The laws concerning handling of classified information are serious business, and everyone with a clearance knows what they are and what the consequences of breaking them, even inadvertently, are. If the chief executive in charge of that system clearly disrespects the rules, what does everyone think is going to happen? There have already been far too many episodes since 1990 where powerful, well-connected people flouted the laws regarding classified information handling, and got away with it because of who they were.

The kool-aid has been drunk and the wagons circled.

(The continuing questioning about simple "details" is simply sexist, racist (bound to be some indian in her somewhere), and a right-wing conspiracy. i.e. see Nixon "tapes")

http://thehill.com/policy/technology/234487-hillarys-emails-not-technically-illegal

Having your own server is not illegal.

Running official government business thru it to dodge freedom of information act requests is at least unethical[1]. Especially since there are Executive Orders mandating that official email goes thru official channels so that FOIA requests can be responded to in a timely manner.

The other advantage of doing it thru official channels is that when you leave your post, you don't have to wonder what's personal and what's not. Better yet, any request for such material can be forwarded on to the department and you don't have futz with it at all.

Putting any classified material on such a machine is all kinds of illegal. Petraeus was convicted of a felony for much, much less. HRC has made herself ineligible for the position she is campaigning for.

1. it might be illegal, but I am unaware of a particular statute making it so

One simply can not trust a word that comes out of that woman's mouth. Truth is for the little people.

But she is a woman!

If we don't elect her we'll all be misogynists!

Running official government business thru it to dodge freedom of information act requests is at least unethical[1]. Especially since there are Executive Orders mandating that official email goes thru official channels so that FOIA requests can be responded to in a timely manner.

Exactly. Remember when Sarah Palin used a Yahoo! mail account to conduct official business? That was wrong, this is wrong, and it's all done to skirt FOIA.

Regardless of what one thinks of Clinton politically, I think everyone can agree she's a smart person, which makes her protestations in this matter disingenuous at best.

I agree w/this.

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/08/hillary_may_just_be_dumb.html

Wait a second now, I may be in the forest except for all these trees. So having the server might not be illegal. But sending/receiving classified documents is or is not illegal? They have already said classified documents were found, no?

And this excerpt doesn't even touch on the shady links between Clinton's State Dept. work and donations to their foundation.

At least, for once, the blatant lying and lack of any sense of responsiblity appears to be causing her trouble in the polls.

Hillary Clinton now joins the ranks of the IRS and the George W. Bush White House as just another "the rules don't apply here" destroyer of unflattering (at best) e-mails.

Enough already. Round these miscreants up and incarcerate them.

We'd do it if they were selling crack, right? So why not throw them in the tank for violating their oaths and our security?

As I understand the legal situation:

- Using a private server for official business violates regulations. The government can treat regulatory violations a lot of different ways, depending on whether it feels like making a criminal case out of it or not.

- Having classified information on an unsecured server is hugely illegal. There is absolutely no question about this. Anyone else would already be in jail, likely without bail, awaiting trial.

- If you mix private and official documents (in this case, her emails), regulations state that the government gets them all. Her deliberate destruction of emails before turning them over to the government violates this regulation (see above).

- It seems clear that many of the destroyed emails were official. for example, it defies belief that she sent 15000 emails per year, and yet no official ones at all during the months around the Bengazi crisis. Hence, she has almost certainly violated FOIA requests, committed fraud, lied to law enforcement, etc.. Criminal actions the government is normally not shy about prosecuting.

Here's hoping the Dept. of Justice takes the bit in its teeth and unravels this whole case despite any political pressure. Very likely Ms. Clinton would not go down alone - anyone she exchanged classified email with (who was not on a government server) will go down with her. I expect there would be lots of big names on that list...

sanders is catching up, she may not get the nomination

It will NOT be Bernie Sanders. It's just too easy to poke holes in any of his ideas.

What will really happen is that Hillary will abandon her campaign with about 6 months to go, Uncle Joe will be offered as the sensible solution to a frantic America, and everybody will vote for his puppetry with a big sigh of relief.

I don't think Uncle Joe has that good of a chance Rad. He is a gaff-o-matic and there are reams of video of him saying incredibly stupid stuff. I'm betting on another Obama type candidate. A complete dark horse with no history. So in 6-9 months keep an eye out for Mr. Nobody taking over.

Have you ever seen his video advising women to defend their homes by firing a shotgun blindly through a door? For anyone who knows anything about guns, it's ROTFL material. If he was a comedian, he'd have topped Pat Paulsen with that one. But Pat knew when he was spewing nonsense. Biden doesn't.

On the serious side, there's the Michigan man who fired a shotgun through his screen door at a shadow. He's been convicted of 2nd-degree murder.

I have no doubt that somewhere a Republican campaign strategist is collecting similar videos and quotes, for release after Biden is nominated _and_ Democratic politicians around the country have endorsed this clown.

But why would Hillary think she could get away with running official mail through a private server without attention to whether it was classified? Maybe because back when Bill was President, Sandy Berger stuffed classified documents in his trousers and got off without jail time, just a fine that might have hurt him but Hillary could pay from petty cash. According to Wikipedia, "Berger was fined $50,000,[16] sentenced to serve two years of probation and 100 hours of community service, and stripped of his security clearance for 3 years." Less important people have been sentenced to 20 years for less. He could even have been re-appointed to his job as National Security Adviser after 3 years; can you imagine a military officer who did the same ever getting his job back?

So here's a legal precedent: the penalty for violating the rules for classified materials depends on how important you are. Hillary is so much more important than Berger (at least in her own mind) that she expects to get off entirely.