weekend.

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Judge: Video of Clinton aides' depositions to be kept secret

Politico  /  May 26, 2016

Videos of Hillary Clinton's former aides and others giving depositions in a lawsuit related to her private email set-up will be kept secret, at least for now, a federal judge ruled Thursday.

U.S. District Court Judge Emmet Sullivan granted a request from former Clinton Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills that the deposition recordings be kept from the public because of the potential they could be used for partisan purposes or perhaps used in attack ads against Clinton, the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination.

In a brief order Thursday afternoon, Sullivan acted on his own initiative to broaden Mills' request, putting off limits the videos of all depositions in the case.

"The depositions permitted by the Court are limited in scope, but relate to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's email practices during her tenure at the State Department," the judge wrote. "The public has a right to know details related to the creation, purpose and use of the clintonemail.com system. Thus, the transcripts of all depositions taken in this case will be publicly available. It is therefore unnecessary to also make the audiovisual recording of Ms. Mills' deposition public." [Disagree]

Sullivan [oddly] did not explain what his concern was about improper use of the videos, nor did he explain whether he agreed with Mills' attorneys that the videos were more susceptible to misuse or distortion than the written transcripts that will be released.

"We're please that he ordered that the transcripts will be public. He put off for another day the audiovisual copies and if they will be released," said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. "Certainly, the judge reaffirming the public's right to know is nothing we're going to be complaining about.

The judge, who is an appointee of President Bill Clinton, did order that the videos be filed with the court. That raises the possibility that the recordings could eventually be released.

[41chevy]

The last line is "released" correct or should it be erased?    Paul

[kscarbel2]

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[kscarbel2]

Emails in Clinton Probe Dealt With Planned Drone Strikes

The Wall Street Journal  /  June 9, 2016

Some vaguely worded messages from U.S. diplomats in Pakistan and Washington used a less-secure communications system

At the center of a criminal probe involving Hillary Clinton’s handling of classified information is a series of emails between American diplomats in Islamabad and their superiors in Washington about whether to oppose specific drone strikes in Pakistan.

The 2011 and 2012 emails were sent via the “low side’’—government slang for a computer system for unclassified matters—as part of a secret arrangement that gave the State Department more of a voice in whether a Central Intelligence Agency drone strike went ahead, according to congressional and law-enforcement officials briefed on the Federal Bureau of Investigation probe.

Some of the emails were then forwarded by Mrs. Clinton’s aides to her personal email account, which routed them to a server she kept at her home in suburban New York when she was secretary of state, the officials said. Investigators have raised concerns that Mrs. Clinton’s personal server was less secure than State Department systems.

The vaguely worded messages didn’t mention the “CIA,” “drones” or details about the militant targets, officials said.

The still-secret emails are a key part of the FBI investigation that has long dogged Mrs. Clinton’s campaign, these officials said.

They were written within the often-narrow time frame in which State Department officials had to decide whether or not to object to drone strikes before the CIA pulled the trigger, the officials said.

Law-enforcement and intelligence officials said State Department deliberations about the covert CIA drone program should have been conducted over a more secure government computer system designed to handle classified information.

State Department officials told FBI investigators they communicated via the less-secure system on a few instances, according to congressional and law-enforcement officials. It happened when decisions about imminent strikes had to be relayed fast and the U.S. diplomats in Pakistan or Washington didn’t have ready access to a more-secure system, either because it was night or they were traveling.

Emails sent over the low side sometimes were informal discussions that occurred in addition to more-formal notifications through secure communications, the officials said.

One such exchange came just before Christmas in 2011, when the U.S. ambassador sent a short, cryptic note to his boss indicating a drone strike was planned. That sparked a back-and-forth among Mrs. Clinton’s senior advisers over the next few days, in which it was clear they were having the discussions in part because people were away from their offices for the holiday and didn’t have access to a classified computer, officials said.

The CIA drone campaign, though widely reported in Pakistan, is treated as secret by the U.S. government. Under strict U.S. classification rules, U.S. officials have been barred from discussing strikes publicly and even privately outside of secure communications systems.

The State Department said in January that 22 emails on Mrs. Clinton’s personal server at her home have been judged to contain top-secret information and aren’t being publicly released. Many of them dealt with whether diplomats concurred or not with the CIA drone strikes, congressional and law-enforcement officials said.

Several law-enforcement officials said they don’t expect any criminal charges to be filed as a result of the investigation, although a final review of the evidence will be made only after an expected FBI interview with Mrs. Clinton this summer.

One reason is that government workers at several agencies, including the departments of Defense, Justice and State, have occasionally resorted to the low-side system to give each other notice about sensitive but fast-moving events, according to one law-enforcement official.

When Mrs. Clinton has been asked about the possibility of being criminally charged over the email issue, she has repeatedly said “that is not going to happen.’’ She has said it was a mistake to use a personal server for email but it was a decision she made as a matter of convenience.

U.S. officials said there is no evidence Pakistani intelligence officials intercepted any of the low-side State Department emails or used them to protect militants.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner said the agency “is not going to speak to the content of documents, nor would we speak to any ongoing review.’’

The email issue has dogged Mrs. Clinton for more than a year. Despite her success in nailing down the Democratic presidential nomination, polls show many voters continue to doubt her truthfulness and integrity. Her campaign manager has acknowledged the email matter has hurt her.

Republican rival Donald Trump has attacked Mrs. Clinton repeatedly on the issue, calling her “Crooked Hillary,’’ saying what she did was a crime and suggesting the Justice Department would let her off because it is run by Democrats.

Beyond the campaign implications, the investigation exposes the latest chapter in a power struggle that pits the enforcers of strict secrecy, including the FBI and CIA, against some officials at the State Department and other agencies who want a greater voice in the use of covert lethal force around the globe, because of the impact it has on broader U.S. policy goals.

In the case of Pakistan, U.S. diplomats found themselves in a difficult position.

Despite being treated as top secret by the CIA, the drone program has long been in the public domain in Pakistan. Television stations there go live with reports of each strike, undermining U.S. efforts to foster goodwill and cooperation against militants through billions of dollars in American aid.

Pakistani officials, while publicly opposing the drone program, secretly consented to the CIA campaign by clearing airspace in the militant-dense tribal areas along the Afghan border, according to former U.S. and Pakistani officials.

CIA and White House officials credit a sharp ramp-up in drone strikes early in Mr. Obama’s presidency with battering al Qaeda’s leadership in the Pakistani tribal areas and helping protect U.S. forces next door in Afghanistan. Targets have also included some of the Pakistan government’s militant enemies.

In 2011, Pakistani officials began to push back in private against the drone program, raising questions for the U.S. over the extent to which the program still had their consent.

U.S. diplomats warned the CIA and White House they risked losing access to Pakistan’s airspace unless more discretion was shown, said current and former officials. Within the administration, State Department and military officials argued that the CIA needed to be more “judicious” about when strikes were launched. They weren’t challenging the spy agency’s specific choice of targets, but mainly the timing of strikes.

The CIA initially chafed at the idea of giving the State Department more of a voice in the process. Under a compromise reached around the year 2011, CIA officers would notify their embassy counterparts in Islamabad when a strike in Pakistan was planned, so then-U.S. ambassador Cameron Munter or another senior diplomat could decide whether to “concur” or “non-concur.” Mr. Munter declined to comment.

Diplomats in Islamabad would communicate the decision to their superiors in Washington. A main purpose was to give then-Secretary of State Clinton and her top aides a chance to consider whether she wanted to weigh in with the CIA director about a planned strike.

With the compromise, State Department-CIA tensions began to subside. Only once or twice during Mrs. Clinton’s tenure at State did U.S. diplomats object to a planned CIA strike, according to congressional and law-enforcement officials familiar with the emails.

U.S. diplomats in Pakistan and Washington usually relayed and discussed their concur or non-concur decisions via the State Department’s more-secure messaging system. But about a half-dozen times, when they were away from more-secure equipment, they improvised by sending emails on their smartphones about whether they backed an impending strike or not, the officials said.

Some officials chafed at pressure to send internal deliberations through intelligence channels, since they were discussing whether to push back against the CIA, congressional officials said.

The time available to the State Department to weigh in on a planned strike varied widely, from several days to as little as 20 or 30 minutes. “If a strike was imminent, it was futile to use the high side, which no one would see for seven hours,” said one official.

Adding to those communications hurdles, U.S. intelligence officials privately objected to the State Department even using its high-side system. They wanted diplomats to use a still-more-secure system called the Joint Worldwide Intelligence Community Systems, or JWICs. State Department officials don’t have ready access to that system, even in Washington. If drone-strike decisions were needed quickly, it wouldn’t be an option, officials said.

The Wall Street Journal first reported on the State Department-CIA tug-of-war over the drone program in 2011.

Under pressure to address critics abroad, Mr. Obama pledged to increase the transparency of drone operations by shifting, as much as possible, control of drone programs around the world to the U.S. military instead of the CIA. An exception was made for Pakistan.

But even in Pakistan, Mr. Obama recently signaled a shift. The drone strike that killed Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour last month was conducted by the military, not the CIA, and the outcome was disclosed.

While the CIA still controls drones over the tribal areas of Pakistan near Afghanistan, the pace of strikes has declined dramatically in recent years. U.S. officials say there are fewer al Qaeda targets there now that the CIA can find.

 

[kscarbel2]

Barack Obama mobilises for Hillary Clinton victory to seal legacy

The Financial Times  /  June 10, 2016

Energised by a desire to secure his legacy and a barely concealed contempt for Donald Trump, President Barack Obama says he is “fired up” to hit the campaign trail on behalf of Hillary Clinton.

The two former rivals will campaign together next week in Wisconsin and Mr Obama has already been rehearsing some of his lines. “This is not reality TV,” he said on The Tonight Show on Thursday. “You want the Republican nominee to be somebody who could do the job if they win.”

Buoyed by an approval rating that is now about 50 per cent, Mr Obama is likely to become the first president in recent times to play a prominent role in the election campaign for his successor.

After seven years of often trench warfare in Congress, he knows a Republican administration would seek to gut Obamacare and he makes no secret of his low view of Mr Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee.

“It is almost unique and unprecedented, the degree to which he has made it clear that this is important to him,” says Gil Troy, a presidential historian at McGillUniversity. “For Trump to become president would be an enormous slap in the face. People would ask what had gone so wrong in America for a figure like Trump to become president.”

Only two years ago, Mr Obama found himself shunned by many of the Democratic party’s candidates in the 2014 midterm elections. However, according to Gallup, the president’s approval rating is now 53 per cent, compared with the low-40s it was at for most of 2014.

Christopher Wlezien at the University of Texas and Robert Erikson from Columbia University have calculated that in all but one of the past 16 elections, the sitting president’s party won the popular vote if his approval rating was above 48 per cent in the second quarter.

“Presidential elections, especially in the US, are a referendum on the incumbent,” says Mr Wlezien. “It is a choice about whether you want another four years.”

Mr Obama’s role is likely to be twofold. Having attacked Mitt Romney in 2012 over his business record, the Democrats appear to have decided that the most effective approach against Mr Trump is to argue he is unfit for the office because of lack of knowledge and his temperament. The president seems eager to ridicule the Republican candidate.

When Theodore Roosevelt hand-picked William Howard Taft to run in the 1908 election to be his successor, a columnist joked that the candidate’s name stood for: “Take Advice From Theodore”. Yet no modern president about to leave office has played a major role in an election.

Lyndon Johnson and George W Bush were too discredited to have much influence in the 1968 and 2008 elections, respectively, and in 1960 Dwight Eisenhower did few favours for Richard Nixon. Asked to name an idea he adopted from his vice-president, Eisenhower responded: “If you give me a week, I might think of one.”

Despite being popular presidents in their last year, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton also took back seats. In Reagan’s case, by 1988 he was eager for retirement.

Many of Al Gore’s aides in 2000 wanted to make more use of Mr Clinton, but the then vice-president was concerned about the taint of the Monica Lewinsky scandal and wanted to escape the Clinton shadow. “Al Gore was worried that he would be smothered by the charisma and animal magnetism of Bill Clinton,” says Mr Troy.

Even then, Mr Clinton managed to steal the show at the Democratic convention in Los Angeles, his theatrical entrance to the stage captured by a camera that followed him like a prize fighter down a hall and into the bright lights.

Mr Gore’s experience highlights one of the main dangers for Mrs Clinton in leaning on the president. At times a wooden performer, she too could find herself outshone by Mr Obama.

A prominent role for the two-term president would cement Mrs Clinton’s position as the status quo candidate in an election year marked by populist anger. Mr Obama could also galvanise turnout among Republican voters — something Mrs Clinton is already likely to do. The president’s rising approval rating is not the product of softening opposition from the right.

“The conservative movement over the last decade has come to be substantially defined by opposition to Obama,” says Henry Olsen, a conservative analyst at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

However, he points out one of the reasons Mr Romney lost was the historically high turnout by African-Americans — something Mr Obama might be able to galvanise again this year.

“For conservatives, the upside of Obama being involved is balanced out by the downsides,” says Mr Olsen.

[kscarbel2]

State Dept. Emails Shed Light on How Clinton Donor Was Named to Intelligence Board

Time Magazine  /  June 10, 2016

Newly released State Department emails help reveal how a major Clinton Foundation donor was placed on a sensitive government intelligence advisory board even though he had no obvious experience in the field, a decision that appeared to baffle the department’s professional staff.

The emails further reveal how, after inquiries from ABC News, the Clinton staff sought to “protect the name” of the Secretary, “stall” the ABC News reporter and ultimately accept the resignation of the donor just two days later.

Copies of dozens of internal emails were provided to ABC News by the conservative political group Citizens United, which obtained them under the Freedom of Information Act after more the two years of litigation with the government.

A prolific fundraiser for Democratic candidates and contributor to the Clinton Foundation, who later traveled with Bill Clinton on a trip to Africa, Rajiv K. Fernando’s only known qualification for a seat on the International Security Advisory Board (ISAB) was his technological know-how. The Chicago securities trader, who specialized in electronic investing, sat alongside an august collection of nuclear scientists, former cabinet secretaries and members of Congress to advise Hillary Clinton on the use of tactical nuclear weapons and on other crucial arms control issues.

“We had no idea who he was,” one board member told ABC News.

Fernando’s lack of any known background in nuclear security caught the attention of several board members, and when ABC News first contacted the State Department in August 2011 seeking a copy of his resume, the emails show that confusion ensued among the career government officials who work with the advisory panel.

“I have spoken to [State Department official and ISAB Executive Director Richard Hartman] privately, and it appears there is much more to this story that we’re unaware of,” wrote Jamie Mannina, the press aide who fielded the ABC News request. “We must protect the Secretary’s and Under Secretary’s name, as well as the integrity of the Board. I think it’s important to get down to the bottom of this before there’s any response.

“As you can see from the attached, it’s natural to ask how he got onto the board when compared to the rest of the esteemed list of members,” Mannina wrote, referring to an attachment that was not included in the recent document release.

Fernando himself would not answer questions from ABC News in 2011 about what qualified him for a seat on the board or led to his appointment. When ABC News finally caught up with Fernando at the 2012 Democratic convention, he became upset and said he was "not at liberty" to speak about it. Security threatened to have the ABC News reporter arrested.

Fernando's expertise appeared to be in the arena of high-frequency trading -- a form of computer-generated stock trading. At the time of his appointment, he headed a firm, Chopper Trading, that was a leader in that field.

Fernando's history of campaign giving dated back at least to 2003 and was prolific -- and almost exclusively to Democrats. He was an early supporter of Hillary Clinton's 2008 bid for president, giving maximum contributions to her campaign, and to HillPAC, in 2007 and 2008. He also served as a fundraising bundler for Clinton, gathering more than $100,000 from others for her White House bid. After Barack Obama bested Clinton for the 2008 nomination, Fernando became a major fundraiser for the Obama campaign. Prior to his State Department appointment, Fernando had given between $100,000 and $250,000 to the William J. Clinton Foundation, and another $30,000 to a political advocacy group, WomenCount, that indirectly helped Hillary Clinton retire her lingering 2008 campaign debts by renting her campaign email list.

The appointment qualified Fernando for one of the highest levels of top secret access, the emails show. Among those with whom Fernando served on the International Security Advisory Board was David A. Kay, the former head of the Iraq Survey Group and United Nations Chief Weapons Inspector; Lt. Gen. Brent Scowcroft, a former National Security Advisor to two presidents; two former congressmen; and former Sen. Chuck Robb. William Perry, the former Secretary of Defense, chaired the panel.

“It is certainly a serious, knowledgeable and experienced group of experts,” said Bruce Blair, a Princeton professor whose principal research covers the technical and policy steps on the path toward the verifiable elimination of nuclear weapons. “Much of the focus has been on questions of nuclear stability and the risks of nuclear weapons use by Russia and Pakistan.”

The newly released emails reveal that after ABC News started asking questions in August 2011, a State Department official who worked with the advisory board couldn’t immediately come up with a justification for Fernando serving on the panel. His and other emails make repeated references to “S”; ABC News has been told this is a common way to refer to the Secretary of State.

“The true answer is simply that S staff (Cheryl Mills) added him,” wrote Wade Boese, who was Chief of Staff for the Office of the Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, in an email to Mannina, the press aide. “Raj was not on the list sent to S; he was added at their insistence.”

Mills, a former deputy White House counsel, was serving as Clinton’s chief of staff at the time, and has been a longtime legal and political advisor.

Four minutes later, Boese wrote to his boss, Richard Hartman, to alert him that Ellen Tauscher, who was then the Undersecretary for State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs, would be meeting with Mills to devise a response to the ABC News request.

“Sorry this has become a headache,” he wrote.

Hartman wrote the next morning to say he would “come up and brief you... about where Raj Fernando stands and the ABC News investigative journalist inquiries. You do need to hear about it.” Separately, in an email to another official, Hartman noted that it was "Cheryl Mills, who added Mr. Fernando’s name to the list of ISAB nominees."

When ABC News sent a follow-up inquiry about the qualifications of another board appointee, Massachusetts state Rep. Harold P. Naughton, Jr., Boese wrote to Hartman to say the department would have a far easier time explaining Naughton’s credentials. “The case for Rep. Naughton is an easy one. We are on solid ground,” he said.

By this point, Fernando himself had been looped into the discussion. He and Hartman exchanged emails, but the entire text of Fernando’s letter was redacted by the State Department prior to its release.

Twice, Mannina was instructed to stall with ABC News, before Mills sent a public statement. It announced Fernando’s abrupt decision to step down.

“Mr. Fernando chose to resign from the Board earlier this month citing additional time needed to devote to his business,” it reads, noting that membership on the board was required to be “fairly balanced in terms of the points of view represented and the functions to be performed by the advisory committee.”

“As President and CEO of Chopper Trading, Mr. Fernando brought a unique perspective to ISAB. He has years of experience in the private sector in implementing sophisticated risk management tools, information technology and international finance,” the statement says.

The statement was emailed to ABC News two days after Fernando’s resignation and four days after the initial ABC News inquiry.

Fernando’s letter of resignation to Clinton says he “intended to devote a substantial amount of time to the work of ISAB in furtherance of its objectives. However, the unique, unexpected, and excessive volatility in the international markets these last few weeks and months require[d him] to focus [his] energy on the operations of [his] company.”

Additional emails collected from Hillary Clinton’s personal server only hint at her possible involvement in Fernando’s selection to the board. The records request for documents about Fernando’s appointment produced a chain of correspondence from 2010 with the subject line “ISAB” -- or International Security Advisory Board. In those, Mills writes, “The secretary had two other names she wanted looked at.” The names are redacted. Mills then forwarded the response to “H,” which is the designation for Clinton’s personal account. Three minutes later Clinton forwards the email chain to another State official and says simply, “Pls print.”

The Clinton campaign declined requests from ABC News to make Mills available for an interview. Campaign spokesman Nick Merrill deferred to the U.S. State Department, which issued a statement saying the board’s charter specifically calls for a membership that reflects “a balance of backgrounds and points of view. Furthermore, it is not unusual for the State Department Chief of Staff to be involved in personnel matters.”

Fernando did not respond to messages left by ABC News at home and mobile numbers listed for Fernando, nor to a letter left at the office of his current business.

Today State Department spokesperson Mark Toner told reporters that Fernando had been fully vetted, but Toner said he could not speak to his specific qualifications. When asked if he came from a security background, Toner said, “I don’t believe so.”

“I apologize, I don’t have his [resume] in front of me,” Toner said. “All I know is that the charter does lay out or stipulate that [they're] looking for a broad range of experiences. It’s not unimaginable that a businessman, an international businessman, might bring a certain level of expertise or knowledge or experience to such a job.”

The State Department’s website lists former members of the ISAB, but Fernando’s name is not among them. Toner was unable to explain why the name was missing and when asked if the list was comprehensive, said, “Apparently not.”

As is customary with a new administration, the make-up of the board changed substantially when Clinton took over the State Department, according to Amb. James Woolsey, who served on the panel from 2006 to 2009. But the seriousness of its mission remained the same.

He said the board’s primary purpose was to gather an array of experts on nuclear weapons and arms control to constantly assess and update the nation’s nuclear strategy.

“Most things that involve nuclear weapons and nuclear strategy are dealt with at a pretty sensitive basis -- top secret,” he said, noting that participants meet in a secure facility and are restricted in what materials they can discuss.

That is not typically the realm of political donors, Woolsey said. Though, he added, it would not be impossible for someone lacking a security background to make a contribution to the panel. “It would depend on how smart and dedicated this person was... I would think you would have to devote some real time to getting up to speed,” he said.

Fernando is now a board member of a private group called the American Security Project, which describes itself as “a nonpartisan organization created to educate the American public and the world about the changing nature of national security in the 21st Century.” He also identifies himself online as a member of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and says he's involved with a Washington think tank.

And he continued to donate to Democrats, and to Clinton. He emerged as one of the first “bundlers” to raise money for Clinton’s 2016 bid. And in July 2015, he hosted a fundraiser for Clinton at his Chicago home. Fernando has also continued to donate to the Clinton Foundation. He now is listed on the charity’s website as having given between $1 million and $5 million.

About six months after Fernando resigned from the State Department advisory board, he was invited to attend a White House State Dinner, honoring the British Prime Minister. And this summer Fernando will serve as a super delegate at the Democratic National Convention. According to Chicago media reports, he has committed to supporting Clinton.

The following emails were obtained by the conservative political group Citizens United, which obtained them under the Freedom of Information Act, and were provided to ABC News. ABC News has arranged the emails in chronological order. Scroll through the emails below or CLICK HERE to open them in a new window.

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[41chevy]

17 hours ago, kscarbel2 said:

Barack Obama mobilises for Hillary Clinton victory to seal legacy

The Financial Times  /  June 10, 2016

Energised by a desire to secure his legacy and a barely concealed contempt for Donald Trump, President Barack Obama says he is “fired up” to hit the campaign trail on behalf of Hillary Clinton.

The two former rivals will campaign together next week in Wisconsin and Mr Obama has already been rehearsing some of his lines. “This is not reality TV,” he said on The Tonight Show on Thursday. “You want the Republican nominee to be somebody who could do the job if they win.”

Buoyed by an approval rating that is now about 50 per cent, Mr Obama is likely to become the first president in recent times to play a prominent role in the election campaign for his successor.

After seven years of often trench warfare in Congress, he knows a Republican administration would seek to gut Obamacare and he makes no secret of his low view of Mr Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee.

“It is almost unique and unprecedented, the degree to which he has made it clear that this is important to him,” says Gil Troy, a presidential historian at McGillUniversity. “For Trump to become president would be an enormous slap in the face. People would ask what had gone so wrong in America for a figure like Trump to become president.

So the American tax payers must foot the bull for Obama to fly around the county to stump for Hillary.

One brief mention of a bill or issue he wants action on takes it from a campaign trip paid for by him or the Democratic party, to a Presidential business trip that the tax payers fund.

[kscarbel2]

5 hours ago, 41chevy said:

So the American tax payers must foot the bull for Obama to fly around the county to stump for Hillary.

One brief mention of a bill or issue he wants action on takes it from a campaign trip paid for by him or the Democratic party, to a Presidential business trip that the tax payers fund.

Any educated, ordinarily prudent individual couldn't possibly believe that either one of these dysfunctional and over-age primadonnas would actually be allowed to head the United States of America.

If one believes that it's all real, then its amusing to see two people who surely despise each other working together "for the sake of the party". The party system is highly overrated (but it's a key pillar of the "show").

[41chevy]

3 hours ago, kscarbel2 said:

Any educated, ordinarily prudent individual couldn't possibly believe that either one of these dysfunctional and over-age primadonnas would actually be allowed to head the United States of America.

If one believes that it's all real, then its amusing to see two people who surely despise each other working together "for the sake of the party". The party system is highly overrated (but it's a key pillar of the "show").

And the "Show" is something that 99% don't understand or don't want to believe, that it's all smoke and mirrors for the public.    Paul

[kscarbel2]

"In 1978 and 1979, lawyer and First Lady of Arkansas Hillary Rodham engaged in a series of trades of cattle futures contracts. Her initial $1,000 investment had generated nearly $100,000 when she stopped trading after ten months. In 1994, after Hillary Rodham Clinton had become First Lady of the United States, the trading became the subject of considerable controversy regarding the likelihood of such a spectacular rate of return, possible conflict of interest, and allegations of disguised bribery,[1] allegations that Clinton strongly denied. There were no official investigations of the trading and Clinton was never charged with any wrongdoing."

Rodham had no experience in such financial instruments.

Bill Clinton's salary as Arkansas Attorney General and then Governor of Arkansas was modest and Rodham later said she had been interested in building a financial cushion for the future (the ill-fated Whitewater Development Corporation would be another such effort from this time).

Starting in October 1978, when Bill Clinton was Attorney General and on the verge of being elected Governor, she was guided by James Blair, a friend, lawyer, outside counsel to Tyson Foods, Arkansas' largest employer, and, since 1977, a futures trader who was doing so well he encouraged friends and family to enter the commodity markets.

Blair in turn traded through, and relied upon cattle markets expertise from, broker Robert L. "Red" Bone of Refco, a former Tyson executive and professional poker player.

Rodham later wrote that she educated herself about the market and followed it closely, winning and losing money.

By January 1979, she was up $26,000; but later, she would lose $16,000 in a single trade. At one point she owed in excess of $100,000 to Refco as part of covering losses, but no margin calls were made by Refco against her. Near the end of the trading, Blair correctly sold short and gave her a $40,000 gain in one afternoon.

In July 1979, once she became pregnant with Chelsea Clinton, Clinton said "I lost my nerve for gambling [and] walked away from the table $100,000 ahead."

She briefly traded sugar futures contracts and other non-cattle commodities in October 1979, but more conservatively, through Stephens Inc. During this period, she made about $6,500 in gains (which she failed to pay taxes on at the time, consequently later paying some $14,600 in federal and state tax penalties in the 1990s).

After her daughter was born in February 1980, she moved all her commodities gains into U.S. Treasury Bonds.

The profits made during the cattle trading first came to public light in a March 18, 1994 report by The New York Times, which had been reviewing the Clintons' financial records for two months. The matter immediately gained considerable press attention, and coincided with the beginning of congressional hearings over the Whitewater controversy.

Media pressure continued to build, and on April 22, 1994, Hillary Clinton gave an unusual press conference under a portrait of Abraham Lincoln in the State Dining Room of the White House, to address questions on both matters.

She stated that she had done the trading, but often relying upon the advice of Blair, and having him place orders for her; she said she did not believe she had received preferential treatment in the process. She also downplayed the dangers of such trading: "I didn't think it was that big a risk. [Blair] and the people he was talking with knew what they were doing."

Afterwards she won media praise for the manner in which she conducted herself during this, her first adversarial press conference; Time called her "open, candid, but above all unflappable ... the real message was her attitude and her poise. The confiding tone and relaxed body language ... immediately drew approving reviews."

Financial writer Edward Chancellor noted in 1999 that Clinton made her money by betting "on the short side at a time when cattle prices doubled."

Bloomberg News columnist Caroline Baum and hedge fund manager Victor Niederhoffer published a detailed 1995 analysis in National Review that found typical patterns and behaviors in commodities trading not met and concluded that her explanations for her results were highly implausible. Possibilities were raised that broker actions such as front running of trades, or a long straddle with the winning positions thereof assigned to a favored client, had taken place.

In a 1998 article, Marshall Magazine, a publication of the Marshall School of Business, sought to frame the trading, the nature of the results, and possible explanations for them:

These results are quite remarkable. Two-thirds of Hillary’s trades showed a profit by the end of the day she made them, and 80 percent were ultimately profitable. Many of her trades took place at or near the best prices of the day.

Only four explanations can account for these remarkable results. Blair may have been an exceptionally good trader. Hillary Clinton may have been exceptionally lucky. Blair may have been front-running other orders. Or Blair may have arranged to have a broker fraudulently assign trades to benefit Clinton's account.

Chicago Mercantile Exchange records indicated that $40,000 of her profits came from larger trades initiated by James Blair. According to exchange records, "Red" Bone, the commodities broker that facilitated the trades on behalf of Refco, reportedly because Blair was a good client, allowed Rodham to maintain her positions even though she did not have enough money in her account to cover her activity.

For example, she was allowed to order 10 cattle futures contracts, normally a $12,000 investment, in her first commodity trade in 1978 although she had only $1,000 in her account at the time.

Bone denied any wrongdoing in conjunction with Rodham's trading and said he did not recall ever dealing with Rodham personally.

As it happened, during the period of Rodham's trading, Refco was under investigation by the Mercantile Exchange for systematic violations of its margin trading rules and reporting requirements regarding cattle trading.

In December 1979, the exchange issued a three-year suspension to Bone and a $250,000 fine of Refco (at the time, the largest such penalty imposed by the exchange).

The trading practices in Refco's Springdale, Arkansas, office, which Bone was the manager of, came under investigation following the October 1979 collapse of cattle prices, which caused traders with that office to lose close to $20 million.

A number of the traders, including Blair, sued Refco and its chair, Thomas Dittmer, as well as Bone, on grounds of having manipulated prices and thus precipitating the collapse. Blair and Refco reached an out-of-court settlement.

In a case that went to trial, an Arkansas jury found in favor of some of the traders and against Refco and Dittmer, but that verdict was later overturned by a federal appellate court. Court documents detailed some of the alleged trading practices at Refco, including block trading, end-of-day allocation, backdating of trades, and waived margin calls.

Two brokers at Springdale, Bill McCurdy and Steven Johns, testifying about another trader's case, said they participated in a cover-up of block trading on a day in June 1979 that happens to coincide with the opening of what would become Rodham's single most profitable trade.

After the Rodham trading matter became public, Leo Melamed, a former chairman of the Mercantile Exchange, was brought in by request of the White House to review the trading records. On April 11, 1994, he said that the whole matter was "a tempest in a teapot" and that while her brokers had not required her to provide typical margin cushions, she had not knowingly benefited.

On May 26, 1994, after the new records concerning the larger Blair trades came to light, he said "I have no reason to change my original assessment. Mrs. Clinton violated no rules in the course of her transactions."

But as to the question of whether Hillary had been allocated profits from larger block trades, he said of the new accounting, "It doesn't suggest that there was allocation, and it doesn't prove there wasn't."

Hillary Clinton's defenders, including White House Counsel Lloyd Cutler, maintained throughout that she had made her own decisions, that her own money was constantly at risk, and that she made both winning and losing trades throughout the ten months.^[20] Regarding suggestions that Blair had favored Clinton so that Tyson Foods could gain influence with Governor Clinton, they pointed out that Tyson had, in fact, later opposed Clinton during his 1980 re-election bid, an observation the First Lady had also made at her news conference.

Clinton's defenders also stressed that Blair and others stayed in the market longer than Rodham and lost a good amount of what they had earlier made later that summer and fall, showing that the risk was real. Indeed, some reports had Blair losing $15 million and Bone was reported as bankrupt.^[7]

There never was any official governmental investigation into, or findings about, or charges brought regarding Hillary Rodham's cattle futures trading (as opposed to Refco practices overall). Furthermore, by the time her trading results became known, 15 years had passed and statute of limitations issues may have been pertinent.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hillary Clinton Turned $1,000 Into $99,540, White House Says

Stephen Labaton, The New York Times  /  March 30, 1994

The White House said today that in 1978 Hillary Rodham Clinton invested $1,000 in commodities futures and that the investment grew in 10 months of trading in the notoriously volatile market into a gain of nearly $100,000.

Seeking to dispel suggestions that the trades were risk-free and improperly arranged by an Arkansas lawyer who represents one of the state's most powerful companies, the White House issued a statement this afternoon that said the First Lady had put up her own money and that she bore all of the financial risks in a marketplace where three out of four investors lose money.

The officials also released a year's worth of brokerage statements from one of Mrs. Clinton's two accounts. They show winnings outrunning losses about three-to-one. 'Too Nerve-Racking'

Senior advisers to President Clinton and his wife said in a briefing this afternoon at the White House that Mrs. Clinton based her trades on information in The Wall Street Journal, and that she stopped trading by 1980, despite her success, because, as one senior aide put it, "she did not have the stomach for it any more and found it to be too nerve-racking."

The string of winning trades began in October 1978, as Mr. Clinton, then the state's Attorney General, was leading in polls in the race for Governor.

The White House insisted today that Mrs. Clinton received no improper financial assistance on the trades from the lawyer, James B. Blair, a close friend who at the time was the top lawyer for Tyson Foods of Springdale, Ark., the nation's biggest poultry company. Mr. Blair has said that he had suggested that she get into the commodities market, and that he used his knowledge of trading to guide her along the way.

During Mr. Clinton's tenure as Governor, Tyson benefited from several state decisions, including favorable environmental rulings, $9 million in state loans, and the placement of company executives on important state boards.

Mr. Blair and the Clintons denied any favoritism or conflict of interest when the trades were first reported earlier this month.

The commodities trades were the most successful investment the Clintons ever made. The nearly $100,000 profit enabled them to buy a house, invest in securities and real estate and provide a nest egg for their daughter, Chelsea.

In its statement, the White House said Mrs. Clinton accumulated trading profits of $49,069 in 1978 and losses of $22,548, for a net gain of $26,541. In 1979, the White House said, she had trading profits of $109,600 and losses of $36,600, for a net gain of about $73,000.

Mrs. Clinton did a small amount of commodities trading in a second account through her stockbroker at Stephens Inc. in Little Rock, Ark. In that account, according to officials, she had a net trading loss of about $1,000; she closed the account in March 1980, shortly after Chelsea was born.

The release of the trading documents today and tax returns made public on Friday show that in 1978 and 1979 the Clintons took on two high-risk investments with little money down but with Arkansas business figures as advisers or partners. One was the commodities trades.

The other was the Whitewater development. The tax returns released on Friday show the Clintons making a $500 investment as their total capital contribution to the Whitewater Development Company, a real estate venture in the Ozarks.

Their partner in the venture was a close friend, James B. McDougal, who later became a banker whose savings and loan was subject to broad state regulation. Critics of the Clintons have asserted that Mr. McDougal, who guaranteed a $200,000 loan taken out by the partnership, carried the brunt of the risk on the Whitewater venture.

The Clintons say that they ultimately lost about $42,000, mostly from interest payments, in Whitewater. But their relationship with Mr. McDougal is now being investigated by the independent counsel, Robert B. Fiske Jr., who is examining whether Mr. McDougal's savings and loan improperly diverted money into Whitewater or into Mr. Clinton's 1984 campaign for government.

Mr. Fiske said today that he could not comment on whether he would look into the commodities trades. But his charter is written broadly enough to enable him to examine the trades if he decided they were relevant. 'Bull Market' in Cattle

Brokers and commodities officials differed today in their assessment of the account given by the White House.

Jack F. Sandner, chairman of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, a hub of commodities trading, said that such profits were not unusual during the cattle futures market of the late 1970's, which he described as one of the most booming ever.

"At the time the First Lady was trading, it happened to coincide with the biggest bull market in the history of cattle," he said. "When you are lucky enough to catch a dramatic market, you can take $1,000 and scale up and you can make a million. If somebody said they made a million dollars, I wouldn't be surprised at all."

But Bill Biederman, vice president of research at Allendale Inc., a research and brokerage firm in suburban Chicago, said such huge winnings are very unusual in the risky commodities market. "It is possible but it is rare," he said. "This has happened just a few times in my career, where I've made millions on a small amount of money." He said it was also unusual for a customer to abandon the markets after such a profitable run.

In commodities trading, a speculator essentially bets on whether the future price of a commodity will rise or decline, and the White House said today that Mrs. Clinton's investments were in cattle, soybeans, sugar, hogs, copper and lumber. Brokers in the Refco office have said that most of her profits were in cattle futures.

Many of her trades were done on margin, a common practice of investing by using borrowed funds. But regulators and traders said today that most brokers required customers trading on margin to put up additional collateral in case there are sudden losses.

"They would want some kind of a minimum until such time as a customer establishes a track record," said David Gary, a spokesman for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

Joseph Collins, a lawyer for Refco, said that with the passage of time it is difficult to determine whether the Springdale office had such a rule. But he said that generally the decision whether or not to take on a customer with limited resources would be up to the individual broker. Consulting Blair

White House officials acknowledged today that Mr. Blair was consulted on many of the commodities trades and was viewed as an important financial adviser, but they said other people, who they could not identify, were also consulted. A senior aide to Mrs. Clinton also said today that she occasionally spoke to her broker about the trades.

But brokers in the Springdale office of Refco where Mrs. Clinton executed the trades, including the one she describes as her personal broker, said in interviews in recent weeks that they have no recollection of ever talking with her about the trades.

Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Blair have said that they used Robert L. (Red) Bone, the broker who founded the Springdale office of Refco, a Chicago commodities firm, to execute the trades. But Mr. Bone, who worked at Tyson for 13 years until 1973, insisted in several interviews this month that he has no recollection of ever trading for Mrs. Clinton or talking to her about commodities trades.

"I can't recall ever dealing with the Clintons," Mr. Bone said in an interview on March 9. After Mr. Blair suggested that Mr. Bone was trying to protect the Clintons' privacy and recommended that a reporter try to talk to the broker again, Mr. Bone again insisted that he had no recollection of ever trading for the Clintons. Mr. Bone could not be reached for comment tonight.

During the 1970's, Mr. Bone had been disciplined by regulators and settled charges that he tried to corner the egg market and that he had failed to keep proper records. Those accusations did not involve Mrs. Clinton's account. Mr. Bone's lawyer in both the regulatory proceedings and other legal disputes over the last 15 years has been Mr. Blair.

According to the White House, Mrs. Clinton's commodity account was a type in which the client must personally approve each trade.

Thomas A. Russo, a New York lawyer who was the Commodity Futures Trading Commission's first director of trading and markets, said the only possible exception to this rule arises when a client grants power of attorney to a third party and allows them to order trades.

The rules in effect at the time, Mr. Russo said, otherwise required clients to specify the commodity, the price range and the amount. The only matter that could be left to the broker in such a circumstance is the precise timing of the order, he said.

Mr. Blair earlier this month said that he and Mrs. Clinton discussed potential trades; he said he gave her advice on whether to bet on prices rising or falling and she decided on the size of the trades. Omitted Details

Tax returns disclosed last Friday show that the Clintons claimed about $100,000 in capital gains from the trades. The returns, which the Clintons had declined to disclose during the campaign, were made public only after a New York Times article on March 18 revealed that the Clintons had made the commodities profits. But in the tax returns the Clintons ignored Internal Revenue Service instructions to detail how much money was invested, how much was earned and on what dates the trades occurred.

Today the White House released brokerage statements that show many of the trades. The statements appear on an account that spells Mrs. Clinton's first name wrong and begin with an entry for cash for $1,000 on Oct. 11, 1978.

The White House said today that it released the information on Mrs. Clinton's stake in response to a Newsweek article published on Monday that quoted a Columbia University law professor as saying that Mrs. Clinton's investments were financially supported by Mr. Blair and could be considered to be a gift. The professor, Marvin A. Chirelstein, denied making such a statement.

Evan Thomas, Washington bureau chief of Newsweek, said today that the report had been the result of "an honest mistake and we regret that."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hillary Clinton Futures Trades Detailed

 Charles R. Babcock, The Washington Post  /  May 27, 1994

Hillary Rodham Clinton was allowed to order 10 cattle futures contracts, normally a $12,000 investment, in her first commodity trade in 1978 although she had only $1,000 in her account at the time, according to trade records the White House released yesterday.

The computerized records of her trades, which the White House obtained from the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, show for the first time how she was able to turn her initial investment into $6,300 overnight. In about 10 months of trading, she made nearly $100,000, relying heavily on advice from her friend James B. Blair, an experienced futures trader.

The new records also raise the possibility that some of her profits -- as much as $40,000 – came from larger trades ordered by someone else and then shifted to her account, Leo Melamed, a former chairman of the Merc who reviewed the records for the White House, said in an interview. He said the discrepancies in Clinton's records also could have been caused by human error.

Even allocated trades would not necessarily have benefited Clinton, Melamed added. "I have no reason to change my original assessment. Mrs. Clinton violated no rules in the course of her transactions," he said.

Lisa Caputo, Clinton's spokeswoman, said the documents were released yesterday "to give as complete a picture as possible" of her trades. She said Clinton had never before seen them.

Blair, who urged Clinton to enter the high-risk futures market and ordered most of her trades, said in a recent interview that he "talked her into" her first futures trade in October 1978 before paperwork on her account was completed. It was liquidated quickly, he recalled, because "it was bigger than she wanted and required more money."

A close examination of her individual trades underscores Blair's pivotal role. It also shows that Robert L. "Red" Bone, who ran the Springdale, Ark., office of Ray E. Friedman and Co. (Refco), allowed Clinton to initiate and maintain many trading positions – besides the first – when she did not have enough money in her account to cover them.

Why would Bone do so? Bone could not be reached for comment, but Blair said he thought he knew why. "I was a very good customer," he said, noting he paid Bone $800,000 in commissions over the years. "They weren't going to hassle me. If I brought them somebody, they weren't going to hassle them."

Besides, he added, Bone would not worry if he agreed with his clients' bet on which way the price of a given contract would go.

Blair, who at the time was outside counsel to Tyson Foods Inc., Arkansas' largest employer, says he was advising Clinton out of friendship, not to seek political gain for his state-regulated client. At the time of many of the trades, Bill Clinton was governor.

Hillary Clinton has said she made all the trading decisions herself and has tried to play down Blair's role. But she acknowledged in April, three weeks after her trades were first disclosed, that Blair actually placed most of the trades.

Blair advised Clinton again on July 17, 1979. He recalled that she started that trading day by losing $26,460 on 10 cattle contracts she had held for more than a month, by far her worst loss as a futures player. On his recommendation, he said, she immediately went back into the market. She acquired 50 new cattle contracts – worth $1.4 million -- and when the price moved in her favor, unloaded them around noon for a quick gain of $10,550. This recouped part of her loss.

Blair said Clinton and other friends he suggested trades for had lost money that spring on feeder cattle. Those trades "caused everyone some grief," he said. "I'm sure I was pressing to get everyone back above water" in recommending the quick and bold day trade.

The White House defense of Hillary Clinton's preferential treatment was that other customers in the same office also were allowed to trade without having enough cash in their accounts.

While Clinton's account was wildly successful to an outsider, it was small compared to what others were making in the cattle futures market in the 1978-79 period. An investigation of the cattle futures market at that time by Rep. Neal Smith (D-Iowa) found that in one 16-month period 32 traders made more than $110 million in profits from large trades -- those of 50 contracts or more. Clinton traded positions of 50 or more contracts only three times.

The records the White House released yesterday were part of an investigative file from 1979, when the exchange charged Bone and Refco with violations of its record keeping and margin requirement rules. Bone was suspended for three years; Refco paid a $250,000 fine, then the largest in the exchange's history. Internal memos from that investigation cover transactions from the same period in June in which Clinton was trading, but not the same trades. In one instance, the Merc found Bone and a fellow broker were ordering 1,000 cattle contracts at a time – far over the limit allowed at the time – and then allocating them to other customers.

One internal Merc memo said "there is reason to believe" that a majority of Bone's accounts were traded without the clients' permission. Blair said that Bone at times traded his personal account without permission.

Blair said he doubted Bone traded Clinton's account without her permission.

Melamed said it was "impossible" to determine the exact cause for the discrepancies between the Merc computer record of Clinton's trades and the trading records she received from Refco, which the White House released earlier.

She said that for six trades, her initial trading position in the Refco records were not reflected in the Merc documents. On one other trade neither her purchase nor sale was included. On that trade she netted $12,150 on 15 cattle contracts she held for four days.

Clinton reported a loss of $2,480 on one of the trades in question, Melamed noted.

One was a "day trade" on hog contracts that netted $2,553. Melamed said "day trades" are the only way to assure profit even if favorable trading positions are allocated to a customer's account. Any position held overnight would be subject to the rise and fall in prices in the volatile futures market, he added.

In commodities futures trading, an account that falls below the "maintenance margin" typically triggers a "margin call," where the trader must put up sufficient cash to cover the contracts. Although Hillary Rodham Clinton's account was under-margined for nearly all of July 1979, no margin calls were made, no additional cash was put up, and she eventually reaped a $60,000 profit.

June 29 ......... $56,466 (Margin: Value account should have had to continue trading.)

July 12 ........ -$24,243

July 17 ......... $22,537 (Account value: Total cash on hand plus (or minus) paper value of contracts.)

July 20 ......... $61,537

July 23, 1979: She withdrew $60,000 and never traded again, closing the account in October.

[kscarbel2]

Associated Press  /  June 24, 2016

Former Secretary Hillary Clinton failed to turn over a copy of a key message involving problems caused by her use of a private homebrew email server, the State Department said Thursday.

The disclosure raises the question of whether other work-related emails were deleted by the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.

The email was included within messages exchanged Nov. 13, 2010, between Clinton and her Deputy Chief of Staff Huma Abedin.

At the time, emails sent from Clinton’s BlackBerry device and routed through her private clintonemail.com server in the basement of her New York home were being blocked by the State Department’s spam filter.

A suggested remedy was for Clinton to obtain a state.gov email account.

“Let’s get separate address or device but I don’t want any risk of the personal being accessible,” Clinton responded to Abedin.

Clinton never used a government account that was set up for her, instead continuing to rely on her private server until leaving office.

The email was not among the thousands of emails Clinton turned over to the State Department in response to public records lawsuits seeking copies of her official correspondence.

Abedin, who also used a private account on Clinton’s server, provided a copy from her own inbox after the State Department asked her to return any work-related emails. That copy of the email was publicly cited last month in an audit by the State Department’s inspector general that concluded Clinton and her team ignored clear internal guidance that her email setup violated federal standards and could have left sensitive material vulnerable to hackers.

“While this exchange was not part of the approximately 55,000 pages provided to the State Department by former Secretary Clinton, the exchange was included within the set of documents Ms. Abedin provided the department in response to our March 2015 request,” said State Department spokesman John Kirby.

Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon said Clinton provided “all potentially work-related emails” that were still in her possession when she received the 2014 request from the State Department.

Fallon refused to say whether Clinton deleted any work-related emails before they were reviewed by her legal team.

Clinton’s lead lawyer, David Kendall, refused to comment.

The November 2010 email was among documents released under court order Wednesday to the conservative legal advocacy group Judicial Watch, which has sued the State Department over access to public records related to Clinton’s tenure as Secretary of State between 2009 and 2013. The case is one of about three dozen lawsuits over access to records related to Clinton, including one filed by the AP.

Before turning over her emails to the department for review and potential public release, Clinton and her lawyers withheld thousands of additional emails she said were clearly personal.

Clinton has never outlined in detail what criteria she and her lawyers used to determine which emails to release and which to delete, but her 2010 email with Abedin appears clearly work-related under the State Department’s own criteria for agency records under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act.

Dozens of the emails sent or received by Clinton through her private server were later determined to contain classified material.

The FBI has been investigating for months whether Clinton’s use of the private email server imperiled government secrets.

As part of the probe, Clinton turned over the hard drive from her email server to the FBI. It had been wiped clean, and Clinton has said she did not keep copies of the emails she choose to withhold.

On Wednesday, lawyers from Judicial Watch, a conservative legal organization, questioned under oath Bryan Pagliano, the computer technician who set up Clinton’s private server.

A transcript released Thursday shows Pagliano repeatedly responded to detailed questions by invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, as he did last year before a congressional committee.

Dozens of questions Pagiliano declined to answer included who paid for the system, whether there was technical help to support its users and who else at the State Department used email accounts on it.

Pagliano also would not answer whether he discussed setting up a home server with Clinton prior to her tenure as secretary of state.

“Contrary to her statement under oath suggesting otherwise, Mrs. Clinton did not return all her government emails to the State Department,” Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton said. “Our goal is to find out what other emails Mrs. Clinton and the State Department are hiding.”

[grayhair]

Quoted from above:  "The records the White House released yesterday were part of an investigative file from 1979, when the exchange charged Bone and Refco with violations of its record keeping and margin requirement rules. Bone was suspended for three years; Refco paid a $250,000 fine, then the largest in the exchange's history. Internal memos from that investigation cover transactions from the same period in June in which Clinton was trading, but not the same trades. In one instance, the Merc found Bone and a fellow broker were ordering 1,000 cattle contracts at a time – far over the limit allowed at the time – and then allocating them to other customers."

I remember this pretty clearly.  Those scum bags, Bone and Refco, were charged with co-mingling accounts. They gave monies to Hilary, supposed profits, while other unsophisticated investors took the losses.  

[41chevy]

Obama Endorses Hillary, Immediately Meets With Attorney General Loretta Lynch

 

 

 

Earlier today President Obama officially endorsed Democrat presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton for President. In an endorsement video released by the Clinton campaign, Obama made it clear he wants Clinton to win the White House in order to preserve his legacy. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest also made this point clear during the daily briefing. Shortly after the endorsement was made, President Obama met with Attorney General Loretta Lynch this afternoon in the Oval Office. The meeting was closed to the press.

Lynch, of course, will ultimately make the decision as to whether Clinton will be prosecuted should the FBI issue an indictment surrounding her use of a private email server to store and transfer top secret, classified information.

In order for Clinton to carry Obama's torch, she has to stay out of prison. In order to do that, she has to avoid prosecution. I'm sure Obama made that very clear to his somewhat new Attorney General.

[kscarbel2]

[kscarbel2]

She lied to the American government and its people

 

Clinton email claims collapse under FBI probe

Associated Press  /  July 5, 2016

Key assertions by Hillary Clinton in defense of her email practices have collapsed under FBI scrutiny.

The FBI's yearlong investigation found that Hillary Clinton did not, as she claimed, turn over all her work-related messages for release.

It found that Clinton’s private email server DID carry classified emails, also contrary to her past statements.

And the FBI made clear that Clinton used many devices to send and receive email despite her statements that she set up her email system so that she only needed to carry one.

FBI Director James Comey's announcement Tuesday that he will not refer criminal charges to the Justice Department against Clinton spared her from prosecution and a devastating political predicament.

But the FBI’s investigation left much of Clinton’s account in tatters and may have aggravated questions of trust swirling around her Democratic presidential candidacy.

A look at Clinton's claims since questions about her email practices as secretary of state surfaced and how they compare with facts established in the FBI probe:

CLINTON: "I did not email any classified material to anyone on my email. There is no classified material." News conference, March 2015.

THE FACTS (as we’re told): Actually, the FBI identified at least 113 emails that passed through Clinton's server and contained materials that were classified at the time they were sent, including some that were Top Secret and referred to a highly classified special access program, Comey said.

Most of those emails - 110 of them - were included among 30,000 emails that Clinton returned to the State Department around the time her use of a private email server was discovered. The three others were recovered from a forensic analysis of Clinton's server. "Any reasonable person in Secretary Clinton's position or in the position of those with whom she was corresponding about the matters should have known that an unclassified system was no place for that conversation," Comey said. Clinton and her aides "were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information," he said.

---

CLINTON: "I never received nor sent any material that was marked classified." NBC interview, July 2016.

THE FACTS: Clinton has separately clung to her rationale that there were no classification markings on her emails that would have warned her and others not to transmit the sensitive material. But the private system did, in fact, handle emails that bore markings indicating they contained classified information, Comey said.

He said the marked emails were "a very small number." But that's not the only standard for judging how officials handle sensitive material, he added. "Even if information is not marked classified in an email, participants who know, or should know, that the subject matter is classified are still obligated to protect it."

---

CLINTON: "I responded right away and provided all my emails that could possibly be work related" to the State Department. News conference, March 2015.

THE FACTS: Not so, the FBI found.

Comey said that when his forensic team examined Clinton's server it found there were "several thousand work-related emails that were not in the group of 30,000" that had been returned by Clinton to the State Department.

---

CLINTON: "I thought it would be easier to carry just one device for my work and for personal emails instead of two." News conference, March 2015.

THE FACTS: This reasoning for using private email both for public business and private correspondence didn't hold up in the investigation. Clinton "used numerous mobile devices to view and send email" using her personal account, Comey said. He also said Clinton had used different servers.

---

CLINTON: "It was on property guarded by the Secret Service, and there were no security breaches. ... The use of that server, which started with my husband, certainly proved to be effective and secure." News conference, March 2015.

CLINTON campaign website: "There is no evidence there was ever a breach."

THE FACTS: The campaign website claimed "no evidence" of a breach, a less categorical statement than Clinton herself made last year, when she said there was no breach. The FBI did not uncover a breach but made clear that that possibility cannot be ruled out.

"We assess it is possible that hostile actors gained access to Secretary Clinton's personal email account," Comey said.

He said evidence would be hard to find because hackers are sophisticated and can cover their tracks. Comey said his investigators learned that Clinton's security lapses included using "her personal email extensively while outside the United States, including sending and receiving work-related emails in the territory of sophisticated adversaries." Comey also noted that hackers breached the email accounts of several outsiders who messaged with Clinton.

Comey did not mention names, but a Romanian hacker who called himself Guccifer accessed and later leaked emails from Sidney Blumenthal, an outside adviser to Clinton who regularly communicated with her.

---

CLINTON: "I opted for convenience to use my personal email account, which was allowed by the State Department." News conference, March 2015.

THE FACTS: Comey did not address Clinton's reason for using a private server instead of a government one, but he highlighted the perils in routing sensitive information through a home server.

The FBI found that Clinton's personal server was "not even supported by full-time security staff like those found at agencies and departments of the United States government or even with a commercial email service like Gmail," the director said.

A May 2016 audit by the State Department inspector general found there was no evidence Clinton sought or received approval to operate a private server, and that she "had an obligation to discuss using her personal email account to conduct official business with their offices." Courts have frowned on such a practice.

In an unrelated case, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled Tuesday that the purpose of public records law is "hardly served" when a department head "can deprive the citizens of their right to know what his department is up to" by maintaining emails on a private system.

.

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

And yet................

 

No charges for Clinton, FBI says

Associated Press  /  July 5, 2016

The FBI lifted a major legal threat to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign Tuesday, recommending no criminal charges for her handling of highly classified material in a private email account. But Director James Comey's scathing criticism of her "extremely careless" behavior revitalized Republican attacks and guaranteed the issue will continue to dog her [a slap on the wrist].

Comey's announcement effectively removed any possibility of criminal prosecution arising from Clinton's email practices as President Barack Obama's secretary of state. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said last week that she intended to accept the recommendations of the FBI and of career prosecutors.

But the FBI director's blistering televised statement [a carefully written script for the masses] excoriated her handling of national secrets, contradicted her past explanations about her emails and ensured she will remain on the defensive about voters' views of her trustworthiness and judgment.

GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump said the statement provided more evidence against "Crooked Hillary" and showed anew that "the system is rigged." Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan said the decision not to prosecute simply defied explanation.

The findings concluded a yearlong FBI investigation into whether Clinton mishandled classified information, either intentionally or through gross negligence.

Investigators who pored over tens of thousands of emails found no proof that Clinton or her aides intended to break laws governing the handling of classified information, Comey said. But he said, "There is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information."

The statement was extraordinary, with Comey revealing his recommendation on live television from FBI headquarters rather than privately to Justice Department prosecutors, as is normally the case.

Comey said he'd shared the FBI's findings with no one before his announcement, which came just hours before Clinton traveled to North Carolina with Obama on Air Force One to campaign with him for the first time this year.

The announcement came three days after the FBI interviewed Clinton in a final step of its yearlong investigation.

Comey directly contradicted many of Clinton's past explanations in the case, including her assertion that she'd turned over all her emails and that she had never sent or received any that were classified at the time.

The FBI chief said that in the course of the investigation, 113 emails were determined to contain classified information at the time they were sent or received.

He also found that "several thousand work-related emails" were not among the group of 30,000 Clinton turned over in 2014. And he raised the possibility that people hostile to the U.S. had gained access to her personal email account.

"There is evidence to support a conclusion that any reasonable person in Secretary Clinton's position ... should have known that an unclassified system was no place" for sensitive conversations, Comey said.

Yet after criticizing Clinton, her aides and the State Department for their actions, he said that after looking at similar circumstances in past inquiries, the FBI believed that "no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case."

"No charges are appropriate in this case," said Comey, who began a 10-year term as FBI director in 2013, meaning he would presumably remain if Clinton is elected president.

House Speaker Paul Ryan said the decision defied explanation, adding, "No one should be above the law."

The staff member who set up the server, Bryan Pagliano, was granted limited immunity from prosecution by the Justice Department and also agreed to speak with prosecutors.

Lynch said Friday that she would accept whatever findings and recommendations were presented to her. Though she said she had already settled on that process, her statement came days after an impromptu meeting with former President Bill Clinton on her airplane in Phoenix that she acknowledged had led to questions about the neutrality of the investigation.

.

 

[HeavyGunner]

I listened to the "findings" report last night and was so absolutely disgusted at our entire government. First the fbi says they can't find anything to charge her with and then he spends the rest of the time scolding Clinton on all the reckless things she KNOWINGLY did in regards to the emails and he even said it was very likely some of our super top secret stuff is in enemy hands now. Just remember Obama promised this would be the most transparent administration but I contest it is one of the most crooked. Under this admin. which Hillary is part of they have let the irs target the opposition, they have covered up 4 murders to win an election, they forced healthcare thru and the writer got caught saying we are too stupid to realize it's a tax, when obummer doesn't get his way he reminds us that he has a pen and a phone. This is barely the tip of the iceberg and some people think that it's far fetched for our government to turn against us so we should just hand all our weapons in. This is exactly why we need the 2nd amendment. What would this or any other administration do if they knew we couldn't fight back?  In a country where you can be armed you are a citizen, in a country where you are unarmed you are a subject. 

Edited July 6, 2016 by HeavyGunner
Damn autocorrect

[kscarbel2]

The face of an attorney general (Loretta Lynch) who is most uncomfortable with the "script" she was forced to read by those behind the veil, exonerating Teflon Sue (Hillary Clinton) even though she is guilty of violating 793(f) of the federal penal code (Title 18).

With lawful access to highly classified information, Hillary Clinton acted with gross negligence in removing and causing it to be removed it from its proper place of custody, and she transmitted it and caused it to be transmitted to others not authorized to have it, in patent violation of her trust.

Related reading - https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/793

.

[grayhair]

Color me "not shocked."  She is just another POS in an administration chock-full of them.  Oh yeah, and Comey ain't stupid.  He knows what happens to people that cross the Clintons.  

[41chevy]

She is a Clinton and had to get a free pass and a sailor who took a selfie against the conning tower of his sub gets his butt nailed to the wall. I hope, but doubt the voters will remember to "convict" her in November.

[HeavyGunner]

On June 5, 2016 at 5:55 PM, kscarbel2 said:

.

 

Did you ever watch The Clinton Chronicles?  An interview about the book ended up supporting a lot of what was said in that doc.

 

Edited July 7, 2016 by HeavyGunner

[kscarbel2]

Associated Press  /  July 7, 2016

The FBI did not put Hillary Clinton under oath, or record what she said, when agents questioned her for 3-1/2 hours last Saturday, FBI director James Comey told Congress on Thursday.

'Well, that's a problem,' said Florida Rep. John Mica.

'It's 'still a crime to lie to us,' Comey assured him during more than four hours of testimony before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Without a transcript of what Clinton said, it would be difficult to prove her words were false. 

'The American people would like to see what Hillary Clinton said to the FBI,' Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Wednesday.

A 2006 FBI memo states that except in rare circumstances, 'agents may not electronically record confessions or interviews, openly or surreptitiously'.

The only record of Clinton's interview is likely to be a Form FD-302, an investigative analysis that summarizes what Clinton said.

Comey said he has read the '302' from Saturday's interview, and acknowledged that he was not one of the roughly half-dozen agents present during Clinton's questioning.

Mica said he wants the Oversight Committee's members to see a copy of the analysis.

[kscarbel2]

Associated Press  /  July 7, 2016

FBI director James Comey on Thursday refused to say whether or not is still investigating former secretary of state Hillary Clinton on a separate track from the one that the Department of Justice closed Wednesday afternoon.

In April, Clinton faced two separate investigations, one related to her use of private email to house classified documents, and another focusing on allegations that she used her position in the Obama administration to raise money for her family’s Clinton Foundation and to generate speaking fees for her husband.

On Thursday, Comey refused to comment when the chairman of a congressional committee asked him if the Clinton Foundation was still under scrutiny from federal law enforcement.

'I'm not going to comment on the existence or nonexistence of any other ongoing investigations,' Comey told House Oversight Committee chair Jason Chaffetz, a Utah Republican.  

Comey also refused to say whether the Clinton Foundation was 'tied into' the email investigation that the Obama administration wrapped up this week. 

The FBI has never publicly acknowledged that both Clintons are under investigation for abuse-of-power.

[kscarbel2]

Associated Press  /  July 7, 2016

At the four-and-a-half hour hearing on Thursday, House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz said he would formally ask the FBI to investigate whether Clinton perjured herself in congressional testimony last October by lying to Congress over her email arrangements.

The FBI, Comey said, did not investigate Clinton's testimony before the House Benghazi panel last year because Congress had not asked it to.

"I think when you come to Congress you need to provide truthful testimony and if you don't provide truthful testimony there should be a consequence," said Chaffetz. "I thought the FBI was looking at this, but evidently, they're not. They weren't looking at it."

[kscarbel2]

Associated Press  /  July 7, 2016

"Secretary Clinton said there was nothing marked classified on her emails, either sent or received. Was that true?" South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy asked FBI director James Comey.

"That's not true," Comey replied.

"Secretary Clinton said, 'I did not e-mail any classified material to anyone on my e-mail, there is no classified material.' Was that true?" Gowdy went on.

"There was classified material emailed," Comey replied.

"There is no consequence, director -- there is no consequence," House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz said, demanding to know why Clinton and her aides do not appear to be paying a price over the long-running controversy.

"We are mystified and confused by the fact pattern that you laid out and the conclusions that you reached," said Chaffetz, adding that "the Average Joe" would have been led off in handcuffs had they done what Clinton did.

Comey also testified that there were three emails found on Clinton's servers bearing the letter "C" which denotes they were classified, in contradiction of the former secretary of state's statements.

But he said it was not clear whether Clinton knew that such a designation denoted classified material, saying "the secretary may not have been as sophisticated as people assume" when it comes to such issues.

But Comey testified that Clinton did not lie to the FBI during their year long probe which culminated with her interview with bureau agents on Saturday [???].