Clinton’s dodge another bullet, submitted by Tim Howe
Comey’s remarks on Clinton probe heavily edited
BY ERIC TUCKER Associated Press
JON ELSWICK
Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., says edits to a draft FBI statement on the Hillary Clinton email investigation appear to have watered down the significance of the bureau’s findings. Johnson said he had obtained from the FBI a draft statement that then-Director James Comey produced in May 2016 in anticipation of closing out the Clinton email case. The document shows line-by-line edits. Though the FBI had not yet interviewed Clinton about her use of a private email server, officials had already determined that criminal charges were probably not warranted.
DARRYL DYCK AP
Hillary Clinton
WASHINGTON
A draft statement former FBI Director James Comey prepared in anticipation of concluding the Hillary Clinton email case without criminal charges was heavily edited to change the “tone and substance” of the remarks, a Republican senator said Thursday.
Some of the edits proposed to the May 2016 draft, obtained by The Associated Press, appear to soften the gravity of the bureau’s findings.
Comey, for instance, initially wrote that the FBI believed that Clinton and her aides were “grossly negligent” in their handling of classified information, language also contained in the relevant criminal statute.
But the text was edited to say they were simply “extremely careless” in their use of a personal email server, a phrase Comey adopted for his July 5 public announcement that the FBI would not be recommending charges.
Comey’s ultimate statement also omitted language asserting that the “sheer volume” of information classified as secret at the time it was shared made it reasonable to believe that the former secretary of state and her aides were grossly negligent.
In addition, while Comey initially said it was “reasonably likely” that “hostile actors” had gained access to Clinton’s email server, the text was edited to say that such an intrusion was “possible.”
The original version noted that the FBI had worked with partners in the intelligence community to determine whether the server had been compromised. While it was unclear what significance this had, it was omitted from Comey’s final text.
Though the FBI had not yet interviewed Clinton, then the Democratic candidate for president, at the time the statement was drafted, FBI officials had already determined that criminal charges were probably not warranted and had begun thinking about how to present that conclusion to the public.
Comey on May 2 circulated a proposed draft statement to other senior FBI officials laying out the basis for the eventual decision against recommending charges for Clinton and her aides.
Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, the Republican chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said he had obtained from the FBI a copy of Comey’s original draft with proposed line-by-line edits from other FBI officials. It’s not clear from the document which official suggested what changes, though many were incorporated into Comey’s July 5 announcement.
In a letter to FBI Director Chris Wray, Johnson said edits to Comey’s original remarks “appear to change the tone and substance.” He asked the FBI to identify the officials who had proposed the changes.
She will never be prosecuted ……….there are 7,800 more elites who do the same thing.
Jerry, I happen to agree with you. The Clinton Team knows all the ropes.
What Putin Really Wants
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/01/putins-game/546548/
Long piece but apparently Putin was upset at the Panama Papers he decided to screw the US elections
AJ,
Can you point to ANY concrete, confirmed evidence that Putin screwed US elections?
I can point to concrete evidence that Hillary Clinton and the DNC screwed American elections, including cheating in the debates, and colluding with the media to bring ‘fringe’ Republicans to the forefront in the primaries.
Maybe I missed it, because I can’t stomach paying close attention to the Russiagate farce. But the last I heard, top intelligence officials had admitted they had nothing solid. Furthermore, William Binney, high level NSA whistleblower, says that if there were any Russian hacking of the election, the NSA has the evidence. The fact that they have not come forward with it strongly implies it does not exist.
In spite of the ridiculous opening to the article, calling Putin “just a gambler who won big”, I did try to wade through the Atlantic article. But I slipped on one red herring after another and quickly had to throw in the towel. This is some seriously mush-headed Left propaganda.
That is exactly my impression at this point GH!
Do you like the idea of war with Russia, AJ?
Do you think there is any good reason for war with Russia?
Hillary Clinton was extremely aggressive in her rhetoric toward Russia. Whereas Trump, for all his flaws, indicated an interest in peace with Russia–a serious offense in a country as dominated by the War Industry as the USA, likely a key motive for the seemingly concocted Russiagate scandal.
Clinton was involved with the coup in Ukraine, an extremely bellicose act which, if the tables were turned, would be about the equivalent of Russia provoking a coup and putting in a puppet government in Canada.
Why are Lefties now in bed with the Military Industrial Complex and the gestapo intelligence agencies? Could anything be more hypocritical?
Yet, more good points GH!
Sorry you didn’t see fit to respond, AJ.
Maybe one of these days you’ll defend your viewpoint. Who knows, maybe you’ll bring some of us around to your way of seeing things, if you can present supporting facts and logic.
Great comments, Professor
In spite of certain minor changes over time, the U.S. republic has doggedly preserved its oligarchic structure, and this is readily apparent in the two major selling points of its contemporary “democratic” publicity campaign. The Establishment and its propagandists regularly insist that a structural aristocracy is a “democracy” because the latter is defined by the guarantee of certain fundamental rights (legal definition) and the holding of regular elections (procedural definition). This is, of course, a purely formal, abstract and largely negative understanding of democracy, which says nothing whatsoever about people having real, sustained power over the governing of their lives. However, even this hollow definition dissimulates the extent to which, to begin with, the supposed equality before the law in the United States presupposes an inequality before the law by excluding major sectors of the population: those judged not to have the right to rights, and those considered to have lost their right to rights (Native Americans, African-Americans and women for most of the country’s history, and still today in certain aspects, as well as immigrants, “criminals,” minors, the “clinically insane,” political dissidents, and so forth). Regarding elections, they are run in the United States as long, multi-million dollar advertising campaigns in which the candidates and issues are pre-selected by the corporate and party elite. The general population, the majority of whom do not have the right to vote or decide not to exercise it, are given the “choice”—overseen by an undemocratic electoral college and embedded in a non-proportional representation scheme—regarding which member of the aristocratic elite they would like to have rule over and oppress them for the next four years. “Multivariate analysis indicates,” according to an important recent study by Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page, “that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence. The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination […], but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy.”
Thanks for that, Jerry.
As far as the Clintons are concerned, I think they will never see justice. The system is just too corrupt.
Jerry, last summer I think you were mentioning that smart phone you were using was messing up your posts and you were getting a new one. What did you finally get? It’s amazing what you can get these days.
Here is another one…..
http://www.atlanteanconspiracy.com/2008/06/presidential-bloodlines.html
Same smart phone…….I just never us it, except in Florida……
I am thinking of going back to my flip phone……..throw aways……..
I didn’t have that much of a need for a smart phone as I don’t travel much. I have a laptop plus a Surface Pro clone and even a Nook and those met my mobile needs so I got by with a non-smart cell phone for years. Last summer I finally got a smart phone, a Motorola G4. Nice 5.5 inch screen and I love it. Wouldn’t leave home without it.
Blocked from posting?
WASHINGTON (AP) — Count President Donald Trump among the personal winners in the $1.5 trillion tax package that congressional Republicans are on the verge of passing. It’s not only a political score for Trump but likely a windfall for his real estate empire, too.
Oil drillers would also benefit. So would multimillionaire and billionaire owners of sports teams. Companies would enjoy a bounty from permanently lower tax rates. Lawyers and accountants will profit from the advice suddenly needed to guide clients through the tax plan.
The bill creates plenty of losers, too. An estimated 13 million Americans are projected to lose health insurance. Commuters will no longer receive a perk that has saved them money. Some residents of high-tax states like New York, New Jersey and California will pay more in taxes.
And millions of American households could face tax hikes in coming years. That’s because their new tax breaks are set to expire after 2025. And their taxes could creep up because the IRS has been directed to use a less generous gauge of inflation in adjusting tax brackets.
Republican lawmakers have sold their far-reaching legislation as benefiting everyone in the long run because, they argue, it will speed up economic growth. But most economists say that any boost in growth would be modest in the long term. And most argue that at least some of the tax benefits will be undermined by the much higher budget deficits that help pay for them.
Among the tax plan’s winners:
___
THE TRUMP ORGANIZATION
At least temporarily, companies with profits that double as the owner’s personal income would enjoy a substantial tax break. Consider the Trump Organization. It consists of about 500 such “pass-through” entities, according to the president’s lawyers. Rather than pay the top rate of nearly 40 percent, Trump would likely be taxed on these profits at closer to 30 percent.
The final bill also appears to specifically benefit the real estate sector, the bedrock of the Trump family’s wealth, with benefits for depreciating the value of property held by pass-through companies.
The president’s family didn’t receive every possible benefit. The estate tax on inheritances, for example, will stay in place, though it will apply only to the portion of a family’s estate that exceeds $11 million — twice the previous level — at least through 2025. And the alternative minimum tax, which is intended to prevent the wealthy from exploiting loopholes to avoid taxes, would stay in place as well, though its higher thresholds would also be temporary.
___
ENERGY DRILLERS
It’s no longer off limits to drill in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and natural gas. President Barack Obama had sought to protect the 19.6-million acres, a home for polar bears, caribou, migratory birds and other wildlife. But under the Republicans’ tax plan, fossil fuel companies could tap into oil and gas reserves. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski and other Republicans insist that drilling can be done safely with new technology while ensuring a steady energy supply for West Coast refineries.
___
SPORTS TEAMS
Major sports teams will still be able to build and renovate their stadiums with tax-exempt municipal bonds. The House version of the tax bill had initially scrapped access to this form of debt by sports teams, a provision that drew objections from the NFL. But the final bill retains it.
Such tax-advantaged public financing should make it easier to have the Oakland Raiders, for example, move to Las Vegas and play in a new $1.9 billion dome. Forbes estimates the Raiders, owned by Mark Davis, to be worth $2.4 billion.
___
MAJOR CORPORATIONS
The tax rate for most companies would drop to 21 percent from 35 percent. This is a permanent rate cut, which, along with a shift to a lower rate on some foreign earnings, could help boost corporate profits. Not surprisingly, the stock market has soared in part over anticipation of these lower corporate taxes. The Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index has jumped nearly 24 percent since Trump’s election last year.
___
TAX LAWYERS
Rather than close loopholes, the tax bill appears to create more of them. Tax lawyers and accountants will likely be besieged by clients looking for professional guidance in restructuring companies and incomes to avoid taxes. In fact, tax experts and lawyers who reviewed a prior version of the tax bill outlined a slew of loopholes in a 35-page report in which it warned that the bill would “allow new tax games and planning opportunities for well-advised taxpayers.”
___
At the same time, many individuals and groups are likely to be on the losing end of the tax legislation. Among them:
___
THE UNINSURED
The tax bill removes a penalty that was charged to people without health insurance as required by Obama’s 2010 health insurance law as a way to hold costs down for everyone. By eliminating this mandate, the tax bill will likely deprive 13 million people of insurance, according to estimates by the Congressional Budget Office.
The repeal of the health insurance mandate will help preserve revenue to pay for the tax cuts. The government would no longer have to subsidize as many low-income people receiving insurance. This change would generate $314.1 billion over 10 years, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.
___
COMMUTERS
It could get more expensive to ride the subway or park your car near work. Employers would no longer be able to deduct from their taxes the cost of providing parking or transit passes worth up to $255 a month to workers. Bicycle commuters would also lose their benefit from companies.
Technically, companies could still offer this benefit. But under the tax bill, they will lose the financial incentive to do so. Such a change could have the effect of reducing ridership on public transit and possibly increase costs for riders on rail and bus systems.
___
HOMEOWNER IN HIGH-TAX STATES
The bill imposes a $10,000 cap on people who deduct their state, local and property taxes. Currently, there is no limit on how much in state and local taxes you can deduct. Some Republican lawmakers in such high-tax states such as California and New York intend to vote against the bill because their constituents’ taxes could increase as a result of the provision. Their opposition, though, isn’t expected to block the bill’s passage.
WASHINGTON (AP)
President Donald Trump will be holding a series of weekend meetings with Cabinet members at Camp David.
A White House spokeswoman said Saturday that Trump would meet with Vice President Mike Pence and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin as the Republican-led Congress plans to vote on its tax bill.
Trump will also meet with Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney, Housing and Urban Development head Ben Carson, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue and Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin.
Trump is set to return to the White House on Sunday afternoon.
President Donald Trump is defending the Republicans’ tax cut plan, pushing back against criticism that it will benefit the wealthy more than the middle class.
Speaking to reporters at the White House Saturday before leaving for Camp David, Trump said the middle class will benefit because the tax cut will draw companies back from overseas, creating jobs.
The GOP plans to muscle the bill through Congress next week.
Trump touted the nation’s economy, predicting that it would “start to rock” once the bill is passed.
Trump also predicted that economic growth could go from the current 3 percent to “4, 5 and maybe even 6 percent ultimately.”
Many economists doubt that even a sustained 4 percent growth rate is achievable.
Republicans seem to have secured the votes to pass a tax overhaul that President Donald Trump hopes to sign before Christmas.
Here’s what House Speaker Paul Ryan says: “This is happening. Tax reform under Republican control of Washington is happening.”
It’s the widest-ranging reshaping of the tax system in three decades and is expected to add $1.46 trillion to the nation’s debt over a decade.
The GOP plans to muscle it through Congress next week before its year-end break.
Mr. Big Al Korelin and all you people,
Great Jimmy Bovard interview by Jef Deist.
Also, Bovard’s got a new book out and it is a hoot. (But I laugh when I read his stuff so I do not cry.)
https://mises.org/library/jim-bovard-our-slavish-devotion-politics
Another good one from Deist…
https://mises.org/library/ryan-mcmaken-who-prosecutes-prosecutors
Freaking Loonie Tune Sessions………….what an Idiot…….
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-12-16/sessions-balks-second-special-counsel-says-recent-fbi-bombshell-may-have-innocent-ex
I am questioning the…. “may have innocent explanation “
There will be no need for another special council. It’s all about to come full circle. Remember, we only need a special council because we don’t trust the current leadership. The leadership and law is getting restored. It will be evident pretty soon.
I agree , there is no need for a special council……..just throw the Mueller team in jail.
Here is one , questioning Mueller and obtaining info…..
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-12-16/mueller-obtained-tens-thousands-trump-transition-emails
All of the Mueller team is getting exposed. Many of them are going down. It’s an important part of the swamp drainage…. Gotta get the dirty lawyers and cops at the top, to drop.
palisade radio
Five more going on the HOT SEAT…………Mueller not looking to good……..
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-12-17/top-fbi-and-doj-officials-be-subpoenaed-mccabe-strzok-page-crosshairs
Chicago Nut Job……the commissioner should be run out on a rail…….
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-12-17/chicago-commissioner-pleads-un-deploy-foreign-troops-us-soil
I hope some persons on here saw the cbs report interview on doug jones the new to be senator from alabam . He is not the wild eyed far left wing DEM he was painted in the Trump press [fox] . He would be considered , a conservative DEM if he were from Penn or Ohio . He has three years to prove himself . lots of luck to you Doug Jones.
Lots of luck counting the fake, phony and fraudulent votes, Da Jones.
Wow are you angry . maybe you should have a drink with a friend let a hudered flowers bloom . They dont have to be your particular flower . best of health to you an d all
Russel,
On the campaign trail Hillary said: ” Trump wants to lower taxes on the middle class, I’m going to Raise Taxes on the middle class “…! And the crowd says ..YAY… Those people have been lulled into a demention of stupid that took years to achieve. Most of them can’t even tell you who the secretary of the treasury is.
You Russel, are not one of them. You work for the parasites that suck the blood of those morons. I can tell from your passive aggressive posts that you know it’s a spiritual battle. You and your ilk are loosing the battle, Russel.
Wow again: Stop and watch the colorfull birds at play Have a Dr. Pepper . S
Clear pre-judgement of the issue due to extreme bias of Comey, Mueller et al.
Clinton and her friends, Comey, Mueller et al, then used Alinsky tactics of accusing Trump of being guilty of what Clinton and Husband were traitorously, in fact, doing; namely, colluding with the Russians and accepting bribes (pay to play).
However, the on-going crime is Clinton Tax Evasion via the Clinton Foundation.