What They Don’t Want You To Know About Hillary’s E-mails

“Another classified e-mail released” blares today’s latest headline on page A4 of The Minneapolis Star Tribune (on Saturday, November 5, 2016). But what follows in this news article from the Associated Press sadly illustrates how the media has failed to give complete and accurate information to the American public.

Only The New York Times and a few periodicals like Mother Jones made any attempts to explain the State Department’s continuous game of classifying and declassifying and classifying information. Too many other publications didn’t even try. That’s inexcusable.

What’s far worse, though, is the way numerous media outlets — both broadcast and print alike — have failed in explaining and clarifying the information they’ve carelessly given about Hillary Clinton’s e-mails. Here’s the first paragraph from today’s article that appeared in The Minneapolis Star Tribune:
“The State Department on Friday released a 2009 e-mail chain that shows then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton forwarding to her daughter material that was classified last year by the department.”

Note the phase “material that was classified last year by the department.”

So when Secretary Clinton e-mailed her daughter Chelsea in 2009 and forwarded her some materials, these materials were NOT “CLASSIFIED” at that time.

In fact, they didn’t become “CLASSIFIED” until 2015 — UNTIL 7 YEARS LATER.

So what’s not classified today can literally become classified 7 — even 10 or 20 years — later? Uh, yes. That’s right.

But how is something like that possible? Sure, everybody’s heard about classified materials becoming declassified years later, after crises or conflicts in wartime have subsided or ended. But to get in legal trouble because all kinds of unclassified or nonclassified information suddenly gets “CLASSIFIED” years later, AFTER YOU’RE NO LONGER WORKING AT THE STATE DEPARTMENT? BUT TO FACE CRIMINAL CHARGES FOR THE WAY YOU’VE “MISHANDLED” CLASSIFIED MATERIALS WHEN THESE MATERIALS WEREN’T EVEN CLASSIFIED?

Over five months ago, I sounded the alarm about the GOP’s MO on Hillary in my op-ed Swiftboating Hillary — Without a Swift Boat. It was posted in The Richfield Patch on May 31, 2016. What I said then bears repeating now. Here’s an excerpt from that opinion piece:
“According to news media and nearly all the Republicans on Capitol Hill, Secretary Clinton broke the law. She violated the Federal Records Act. They’re leaving out some important details, though. They’re not telling you that the Federal Records Act was passed by Congress on September 10, 2014, and signed into law by President Obama on November 26, 2014.

And when was Hillary Clinton Secretary of State? She became Secretary in February, 2009, and resigned on February 1, 2013, on the same day John Kerry became new Secretary of State. That means that Hillary left office nearly 2 years BEFORE the Federal Records Act became law.

That means that these laws she allegedly violated were literally not in existence during her 5 years of service. That means that her detractors are so determined to keep her from being elected President that they’re using laws that weren’t even around when she served as Secretary of State!That means they really ARE out to get her.

Whatever your political affiliations are, you’ll have to admit this kind of character assassination is pretty extreme.”

I hate to keep pulling this old chestnut out of the fire again, but I can’t believe that so many professional journalists keep ignoring this important timeline. Knowing that Hillary Clinton served as Secretary of State before The Federal Records Act was signed into law is a highly significant point in this news narrative. So is the fact that these classified materials in question weren’t even classified when then-Secretary Clinton handled them. But now Hillary Clinton might be facing jail time because she did things that were perfectly legal 3 to 7 years ago when she served as Secretary of State?

That’s bizarre. That’s crazy. That’s nuts.

No, that’s just the Republicans at work, dear voters. These fascist autocrats stay awake every night trying to come up with ways to smite their enemies. And make no mistake, Hillary Clinton IS public enemy #1 now. They really are out to get her.

This isn’t my opinion, it’s what a lot of informed people are now saying about the Republicans. Paul Waldman, a senior writer at The American Prospect, posted his opinion on The Plum Line — the blog of The Washington Post. We’re on the same wavelength, only Waldman’s op-ed is a lot scarier than I could have imagined. Apparently, top level Republicans are saying they’re going to impeach Clinton right after she takes office. They don’t even need a reason. They don’t even want a reason. They just want to humiliate and destroy her.

Mature, real mature.

As I’ve said before, you don’t have to like Hillary. You don’t have to vote for her. You don’t have to vote at all this election day.

But whatever you decide to do, you’d better take both hands and pull, your head out of your butt and finally realize that what’s going on in this election is undemocratic and unAmerican.

What the GOP doesn’t want you to know about her e-mail scandal is that THERE IS NO E-MAIL SCANDAL. There are just a lot of frightened men trying to destroy a female candidate who doesn’t think exactly like them. There’s just baseless political theater, that’s all.

Until you understand that such smear tactics have no place in The United States of America, you’re going to remain a hopelessly complacent and useless American citizen.

Happy Election Day!