Michael Isikoff* has committed an act of actual journalism:
Exclusive: FBI still does not have warrant to review new Abedin emails linked to Clinton probe
When FBI Director James Comey wrote his bombshell letter to Congress on Friday about newly discovered emails that were potentially “pertinent” to the investigation into Hillary Clinton’s private email server, agents had not yet been able to review any of the material, because the bureau had not yet gotten a search warrant to read them, three government officials who have been briefed on the probe told Yahoo News.
At the time Comey wrote the letter, “he had no idea what was in the content of the emails,” one of the officials said, referring to recently discovered emails that were found on the laptop of disgraced ex-Rep. Anthony Weiner, the estranged husband of top Clinton aide Huma Abedin. Weiner is under investigation for allegedly sending illicit text messages to a 15-year-old girl.
As of Saturday night, the FBI had still not gotten approval from the Justice Department for a warrant that would allow agency officials to read any of the newly discovered Abedin emails, and are therefore still in the dark about whether they include any classified material that the bureau has not already seen.
“We do not have a warrant,” a senior law enforcement official said. “Discussions are under way [between the FBI and the Justice Department] as to the best way to move forward.”
Oooopsie!
* Also, NY Times, if someone else reports something out before you, you’re supposed to give them credit…
Mnemosyne
Since I’m now home from my NaNoWriMo event, come read my post about The Haunting over at Schrodinger’s Cat’s place! You can comment here or over there — we already have a couple of great comments.
smintheus
Comey needs to step aside from the Directorship of the FBI while he is investigated for politicizing the investigation.
Omnes Omnibus
Comey is a complete hack. On 11/09/2016, Obama should ask for his resignation. If he doesn’t comply, Obama should dismiss him.
The Other Chuck
I’ll take “Stepping On Your Own Dick” for $400, Alex.
Punchy
Damage already done. Horse > barn. HRC likely to still win (altho offshore odds have been cut in half), but she will be facing House investigations non-stop for the 1st 6 months.
$1000 bet that a GOP Senate uses this as their reason to NOT accept any SCOTUS nominee.
Another Scott
ICYMI, from downstairs, Podesta’s piece at Medium on the Comey letter. There’s not a lot new there, but it’s good they’re pressing Comey to answer the obvious questions.
Cheers,
Scott.
WarMunchkin
So, how do we satisfy the mens rea criterion for prosecution under the Hatch Act?
Punchy
@efgoldman: Can you impeach a Pres for something they did before they became Pres? Serious question.
Omnes Omnibus
@WarMunchkin: Who do you want to go after? And why?
ETA: I don’t approve of political witch trials. On our side or theirs.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Punchy: as I recall the discussions from last time, “High Crimes and Misdemeanors” can mean whatever the House wants.
Adam L Silverman
@Another Scott: Which he can’t do, because no one at the FBI has, because they’re not allowed to, looked at the emails as they don’t have a warrant. Makes one wonders about the wording of his letter to the Congressional committee chairs about how the emails appear to be pertinent. This would apply they’ve already viewed them, which means they’re way off the reservation. I’m not a lawyer, just a criminologist, but if I was given the application for the warrant to review by the DOJ, as a judge I’d be asking some very tough questions based on Comey’s language in his correspondence with Congress. Perhaps Omnes or burnes or one of the other attorneys would be willing to weigh in and handicap, if they can, the odds, given the wording of that notification letter, of a Federal judge simply turning them down because Comey’s language indicates they’ve already had a looksee without permission.
Ken
@efgoldman: I have doubts they’ll be able to select a Speaker in the first six months.
WarMunchkin
@Omnes Omnibus: I want to go after Comey for the reason that I’m pissed. Note that I’m not a lawyer and this is a purely emotional statement, and I know the Hatch Act was designed for more explicit acts. The reasonable side of me knows that Comey didn’t do anything illegal, and in all likelihood, he comes off as an honest messenger to people who don’t follow politics for hours a day.
Another Scott
@Omnes Omnibus: TheHill:
Comey’s going to be under tremendous pressure over the next 10 days. It’s hard to imagine him not having to testify and have another press conference very shortly. Doing so will only make one side or the other (or both) even more upset.
10 days of madhouse politics as Drum put it. It’s very hard for me to see Comey surviving. Obama and Clinton probably won’t need to ask for his resignation – the pressure will be too intense.
It looks like he’ll have the shortest post-Hoover term as director (the next shortest was Clarence Kelley in the ’70s).
Cheers,
Scott.
(Who could be wrong, of course.)
ChrisGrrr
@Punchy:
Inevitable, no matter what clouds and shadows are cited.
Six months is incredibly optimistic.
RaflW
@Punchy: Damage already done. Horse > barn. HRC likely to still win (altho offshore odds have been cut in half), but she will be facing House investigations non-stop for
the 1st 6 monthsher entire presidency.FTFY.
Mary G
I said this was purely political, to keep the house and Senate majority. All these people wanking about how much integrity Comey has and how he agonized over this decision are idiots. Maybe Lynch will refuse to apply for the warrant.
smintheus
@WarMunchkin: Comey knew exactly what the Republican recipients were likely to do with the letter he sent them; he might as well have mailed it directly to Hannity. Comey knew not only that they would turn it into political fodder that very day, he almost certainly must have known that people like Jason Chaffetz would make the information public by misrepresenting it in a way highly unfavorable to Clinton…as they have done routinely for years.
Chris
@efgoldman:
This. That is all.
Adam L Silverman
@WarMunchkin: He’s violated DOJ policy. An argument might be made for a violation of the Privacy Act of 1974, which is why DOJ/FBI developed the policy and which is why they don’t comment on whether someone or some group is under investigation, that status of the investigation, and, unless they actually move to indict, the answer is always supposed to be “no comment”.
Lyrebird
@Punchy: Maybe this will help keep motivation up among those us volunteering… maybe we’ll rout Issa after all!
Adam L Silverman
@Punchy: Yes.
ChrisH
Before this news it seemed like Comey had reported “We’ve found a cardboard box that might contain illegal material, and we’ll have to open the box at some point to see.”
Now it appears the story is “We noticed a cardboard box through Huma Abedin’s window and we’ll be looking inside just as soon as we’re allowed to.”
Aleta
From N Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/james-comeys-letter-and-the-problem-of-leaks
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: What Comey said is legally iffy as hell. I think he stepped out onto a ledge in July. He is trying to avoid falling off right now. Let’s give him a push by asking questions.
Jean
So they don’t even have a warrant, and Comey announces an investigation on emails that do not come from Hillary’s server and are neither sent nor received by her, and which may already be in their possession (i.e. copies of mail they already have)? WTH? The backlash from this announcement should be yuge. This is merely anecdata, but my fellow Hillary supporters are even more committed to vote than before. Discussion between the FBI and the DOJ should end with the FBI being told to shut it down because they have nothing 11 days before en election.
burnspbesq
There is a fundamental illogic here.
They have enough access to the device to know that it contains possibly relevant emails, but they don’t have permission to look at them? How is that possible? Did Weiner consent to a search without Abedin also consenting? Who in their right mind would request a search warrant for the device but not the contents?
Whut … ah say whut in the Sam Hill is a-goin’ on heyah?
Mai.naem.mobile
I would like to see the emails of Paul Ryan,Jason Chaffetz,Mark Halperin and Reince Priebus. I don’t expect to find anything illegal just stupid embarrassing stuff.
Chris
@Mary G:
As I was reminded today, Comey is the same scum who stated publicly that he believed in the Ferguson Effect even though he had nothing to back that up. Guy needs to go, the second the election is over.
Patricia Kayden
@Omnes Omnibus: Exactly. Once Secretary Clinton is declared the winner, fire Comey’s partisan behind. Then he can join Faux Noise as the hack he is.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@efgoldman: one of the few lows they didn’t reach in the last six years was impeaching Obama. I’m actually surprised that Boehner and Ryan were able to keep a lid on that
Patricia Kayden
@Mai.naem.mobile: Probably illegal stuff too. I’d love to see Trump’s emails. Those would be all kinds of illegal and sleazy.
Lizzy L
So Comey sent the letter on spec — no one in the FBI has actually read the e-mails on the laptop? Really? Holy f***.
He is not a naif, FFS. He knew what would happen; therefore, I have to assume he wanted this outcome. Fuckhim and the horse he rode in on. Firing him right now would probably cause more harm, unfortunately.
Another Scott
@Adam L Silverman: Good points, but I’m sure the investigators at the FBI were thinking about things like that before Comey even knew about it. One kinda obvious thing would be the following:
1) The FBI has listings of e-mails on Hillary’s server.
2) Some FBI investigators have Weiner’s PC from the separate investigation. Presumably those investigators have warrants to look at that.
3) They see e-mails from Huma in the InBox and/or OutBox on Weiner’s PC. They can see the dates and Subjects and To lists.
4) Would those investigators have reason or authority to check to see if some of the e-mails might be the same as some of the e-mails on Hillary’s server?
Do they need a warrant for #4 if they have a warrant to look in Weiner’s e-mail? How far can they go fishing under a warrant? Presumably the lawyers can argue back and forth about it.
I dunno.
Either way, and even if they somehow had evidence that Huma was sending the Pentagon Papers (via Obama’s Time Machine so that they were still classified) via Weiner’s e-mail, Comey shouldn’t have sent the letter he did. He should have followed protocols about not interfering with elections.
Here’s hoping that this kind of stuff backfires and drives up Hillary’s numbers rather than driving them down….
We’ll see.
Cheers,
Scott.
smintheus
@efgoldman: I’m hoping Obama fires him. I think the best first step toward getting rid of Comey is forcing him to admit that he needs to step aside from the investigation and allow his own actions to be investigated. From there it’s just a half step to convince him to resign. And then try to prosecute him for abuse of office.
Calouste
@efgoldman: Funny thing is that in a parliamentary democracy, parliament can sack the Prime Minister by a simple majority vote, just because they don’t agree with the PM any more. No fussing with impeachment and all that crap. Of course, that typically means parliamentary elections, so their own seats are on the line as well at that point.
gf120581
@efgoldman: Yes, Johnson’s pretty much been given up for dead in his race.
Kind of amazing how much this has blown up in Comey’s face. I don’t think this was intentionally partisan, mainly a very clumsy and poorly thought out CYA attempt, but boy, I don’t see how he survives this. After Hillary’s election, he’s probably going to be shown the door. He’s got no credibility with either side right now and if what Eichenwald and others have been reporting is true, the FBI rank and file are livid with him.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
Obama should pardon Clinton as well. Comey fired 11/9, Hatch act investigation, starting tomorrow.
SiubhanDuinne
@Jean:
More anecdata: I’ve moved from doing phone banking to doing poll watching (aka voter protection). I spent most of today at an early voting location in Gwinnett County, GA (northern suburban Atlanta). Easily half the voters were African American, Muslim, and/or clearly recent immigrants (I heard two or three people tell the lady who passed out the “I’m a Georgia Voter” stickers that they were first-time voters! They were so proud and happy!)
Obviously I can’t know how they all voted, and I wouldn’t want to stereotype them based on race, dress, accent — but I’m just gonna say, I saw more than a few people of the female persuasion doing little shoulder shimmies after they cast their ballots :-)
ed_finnerty
@Punchy: His intention was to save the downticket races
SiubhanDuinne
@Patricia Kayden:
I believe Trump has said that he never uses email.
Now his Twitter account . . . .
gf120581
@efgoldman: I can’t imagine how badly it would backfire if they tried to impeach a newly inaugurated President. Not only would it go nowhere given the Senate will likely be Democratic controlled (and they’d never get anywhere close to the 2/3rds needed to convict), but it’d look blatantly like they were trying to overturn the election.
But if anything’s proven in DC, it’s that Republicans lose all sense and logic when it comes to the subject of the Clintons.
divF
@SiubhanDuinne:
Thank you SD, I needed a little joy.
Jean
@SiubhanDuinne: That’s great, SiubhanDuinne! Thanks for your work.
Lizzy L
@gf120581:
Or else, on the other side of the Looking Glass, it’s a deliberate attempt to create more chaos, it’s specifically aimed at Hillary Clinton, and it’s partisan as hell. He won’t survive as Director of the FBI, but his days at that post were numbered and he knows it. He’ll be taken care of. He won’t starve.
Adam L Silverman
@smintheus: There is unconfirmed reporting that Chaffetz got wind of it and put pressure on Comey. Josh Marshall has mentioned this on twitter.
divF
The rules regarding the Director of the FBI is that the max term is 10 years, but otherwise they serve at the pleasure of the President. So another interpretation of Comey’s move is that he knew that HRC was going to fire him on January 21, 2017, due to his actions in July, so he should feather his nest with the wingnut crowd as best he could.
Mai.naem.mobile
Getting rid of Comedy right now is all well and good but his replacement,even if only temporary better not be a hack, and getting somebody decent through the current Senate is not gonna happen.
Aleta
@Another Scott:
According to several news orgs, in fact they do not know whether these ‘new’ emails have were previously turned over. And since they haven’t read them yet, they don’t know whether any new ones are at all related to the investigation. (Yet a supposed total count has been leaked, as though the volume matters.)
Tom
@gf120581: But if anything’s proven in DC, it’s that Republicans have lost all sense and logic, period.
debbie
@Mnemosyne:
Loved your blog; still terrified of the movie.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: Did you see Matt Miller’s piece in the WaPo. Miller was the DOJ Director of Public Affairs under Holder has concluded that Comey let his reputation as the last person of integrity in the DOJ go to his head, which has led him to believe he is the only one at DOJ/FBI with the judgement to make these sort of calls regardless of actual policy or legal requirements.
Mary G
I can’t remember where I saw it, but I read somewhere that Huma told them that she used Carlos Dangler’s computer LAST APRIL. Why didn’t they investigate then?
This whole thing stinks.
Timurid
Holy shit the cnn.com front page right now… “B-b-b-but both sides do it! And both sides like horsies! And going really fast! So can we have horse race… pleeze?”
Is there a white person in a position of power or responsibility who does not want to watch the country burn?
smintheus
@Adam L Silverman: The right response by the FBI to any inquiries whether they’re investigating someone/something is always “no comment”. So if Comey did go public after hearing from Chaffetz, that’d be pretty decisive evidence of a Hatch Act violation.
amk
One thing I will give to rw’ers – whether they are in politics, government, judiciary or in media – they excel in distraction tactics that takes away the focus from their horrible records, corruption and performance.
debbie
@Mai.naem.mobile:
Just have them look at all the Bush administration emails saved on the RNC server to avoid FOIA. Oh, wait, they can’t. They were destroyed.
JerryN
@Adam L Silverman: That’s my pet theory – the info was leaked and Comey tried to get out in front of it. He made a hash of it probably because he’s incompetent rather than biased. The leak, if true, implies that there are anti-Clinton FBI personnel freelancing and that Comey has lost control. If that’s the case, there’s a whole lot more FBI personnel than just Comey that have to go.
kc
Say, who appointed this Comey asshole anyway?
Gravenstone
@Another Scott: Johnson won’t have his job, come January. He’ll be back in the private sector, where the only people he can fuck over are his poor employees.
gf120581
@Timurid: No, just a lot of the media wants to keep eyeballs on them until November 8. Hence the illusion of a horse race.
As the data guys will tell you, though, at this point, the cake is baked and this really doesn’t have much effect on the outcome of the race.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
That’s what I’ve been thinking: The blundering of a self-righteous goon, somewhere between prima donna and messiah complex
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@kc: Yeah, sick burn, man. Keep on keepin’ it real.
Adam L Silverman
@burnspbesq: My guess is their current warrant covers anything related to Weiner and sexting, especially as related to minors. And that’s it.
gf120581
@JerryN: That sounds quite plausible. It wouldn’t be the first time the Clintons have had to deal with rogue FBI personnel. Remember Gary Aldrich?
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
He’s even confused Alberto Gonzales.
Timurid
@gf120581:
Fuck all of them and their duty to be fair and balanced. Are they fair and balanced in their appraisal of cancer or hurricanes or human traffickers? Do they listen to the Zika virus’s side of the story? Donald fucking Trump is no different than any of those things. He’s a disaster, and he should be reported as such.
Mary G
Our media is not liberal. Memorandum has 22 clusters about Hillary’s emails and one only about Trump’s charity shenanigans, which is an actual story.
Adam L Silverman
@Mary G: Isikoff covers this. They appear to have badly bungled both their interview with Abedin by failing to act accordingly and actually check her email accounts.
amk
Lizzy L
From Wikipedia:
He is not naive, he is not simply “clumsy,” he may indeed be arrogant as fuck and think he knows better than anyone at DOJ including the AG, but he is not a political newcomer. It might even be suggested that he’s simply setting up his future. Or is that too damn cynical?
redshirt
@Mary G: It makes me legitimately angry.
And despair.
Adam L Silverman
@smintheus: No, its a violation of the Privacy Act of 1974, which is the legal basis for the “no comment” response.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: Yes, I did. I still think that he is a hack who does what is best for him. I think he fucked up on this one.
Jean
So why can’t Lynch just say, “no warrant.” Period. ? Granting one violates policy of investigation 60 days (or 11) before an election. They’ve got nothing at this point, and nothing should be all they get.
redshirt
@amk: I mean, this! Trump is literally going to trial in a few weeks. Do we hear a freaking WORD of it in the media? I mean, let me say that again, he’s literally going to trial shortly after the election. After. How convenient.
It’s all so convenient. And yet, YET! Not a word.
Jean
And it violates Privacy Act as previously noted in this thread.
debbie
@Jean:
She has recused herself. I’m not sure she can do anything.
Omnes Omnibus
@Timurid: John Kerry. And all other white cabinet folks. Step back from that thesis.
redshirt
@Jean: The Repukes would go insane. Probably literally at that point, with violence.
Walker
@JerryN:
This is exactly what I got from this. There are stories of FBI agents who felt Vomey did not make a strong enough case in July. We have a rogue agent problem.
WarMunchkin
I just read an article by Tom Tancredo, one of the 2012 Trump beta tests, saying that Hillary Clinton should step down in favor of Tim Kaine, but the mean Democrats won’t allow that because we have no respect for constitutional norms. No link because your brain doesn’t deserve that cancer.
Jean
She may have recused herself from the case, but she is still responsible for the RULES (initiating an investigation prior to election) and the LAW (Privacy Act).
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: No disagreement on the fuck up. I’m a big believer in UNODIR and beg forgiveness rather than ask permission, but he’s taken this to a whole new level.
Omnes Omnibus
@kc: Hey, troll, do you have a point? The current President is not infallible. Next question?
Timurid
Seriously, the MSM’s coverage of Trump is equivalent to posting news stories about ‘Are the authorities out to get Hurricane Matthew?’ and ‘Was North Carolina legally drunk at the time of the alleged assault?’
gf120581
@Lizzy L: No, that’s another theory; that he knows his days are numbered in a Clinton presidency and therefore is setting himself up for some cushy wingnut retirement package or something. I personally don’t buy it, but I’ve seen it suggested. I’ve even seen rumors that he’s setting himself up to run for governor of his native NJ next year, which seems ridiculous (mainly because thanks to Christie, the GOP is basically guaranteed to get blown out in that race).
The Dangerman
@Punchy: I’d put down good money that Garland gets confirmed during the lame duck and the GOP prays HRC never has a chance in 4 years to pick a SC justice (yeah, damn unlikely, but they can hope, pray, burn incense, sacrifice fatted calves, etc).
Mike J
Reminder: change your clocks and grab your socks. BST ends tonight.
Mary G
@redshirt: No despairing allowed! These assholes have gone after Hillary for 30 years and missed every time. I am so fired up to fight back by any means necessary.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mike J:
Here in the US of A (most of it, anyhow), we’re still a week off from time change.
Punchy
I’d chalk this up to a nothingburger except the betting lines went from -650 to -330 on this. Thats an insane move. My guess is that $ is coming from non-US punters who dont understand that most of the voters have baked in their candy, emails or not
redshirt
@Mary G: Despair of the fact these fucks have been out in the wilderness for 8 years now and yet it’s still like they call the tunes. The media dances to their songs whenever they want to sing them. We win by grinding things out with facts and truth, but often that ain’t near enough to defeat these vile assholes. I despair of a world where facts are at everyone’s fingertips and yet we seem to be drowning in lies.
Another Scott
@debbie: Many (most?) of the Bush White House e-mails were recovered, but not released yet.
Cheers,
Scott.
Nom de Plume
It appears that Comey made real sure to let Chaffetz see it before anyone else.
Omnes Omnibus
@Punchy: Go ahead and lose your money.
Larime
How does this help down ballot? Clinton haters are already voting. Who sees this and decides to vote for Blount or Heck?
Matt McIrvin
@Punchy: There’s been discussion of impeaching Hillary Clinton before she enters office (this is apparently possible because of her former job as Secretary of State: there is precedent for impeaching former government officials).
Impeachment is purely political; they can gin up any reason whatsoever. The consequences are also political, of course: impeaching Bill Clinton didn’t do the House Republicans a lot of good in the short term, though there’s a case to be made that it helped them get the Presidency in 2000 by spooking Al Gore into distancing himself from Clinton.
O. Felix Culpa
@Larime: I don’t see how this helps down ballot at all. I’m doing data for the campaign, and so far, when there are split tickets, they’re uniformly against Hillary and straight Dem otherwise. I believe this is an effort to hurt Hillary’s electoral chances (not gonna happen) and set up inevitable investigations afterwards.Love
AnotherBruce
@Another Scott: Who I hope is right, of course.
Matt McIrvin
@redshirt: I liked the tut-tutting about how unprecedented it is for a presidential candidate to possibly be under criminal investigation. Of course, Donald Trump’s child-rape case is, conveniently, a civil one thanks to the statute of limitations.
AnotherBruce
@Lizzy L: No, firing him would not cause more harm. We need to reel in the persecution party and let them know there will be consequences for trying to prosecute bullshit.
Steeplejack
@Nom de Plume:
Would like to see confirmation of that from a less obscure source.
jsrtheta
@Punchy: Not if you believe in “original intent.”
redshirt
@Matt McIrvin: I know, right? It’s like we’re all living in Wink-WinkLand where we all know what’s going on, but just choose to look the other way.
Steeplejack
@Matt McIrvin:
I thought the penalty for impeachment (and conviction—is that the right word?—in the Senate) is being booted out of office. So what’s the point of impeaching someone after she has already left office?
Or is there some double-secret transitive property of impeachment (known only to Republicans) that would prevent Clinton from becoming president after being retroactively impeached as secretary of state?
Rhetorical question. This is so far down the rabbit hole I can’t believe it.
catclub
@Punchy: How about: Can you pardon a president before they are inaugurated.
How about “for any offenses related to email while secretary of state”?
smintheus
@Adam L Silverman: If Comey released his letter knowing that Chaffetz was aiming to politicize the information, then it sure seems like a Hatch Act violation.
Lizzy L
@AnotherBruce: Firing him on November 9th seems like a no-brainer. Firing him Monday morning — um. But if NFTG Obama decides to go there, I’ve no objection.
Adam L Silverman
@Lizzy L: Firing him before the election will only make it worse. It will appear as a politicization of events. And it will certainly be spun to an all to gullible media that way.
Steve in the ATL
@Lizzy L:
Peak cynicism was a lie
redshirt
@Lizzy L: 11/9 is too soon too. First step is to administratively suspend him, but all quiet like, so he can’t actually do anything anymore. Then like 6 weeks after the election you get rid of him in some bureaucratic parlance.
Adam L Silverman
@Steeplejack: Impeachment is a political process, not a criminal one, despite the Supreme Court sitting in judgement in the Senate, which is where the trial portion takes place. It is important to remember that when the Democrats have had the majorities and have had legitimate concerns that could lead to at least a preliminary investigation beyond normal oversight – Iran-Contra, cooked Iraq WMD intel analysis, torture – they have chosen to not even begin the preliminary actions needed for impeachment. There was real evidence that could have, and some have argued persuasively, should have led to impeachment for Iran-Contra. The Democrats decided not to do so because they were worried that a second one, so close to Watergate, even with overwhelming evidence, would lead to impeachment becoming a political weapon to be used whenever the Presidency moved from one party to the other. Unfortunately they weren’t counting on Gingrich who made it clear that part of the reason they were impeaching Clinton was to even the score for Watergate. The vast majority of the institutional degradation and norm destruction in Congress can be traced back to Gingrich’s fight for the Speakership and then his subsequent Speakership.
Villago Delenda Est
I want new risotto tips, and I want them NAOW!
Adam L Silverman
@efgoldman: Harry Reid wasn’t Majority Leader in the 1980s/Reagan Administration. Nor was he Speaker of the House.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman: @efgoldman: I looked it up, Daschle. And the House Dem caucus was still, I imagine, packed with Blue Dogs and even Dixiecrats who probably thought the whole adventure was brilliant. Wasn’t Phil Gramm still a Democrat in the 80?
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: They weren’t happy with it. But they also had determined that the country wasn’t going to tolerate another impeachment again. Especially within a decade (give or take a year) of Watergate.
Villago Delenda Est
@Adam L Silverman: Ford pardoning Nixon opened up a Pandora’s box that we’ll never be rid of. It gave the neo-feudalism party the break it needed to undermine the very concept of rule of law. They’ve been pressing it ever since.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Tom:
Indeed, this is so obvious and so clumsy that there is a good chance it will blow back on themselves.
dianne
The Wikileak email dumps over the last six weeks with the collaboration of Russian hackers were supposed to do Hillary in. The Rep. candidate was so incompetent that it didn’t work. So they had to ramp up the game a bit and bully Comey into this latest political gambit. I don’t think this will work either. I remember the ’98 midterms after Clinton was pilloried for 2 solid years and the Dems still prevailed. All this will do is make the Dems even madder. If it does give Trump a narrow win, we will have a co-president in the form of Mr. Putin and since Donald is so easily swayed, we will become allied with Russia against the rest of the west and most especially the NATO countries. And they will make him think it was his idea. A small price to pay if Trump gets his debts wiped out and the lawsuits against him nullified.The Republicans in Congress think he will be easily led but he is answering to a more powerful master than they realize.
Percysowner
@Nom de Plume: Oh, good. Can Tweety NOW get off his high horse about how Hillary LIED when she said it was only released to the Republicans. Because, in essence, it was, just so they could get ahead of the game.
debbie
@Another Scott:
I know you’re long gone, but whether the emails were recovered or not is irrelevant. What’s relevant is that they were deleted in the first place. Not to mention the thought they could get around FOIA.
Another Scott
@debbie: We’ll have to agree to disagree. Recovering the e-mails is a big deal because it means, once they’re finally released, that historians and the public will be able to see what was going on in the Bush WH and Administration then.
What W’s people did was different than Rmoney who, IIRC, bought all the Massachusetts hard drives and had them destroyed.
Yes, W’s people shouldn’t have tried to go around the records rules. And it’s good that the rules were subsequently tightened up – just like the rules at State were tightened up during Hillary’s term.
IT systems in the US government have lagged industry best practices for a long time, for lots of reasons. It’s good that they’re finally catching up and it’s good that there are fewer ways around the rules now.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Neldob
And there is the Petraus issue hovering. He actually did pass classified info and was not charged? as far as I nkow.
The Other Chuck
@Steeplejack: The House votes to impeach, the Senate must vote to convict by a 2/3 majority. Bill was impeached by the house, but they never had the votes in the senate.
The GOP isn’t quite stupid enough (and will wise up via attrition alone this election) to give impeachment any serious consideration since it backfired so badly on them last time.
The Other Chuck
@Adam L Silverman: I think they were waiting for the Iran-Contra hearings to wind up and claim a few scalps before proceeding with impeachment. Then the prosecution essentially threw the case, and let Oliver North filibuster on and on to become more or less a wingnut cause celebre. Then key witnesses started dropping dead.