Mike Pence Used His AOL Email For Indiana State Business -- and It Got Hacked (theverge.com) 445
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Vice President Mike Pence used a personal AOL email account to conduct sensitive state business -- including issues related to homeland security -- as the governor of Indiana, according to a report from The Indianapolis Star. Not only that, but Pence's email account was also compromised last year, the report reveals. Because personal email accounts are not subject to same types of public transparency laws, it's up to the official and his or her transition staff to hand over any sensitive state-related messages for archiving. Emails from a state account are automatically stored on state servers and subject to public records requests. Pence's office claims the contents of his personal AOL account used for state business are in fact in the process of being archived. A larger concern, however, is security. By using a private AOL account to conduct sensitive state matters, Pence could have exposed sensitive state business. In the hacking incident last year, Pence's email account was compromised by a scammer who used it to try and extort money from members of his contact list by claiming Pence and his wife were stranded in the Philippines, The Indianapolis Star reports. This hack didn't appear to have had been designed specifically to breach Pence's office, which made clear that his AOL account could be compromised by relatively benign breaching techniques designed by spammers and low-level hackers. It is not illegal in Indiana to own and use a personal account while in office, nor is it against the law to handle work-related matters from a personal account -- so long as those emails are in some way archived. However, the Star reports that Pence made no efforts to preserve his AOL emails under after he left office and is only just now doing months after public records requests were first made. "Similar to previous governors, during his time as governor of Indiana, Mike Pence maintained a state email account and a personal email account," reads a statement given to the The Indianapolis Star. "As governor, Mr. Pence fully complied with Indiana law regarding email use and retention. Government emails involving his state and personal accounts are being archived by the state consistent with Indiana law, and are being managed according to Indiana's Access to Public Records Act."
Nope, nothing to see here (Score:2, Insightful)
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Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Interesting)
from tfa:
Vice President Mike Pence used a personal AOL email account to conduct sensitive state business -- including issues related to homeland security
not illegal? sounds illegal to me.
"but, his emails!"
let 'em fly. douse the R's in the same shit they gave hillary.
DROWN them in it. let them realize that any weaspon you use, the other side will use, when its THEIR turn.
assholes.
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Then it will be a simple matter for you to cite the relevant Indiana state law which applies.
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The Department of Homeland Security is a federal department and communications with them are subject to federal laws, not just state laws.
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"Homeland security" is a very broad term.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:4, Insightful)
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I've read a few variations on this article now. And not one of them has indicated any wrong doing on his part. p.s. Sensitive does not equal classified.
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As a guy who has held a clearance for more than 20 years, wrong. You are not liable for classified material that is emailed to you PROVIDED you report it in a timely manner preventing it from being caught in backups and restricting it from further distribution by the original party who emailed it to you who clearly does not understand classified material handling and would be at risk of emailing it to someone else. Sit on it for several months, or /*gasp*/ forward it to someone else, and you have compound
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Going to the source [indystar.com], one finds that "sensitive state
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Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Funny)
What did he do wrong?
Seriously, did you not read the headline? He uses AOL. He clearly can't be trusted with important decisions.
Re:No, because it FUCKING FAKE NEWS AGAIN (Score:5, Insightful)
Fake News would imply the content was incorrect, invented or misleading.
This is not fake news, it happened. There is proof it happened. Just like most of Donald's "fake news" it's not that it's fake, its that he doesn't like it being made public.
Now, what Pence did is NOT illegal. You're not going to see an investigation into it because he hasn't done anything illegal. That doesn't mean it isn't a highly questionable thing to do. It also doesn't wash away the hypocrisy of being part of a ticket whose main selling point was that the main rival was unfit to rule for doing the exact same thing.
Absolutely not illegal what Pence did- but it's not fake news because it was a foolish choice he made and that partially reflects on his fitness to govern, just like it did, as his ticket pointed out, on Hillary's.
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Fake News would imply the content was incorrect, invented or misleading.
I think there are two different definitions of "fake news" running around. In the original "fake news" story it was about a left-wing activist who wanted to "prove" right wingers were dumb and will fall for stupid shit so he created a news blog with completely made up facts, like that protestors were being paid $3500 to protest against Trump. This wasn't true, protestors were being paid around $16 via craigslist posts by people affiliated with Moveon.org, but it's useful disinformation for those who don't p
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I have seen Bernie Goldberg make the argument that what media organizations do is simple bias, while fake news is stuff like Pizzagate. Except that media organizations make up stuff out of whole cloth, like the report about trannie suicides going thru the roof since Trump became president.
I'm actually glad that by slamming the MSM as fake news, Trump has blurred the lines b/w your average Michael Moore type of guy manufacturing stories out of whole cloth, vs the MSM doing it. Both have intentions to mis
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I think there are two different definitions of "fake news" running around. In the original "fake news" story it was about a left-wing activist who wanted to "prove" right wingers were dumb and will fall for stupid shit so he created a news blog with completely made up facts, like that protestors were being paid $3500 to protest against Trump...
...Then we have the way the mainstream media does fake news, which is fake context...
The facts are in the article. Nothing factually incorrect is being stated. If you think a news site is highlighting certain stories or over hyping stories that to you are non-entities that would represent a "biased" news source, not "fake news". Using the term "Fake News" to refer to an item you think is biased against your world-view is disingenuous at best and a down right lie at worst.
There is plenty of biased news articles out there on both sides of the political spectrum. Let's call them what they
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Fake News would imply the content was incorrect, invented or misleading.
This is not fake news, it happened. There is proof it happened. Just like most of Donald's "fake news" it's not that it's fake, its that he doesn't like it being made public.
Now, what Pence did is NOT illegal. You're not going to see an investigation into it because he hasn't done anything illegal. That doesn't mean it isn't a highly questionable thing to do. It also doesn't wash away the hypocrisy of being part of a ticket whose main selling point was that the main rival was unfit to rule for doing the exact same thing.
Absolutely not illegal what Pence did- but it's not fake news because it was a foolish choice he made and that partially reflects on his fitness to govern, just like it did, as his ticket pointed out, on Hillary's.
Well what Clinton did was illegal because there was classified data on her server. Whether or not what Pence did was illegal in Indiana, I can't say. But it should be illegal at all levels. If your city or county wants to enter into a contract to have its mail hosted by AOL, that is one thing. But all government communications should flow through a mail server specifically chosen by that government agency for record keeping purposes. Private email addresses should not be allowed
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Re: No, because it FUCKING FAKE NEWS AGAIN (Score:3, Insightful)
The use of a private email server wasn't prohibited by federal government statues applying to Hillary Clinton either... but that didn't seem to stop significant public concern.
Use of privatized and hacked email servers seemed to be of great issue to the general public which significantly contributed to many voters decisions during the 2016 election. So, based on the general public's flawed logic of determining significance relative to elected officials, this information regarding Pence is also quite pertine
Re: No, because it FUCKING FAKE NEWS AGAIN (Score:5, Insightful)
A large part of Clinton's problems were because her use of private email servers looked like an effort to avoid legally required oversight: avoiding use of any government email account, not depositing government records when she left government service, and only disclosing things when caught. None of those factors look likely in Pence's case, but maybe something will turn up yet.
Re: No, because it FUCKING FAKE NEWS AGAIN (Score:5, Informative)
Clinton and Pence both hired a law firm to determine which emails would be considered private and which emails would be subject to the records keeping act. It was not illegal for neither Pence nor Clinton to use a private (non-gov) account, as long as they submitted all "official business" emails for record-keeping. Both did.
There is no material difference between using an AOL account or using a private server. Indeed, one could argue that using a private server you can at least account for who have had access to the emails. In the AOL case, there is no way of knowing. A private account - on AOL or a private server - cannot be used for classified material.
In the Clinton case it *was* determined that she had sent
- some emails where the contents was retroactively classified. This is not criminal, as Clinton the material *was not* classified at the time.
- A total of 3 emails which contained classified information at the time. However, the "classfied" markings were non-standard which could explain why Clinton did not notice them.
It was not illegal to set up at private server. Clinton was clearly aware that she should not use it for classified material; otherwise you would see a lot of classified material with standard markings on the server. Which there was not.
Maybe she should have realized that there was a risk that she may accidentally send classified material. IMO the greater risk was that state dept. employees would send classified material *to* her account. Was it reckless? Possibly. Criminal? No.
If Pence has sent classified material from his AOL account, it is equally illegal, regardless of whether the account was "official". If he did not instruct aides to avoid sending classified material *to* his account, it would be equally reckless.
Fun fact: Pence was hacked. Clintons email server was not.
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A total of 3 emails which contained classified information at the time. However, the "classfied" markings were non-standard which could explain why Clinton did not notice them.
Here is Comey himself testifying that they were incorrectly marked:
Director Comey: No, there were three e-mails. The “c” was in the body in the text, but there was no header on the email or in the text.
Rep. Cartwright: So if Secretary Clinton really were an expert at what's classified and what’s not classified and we're following the manual, the absence of a header would tell her immediately that those three documents were not classified. Am I correct in that?
Director Comey: That would be a reasonable inference.
In addition, they had already been declassified at that time (which explains why the headers were removed):
“Generally speaking, there’s a standard process for developing call sheets for the Secretary of State. Call sheets are often marked – it’s not untypical at all for them to be marked at the confidential level - prior to a decision by the Secretary that he or she will make that call. Oftentimes, once it is clear that the Secretary intends to make a call, the department will then consider the call sheet SBU, sensitive but unclassified, or unclassified altogether, and then mark it appropriately and prepare it for the secretary’s use in actually making the call. The classification of a call sheet therefore is not necessarily fixed in time, and staffers in the Secretary’s office who are involved in preparing and finalizing these call sheets, they understand that. Those markings were a human error. They didn’t need to be there.”
Source: FBI Director Comey: Emails Were Not Properly Marked as Classified [house.gov]
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In addition to AC's comment above, another salient issue is data retention laws, which is why official use of a private email account is such a red flag. I only RTFS, but it seems the personal account in this case was is still archived by Yahoo! and therefore searchable.
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Backed up in NSA 'cloud' (Score:2)
If he was using an AOL/Yahoo! account it is all backed up at the NSA, so there should be no problem making any of it public for review.
Re: No, because it FUCKING FAKE NEWS AGAIN (Score:4, Insightful)
Read what the OP said again. Don't Kelly Ann the conversation by changing it.
The use of a private email server wasn't prohibited by federal government statues applying to Hillary Clinton
That is a true statement.
The OP left out 2 things:
Things were done wrong, but just having a private e-mail server set up and secured by the Secret Service for the former President's use, and then used by Senator and Secretary H. Clinton was not what was wrong.
It was stupid to use it, but if no classified information had ever been sent or it wasn't done to skirt disclosure laws, then she would have just been embarrassed and not investigated.
The exact same thing applies to Pence. It is really dumb for him to use a private account for government business. If no Indiana "secrets" were revealed ( ie corn or soybean crop yields, pork belly futures), and it wasn't done to skirt disclosure laws, Then Pence is just stupid but not criminal.
Just as most of the Democrats still don't seem to realize that nominating one of the most despised figures in American politics as your candidate for POTUS is not a good strategy for winning an election, most Republicans don't seem to realize that being seen as acting exactly like the Democrats they're always complaining about results in the public despising Republicans as well.
The Democrats didn't win this last election, but neither did the Republicans. Trump won. Trump beat 12 Republicans on his way to the nomination. He wiped the floor with them. Some of them were extremely high profile, well funded candidates. Most of them were a waste of space. None of them stood a chance against Trump. Two years ago Trump was booed at CPAC, and Ted Cruz was held up as a shining example as the perfect, righteous candidate to lead the nation into its future. Trump walked all over "Lying" Ted Cruz.
Boehner, Ryan and others seem to act like they won last November. The Republicans lost. They lost a little less than the Democrats did, but Trump still whipped Republican @$$.
Sadly, both parties seem to be doubling down on the strategy of 'business as usual', which is a much greater threat to the country that the great orange one's erratic tweets.
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Trump won, but his coattails are questionable, and I say this as someone who supports Trump over the GOP. Like in NC, the first candidate who ran in a primary linking her name to his, lost. Similarly, in AZ, Kelly Wirt lost to John McCain, despite it being an open secret of how Trump's last minute endorsement of the latter was more due to Priebus putting pressure on him
In the Congress, the Republicans can claim that they won. Like in the senate races, 2 of the Republicans who distanced themselves from
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This article just came out and I'm sure the Demoocrats and their MSM lapdogs are gonna jump all over it.
Unlike the Republicans who show a total lack of interest when it comes to what public officials do with private email services.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Insightful)
What was the law in respect to Pence?
It's the law that counts. Not private emails.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:4, Informative)
If you have access to Classified information you handle it carefully and keep it on the systems it is supposed to be on.
Hillary should have faced charges (hopefully she still will) for her criminal negligence with out nation's secrets. The outrage at Comey giving her a pass (days after AG Lynch met with Bill Clinton on the tarmac in AZ) was not false it is fully justified.
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If you have access to Classified information you handle it carefully and keep it on the systems it is supposed to be on.
Hillary should have faced charges (hopefully she still will) for her criminal negligence with out nation's secrets. The outrage at Comey giving her a pass (days after AG Lynch met with Bill Clinton on the tarmac in AZ) was not false it is fully justified.
However, President Trump using an unsecured Android phone [businessinsider.in] even after he'd been issued a secure replacement by the Secret Service is nothing to be concerned with. Is nothing like Hillary's email server. Right, Trumpster?
Nothing to see here either [businessinsider.com], is there, Trumpster? Everybody needs to relax a bit, is that it now?
Fucking hypocrit.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Funny)
I just love the people who think they've found a massive smoking gun here -- you're far from the first.
Trump is using an unsecured phone to send... tweets. Messages broadcast to the universe.
Just imagine the harm that could befall the nation if one of those were to be intercepted.
You idiot.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Insightful)
Trump is using an unsecured phone to send... tweets.
He might also be carrying it in locations/situations that should be secure. For us mere mortals, just carrying an unsecured phone somewhere that classified information MIGHT be discussed is a big no-no. But, his dinner discussion regarding the North Korean missile launch suggests that he's a little lax on privacy, so why should his phones be any different?
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However, President Trump using an unsecured Android phone [businessinsider.in] even after he'd been issued a secure replacement by the Secret Service is nothing to be concerned with. Is nothing like Hillary's email server. Right, Trumpster?
You're right it is nothing like Hillary's server. The Hatch Act makes it illegal to use government email accounts for political campaigning, so just about every politician is going to have both a government and private email. Trump having an andoird phone for personal use is completely normal and expected.
What busted Hillary wasn't the private server. It's that she used that private server to send classified data, failed to hand over the emails to the state department, and deleted documents under subpoena.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:4, Informative)
To charge under the Espionage Act scienter is required. You are wrong, and Comey is right.
The statute you are referring to is 18 US 793(f):
(f) Whoever, being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document, writing, code book, signal book, sketch, photograph, photographic negative, blueprint, plan, map, model, instrument, appliance, note, or information, relating to the national defense, (1) through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust, or to be lost, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, or (2) having knowledge that the same has been illegally removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of its trust, or lost, or stolen, abstracted, or destroyed, and fails to make prompt report of such loss, theft, abstraction, or destruction to his superior officer—
Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.
It looks like you're right (and I'm sure the Republican news sources you read agree), but you're wrong.
"But we find no uncertainty in this statute which deprives a person of the ability to predetermine whether a contemplated action is criminal under the provisions of this law. The obvious delimiting words in the statute are those requiring 'intent or reason to believe that the information to be obtained is to be used to the injury of the United States, or to the advantage of any foreign nation.' This requires those prosecuted to have acted in bad faith. The sanctions apply only when scienter is established."Gorin v. US, 312 US 19, 27-28 (1941)
I'm guessing Comey is familiar with Gorin. Without the scienter requirement the clause is unconstitutionally vague. See Id. at 26-27. The reason he said no reasonable prosecutor would pursue the case is because that's the standard for Rule 11 sanctions.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Interesting)
You said the FBI's recommendation not to prosecute "flew in the face of the law . . . because . . . the very crime he specified has no intent requirement." You are wrong. A plain reading of the statute shows a clear mens rearequirement.
This is the crime in question: "Whoever, being entrusted with or having lawful possession or control of any document [or other] information, relating to the national defense, . . . through gross negligence permits the same to be removed from its proper place of custody or delivered to anyone in violation of his trust . . . shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both." 18 U.S.C. 793(f) (emphasis added). In turn, gross negligence is "[a] conscious, voluntary act or omission in reckless disregard of a legal duty and of the consequences to another party." Black's Law Dictionary (9th ed. 2009) (emphasis added).
If storing the classified material on her private server was not a "conscious, voluntary act," then the mens rea requirement here is not met, meaning the crime was not committed.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:5, Informative)
Here is a guy prosecuted for a much less-important violation of the same: http://legalinsurrection.com/2... [legalinsurrection.com]
Only if by "less-important", you mean "more-important". The guy who's story you linked to, deliberate took pictures of equipment he was specifically prohibited from photographing with intent to distribute the pictures to people who were not cleared to see them. As I understand it, from having previously looked at this case, he was specifically warned that what he was doing was illegal, and that he could go to jail for what he was doing and continued to do it. So he deliberately broke the law with full knowledge that he was doing so and what the punishment would be if (when) he was caught.
Hillary, on the other hand has been crucified because she received several emails that contained, improperly marked, classified information over the course of her four years at the State Department. Material that the State department is on record saying it does not believe should have ever been classified.
Do you see the difference here? Because everyone who isn't blinded by partisanship does.
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Nope, nothing to see here (Score:4, Insightful)
One compelling difference b/w the 2 - not that it counts to everyone who wants to see a moral equivalence:
- Pence archived all his emails, so any investigator who wants to look into that and draw conclusions is at liberty to do so
- Hilary deleted some 33k emails of hers, after being subpoena'ed to preserve them, including any emails about the Clinton Foundation.
In other words, no cover up attempt in one case, vs a desperate cover up attempt in the other
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
- Hilary deleted some 33k emails of hers, after being subpoena'ed to preserve them, including any emails about the Clinton Foundation.
In other words, no cover up attempt in one case, vs a desperate cover up attempt in the other
FBI found no evidence of an attempted coverup, or malicious intent, after their investigation. And it wasn't Clinton who deleted them, either. So no, no cover up attempt.
It's plain weird how people get all over Clinton for doing the same things everyone else does too; I haven't seen any mention here of Trump discussing national security policy (i.e. highly classified information) IN PUBLIC. You know, the THREAT of which was the reason that Clinton's email server was so "reckless" or "criminal", depending
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Trump Hypocrisy in 3...2...1... (Score:4, Funny)
Turn on a news channel (or Twitter) to hear Trump rant about how evil and unacceptable email hacks are any second now.
Idiotic (Score:2)
Thank god (Score:5, Insightful)
For a moment I thought there's really one area where the Dems are even stupider than the GOP.
The world is in balance again.
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For a moment I thought there's really one area where the Dems are even stupider than the GOP.
Pence's use of AOL is likely stupid. He's basically a new, older looking, less boyishly handsome version of Dan Quayle. Hillary Clinton's use of personal email was all hubris and greed rather than stupidity. Hillary is smart, but she's also arrogant and greedy. I'm not saying it would have been OK to do this, but had she and Bill hired true IT security gurus, and their money and power gave them access to such people and such people may well be Democratic Party supporters on top of that, and used, say,
Re:Thank god (Score:5, Funny)
The impression I've had about Pence ever since he got picked by Trump is that he's just not the sharpest knife in the drawer.
Pence is what every VP since Humphrey was: An assassination insurance. Any assassin planning to shoot the president is supposed to think "Wait! Stop! If I off him, this goofball is gonna take over! Ok, call it of, that's even worse."
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But this gets to the issue nicely - her private email server existed to bypass FOIA requests. Which was illegal. Period.
That's an assertion which is presuming knowledge of Hillary Clinton's intentions, so can't really be backed up.
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Only 'cause the GOP has a closer and historic relationship with business instead of a predisposition of sitting in an echo chamber.
Alrighty (Score:3)
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Financial industry here:
At least for my little bubble of it, we're EXPLICITLY banned (we'll get blasted out of the industry) for doing or even mentioning business over personal email.
Like, black mark on your FINRA record, no one should hire you kinda stuff.
I'm sure it happens, but our compliance guys are zealous about that stuff. Why don't politicians have compliance guys?
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I'm sure it happens, but our compliance guys are zealous about that stuff. Why don't politicians have compliance guys?
It may be that politicians get prosecuted even less often than financial industry employees.
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Financial industry here:
At least for my little bubble of it, we're EXPLICITLY banned (we'll get blasted out of the industry) for doing or even mentioning business over personal email. Like, black mark on your FINRA record, no one should hire you kinda stuff.
I'm sure it happens, but our compliance guys are zealous about that stuff. Why don't politicians have compliance guys?
They do, they are called the Office of Congressional Ethics but it has no power and is widely ignored because it tends to: 'get in the way of doing business'.
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Why don't politicians have compliance guys?
Why would they? When Hillary broke the law and used her private email server for classified information her voters said "THIS IS FINE AND WE LOVE IT!!!" The public would have to want compliance guys doing their jobs and punishing rule breakers but half of voters vocally approve of this sort of behavior, so why should the government give a shit?
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The FBI investigation turned her near certain win into a loss. Apparently people really do care.
What is even more damning is that after Trump threatened to jail her over it, he didn't even bother to check that his VP wasn't doing the same shit.
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Some of us think he should face the exact same treatment that Hillary got and that both should be prosecuted under the appropriate laws. Having separate work and personal e-mail is fine but you do need to keep them separate and not commingle things. When everyone was making a big deal about people in the Trump administration having private e-mail accounts and conducting private business with them there was nothing to see so long as things were kept separate. This however is different and there should be action taken. That said this doesn't seem as bad as the Hillary case as it should be possible to retrieve the e-mails from AOL unlike Hillary's wiped private server.
I don't think either should be prosecuted because this is extremely commonplace in government, but the wiping in Clinton's case was completely legal, and perhaps even required, when it was ordered. It was only an administrator who screwed up by first forgetting to do the wiping when it was requested, and second carrying it out after a subpoena showed up.
For me the big issue with Pence is that he spent months criticizing Clinton for using a private email server for government business... all the while he was
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AOL? (Score:2)
Amateur Dilettantes in the White House, what did you expect?
It will get much worse, mark my words.
Comment removed (Score:3, Funny)
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No right left to criticize (Score:2, Insightful)
If You or your media outlet was one of the ones that defended or didn't criticize as a fatal flaw: Hillary Clinton and her most glaring case of using personal E-mail server to cause security exposures and Fail to deliver items ordered by the court,
Then you already lost any right to criticize Pence, Etc, for lesser cases Of use of a personal e-mail account.
That seems to be pretty much All people and All the media outlets, by the way.
I don't agree, but For some reason we as a society decided it was all
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They have training classes for all of this. They just feel too important to bother. It's no incompetence - it's hubris. And there's an oversupply at the top levels of all organizations.
Re:No right left to criticize (Score:4, Insightful)
If You or your media outlet was one of the ones that defended or didn't criticize as a fatal flaw: Hillary Clinton and her most glaring case of using personal E-mail server to cause security exposures and Fail to deliver items ordered by the court,
Then you already lost any right to criticize Pence, Etc, for lesser cases Of use of a personal e-mail account.
That seems to be pretty much All people and All the media outlets, by the way.
I don't agree, but For some reason we as a society decided it was all OK, At least for anything that was going on before 2016.
I think they were both wrong to use a private email server but did nothing criminal.
But I do think I have a right to criticize Pence.
1) He continued using a private email server after he knew it was no longer acceptable to do so, not criminal or even outrageous, but he definitely knew it would be frowned upon.
2) He was part of a ticket that called for his opponent to be thrown in jail while he committed those very same supposedly jail-worthy acts. It's blatant hypocrisy and is very worthy of criticism.
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
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The "three stooges" were lawyers, and they were responding to not a subpoena, but a Freedom of Information Act request (so a much lower bar). That does not stink of coverup, especially since there was apparently plenty of
If you want better examples of coverup, look up the Bush email scandal, or the current Trump administration's (meaning the White House) use of "secure messaging" apps. Or the fact that many of them have gone back to using RNC email servers the the majority of their communications. Any bet w
Stupid but there's a difference (Score:2)
It does not matter. (Score:2)
We liberals need to unify and defeat them in the polls. There is no other way. There is absolutely no point in trying to reason with them or find middle ground with them. Their game plan is to make the middle ground far into the right of center. We have taken our civil rights for granted. We have taken the hard won victories for granted. The confederates never stopped fighting
AOL - 'nuff said (Score:3)
"Mike Pence Used His AOL Email..."
He uses AOL....I think we've heard all we need to hear. The man is clearly unfit for office.
Who won the pool? (Score:2, Funny)
Not officially illegal (Score:2)
Does anyone comprehend difference? (Score:3)
I wonder if anyone thinks at all, about the difference in security between a federal account heading the secretary of state, and an account for anyone working at a state level...
I don't think ANY state communication would be classified secret, much less top secret.
Also did anyone ASK Pence if he used public email account? Because a big part of Hilary's issue (beyond just the federal crime of using an unsecured server for Top Secret documents) was that SHE LIED ABOUT DOING SO (Hello, Nixon!!) - and DELETED THOUSANDS OF EMAILS. Pence didn't delete anything, it's being archived as it should.
Both the Democrats and the press have gone mental trying to equate a number of email uses to the vastly different degree of security required between accounts... it's mind-boggling they keep trying to run up these different uses of email as equivalent.
Re:Let's compare Mike to Hillary (Score:4, Informative)
Did Mike share top secret information over his personal email? No.
Actually, we do not know what was shared. They are explicitly witholding "sensitive" emails.
Did Mike use his personal email to discuss P4P "donations" to a personal charity? No.
See above.
If there is no issue, then why is Indiana explicitly withholding emails due to sensitive nature?
http://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2017/03/02/pence-used-personal-email-state-business----and-hacked/98604904/
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The administration of Pence’s successor, Gov. Eric Holcomb, released 29 pages of emails late this past week. But it withheld others, saying they are deliberative or advisory, confidential under rules adopted by the Indiana Supreme Court or the work product of an attorney.
Holcomb’s office declined to disclose how many emails were withheld.
Re: Let's compare Mike to Hillary (Score:4, Insightful)
Sensitive =/= classified.
Remember, Hillary repeatedly justified her use of a private server by claiming she "never sent or received classified material" (later amended to say "never sent classified material", later amended to say "what hard drive backups?")
The FBI investigation into her server did not focus on "sensitive" information, which is not a legal definition. It focused on "classified" information, which is explicitly defined in the statutes she was found to have broken.
Until such evidence that classified information was passed through an unclassified system, this is going to continue to look like the discordant screeching from a panicked and impotent leftist establishment that has been the story du jour of the past few months.
Only sometimes they forgot to remove the markings? (Score:2)
So let me see if I'm clear on your two points:
A) According to some people the Obama State Department, as far as they know, only twice did they forget to remove the "classified" markings as requested.
That's an excellent point! Hillary's great if her staff only occasionally fails to correctly follow her illegal instructions.
B) According to Hillary, when she told someone to remove the markings and send nonsecure, she didn't think he'd actually do it - he knew better than to send classified material nonsecure
Re:Let's compare Mike to Hillary (Score:4, Insightful)
Did Mike share top secret information over his personal email? No.
Actually, we do not know what was shared. They are explicitly witholding "sensitive" emails.
AC conspiracy-mongering aside, we do know for a fact that he didn't share top secret information over his personal email for the profoundly simple reason that he wouldn't have had a top secret clearance [voanews.com] at the time.
So there's no way he could have had top secret information to share -- unless, of course, Hillary emailed it to him.
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Yeah, no one dealing with the State of Indiana could have ever used that information to screw Hoosiers.
If you are going to white wash the Administration, at least try to be intelligent.
Re:Let's compare Mike to Hillary (Score:4, Insightful)
>scrub his email server hardware after the fact during an investigation
That's called destroying evidence involved in a federal investigation. It comes with a 20 year sentence for anyone subject to the laws.
And you missed lying under oath. 15 years ago, in a wholly trifling personal matter, got a president Impeached. Now our elected officials can be caught red handed destroying evidence against themselves in a federal case and be greeted by the press and public with thunderous applause.
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The mere act of using a private email for government business is wrong and should be punished. However, let us not forget that the point of all of this anger isn't the fact that a personal email was used. The anger came about because of what was found on said personal email server. Let us compare between the two politicians:
Did Mike share top secret information over his personal email? No.
Did Mike use his personal email to share deleterious information about any of his campaigns? No.
Did Mike say or do anything particularly damning in his emails (pizza anyone)? No.
Did Mike scrub his email server hardware after the fact during an investigation? No.
Did Mike use his personal email to discuss P4P "donations" to a personal charity? No.
How do you know? He's had months to scrub the emails before he began archiving them. That's why politicians shouldn't use private accounts for official business whether it's illegal or not. Even if he didn't intend to, it gives the appearance of deception and clearly provides the opportunity to do so. Scandals are created and careers destroyed on the mere possibility of impropriety all the time. Look at Flynn.
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I'm not going to address the non-criminal points you make. Those are character issues. I will address the one issue that is a matter of law:
Did Mike share top secret information over his personal email?
The reason she was never prosecuted was quite simple. She didn't actually break the law. The fact is that as best the FBI could determine, Hillary Clinton didn't knowingly share any secret information. If that were not the case you can be quite sure they would have prosecuted her after Trump was sworn in.
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Did Mike share top secret information over his personal email? We don't know because those who hacked his server didn't release the e-mails in order to sway an election.
Did Mike use his personal email to share deleterious information about any of his campaigns? We don't know because those who hacked his server didn't release the e-mails in order to sway an election.
Did Mike say or do anything particularly damning in his emails (pizza anyone)? We don't know because those who hacked his server didn't release
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The claim is that the purpose of her use of a private server was to evade public records laws and scrutiny. This is directly in contrast to the chain of events that led to the discovery of her email server:
1) Congress sends State Dept. a subpoena for Clinton's emails.
2) State Dept. IT, aware that they don't have them, sends a request to Clinton's people for the emails.
Now, what would you expec
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EXCEPT, when this began coming out and she didn't turn them all over, Congress issued a subpoena for the rest of them. 3 days after she received the subpoena, yes exactly 3 days AFTER, she deleted 30,000+ emails from her server and all the backups she had. We even have the email requesting everything be wiped, with the date of 3 days after the subpoena.
So handing over stuff you know won't cause you issues is what you are claiming shows she is not guilty. Deleting evidence AFTER a subpoena is what I am sa
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Now, what would you expect someone that was trying to avoid scrutiny to do, at this point, when they received the first official request for those emails?
I would expect them to do EXACTLY what Hillary did: turn over a limited number of the requested emails and delete the remainder while claiming that the ones turned over were all of them.
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I was under the impression she hired an external law firm to determine which were which, and did not use her own people.
Russians are going to take over Indiana (Score:2)
. . . if they figure out where it is.
Somewhere near Chih-cah-go?
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It was agents of the state of Illinois who hacked the Pence's account. They were looking for some of Indiana's most secret information. Soybean and corn yields, pork belly futures.
Real hush-hush stuff.
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However it's still an incredibly bad idea for an elected official to use a personal email for any type of official work as it provides an easy way to hide documents and correspondence that should be in the public record or at least archived.
I agree, I think the problem is that when you're an elected official so much of your personal life is conflated with your private life it's hard to keep 100% separate. If you're emailing your wife about being late to your daughter's dance recital because you're "still in this meeting talking about the XYZ bill," oh no, now there's "details of official meetings" in your personal email!
It seems a lot of government agencies at all levels probably need to review their email handling procedures. Law, particularl
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That may well be, but at least he uses punctuation in his writings.
Re: Weird INterpretation (Score:2)
This may shock you, but the laws usually work the way you suggest. At least the federal records laws do. They define what makes something a government record, how such records must be retained and deposited for oversight, and the penalties for failing to do so. Notably absent is any reference to email, much less a distinction between government and private email servers.
There is the separate question of what administrative policies say, and what formalisms an official must follow to change or deviate fro
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Yes, let the hate flow.