Mystery: Emails From Hillary’s Top Geek Are M.I.A.

“It’s hard to believe that an IT staffer who set up Hillary Clinton’s reckless email server never sent or received a single work-related email in the four years he worked at the State Department,” Raj Shah, the deputy communications director for the RNC, told The Daily Beast.

If I didn't know better I would say Lois Lerner has a twin brother working at the State Department.

In view of the fact she deleted over 31,000 suspicious emails while under subpoena and the DOJ is clearly in the tank for her... 

Hillary Rakes in Nearly $75,000 From Justice Department Employees
(Check out what they gave Trump)

Is the FBI and the DOJ on the same wavelength? Why didn't the FBI seize the emails long ago? After all that has transpired why would the FBI allow/trust the State Dept to be forthcoming with the truth?

Here she goes into her innocent "Shirley Temple" routine. 

Video 242

...When it come to servers I'm so naive I thought you could wipe it clean with a cloth... 

The truth is instead of using the State Dept server she PAID thousands out of her own pocket for a private server.

Why?

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Bryan Pagliano set up and maintained Hillary’s Clinton’s private email server. But somehow, there’s no record that Pagliano ever sent Clinton an email while he worked for her at the State Department.

Those are the surprising, if preliminary, results from a lawsuit seeking information about State Department staffers linked to the former Secretary of State’s server, according to court documents filed Monday.

The absence of any email written or received by Pagliano, who worked for Clinton at the State Department and was the technology director of her 2008 presidential campaign, suggests an attempt to obscure his role in the controversy over Clinton’s private server, said a spokesman for the Republican National Committee, which filed the lawsuit in March.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/found-at-least-one-pagliano-email-sent-directly-to-clinton/article/2002323

“It’s hard to believe that an IT staffer who set up Hillary Clinton’s reckless email server never sent or received a single work-related email in the four years he worked at the State Department,” Raj Shah, the deputy communications director for the RNC, told The Daily Beast.

“Such records might shed light on his role in setting up Clinton’s server, and why he was granted immunity by the FBI,” Shah continued. “But it seems that his emails were either destroyed or never turned over, adding yet another layer to the secrecy surrounding his role.”

Since the beginning of the email saga 14 months ago, Pagliano has played a central but mysterious role. The Justice Department has given him immunity as part of a law enforcement investigation into the possible mishandling of classified information on the Clinton email server. Pagliano has reportedly been cooperating with investigators and is likely to know key facts about how the server was set up, who had access to it, and what precautions were taken to protect sensitive information. 

Clinton’s campaign didn’t comment for this story. But a State Department spokesman objected to the RNC’s characterization of the reason no email records were found. “It is standard practice for the Department to decline comment on matters in litigation. That said, the Department disagrees with a number of assertions made in today’s filing, and will be responding in court,” department spokesperson Elizabeth Trudeau told The Daily Beast.

Trudeau explained that the department has searched for copies of Pagliano’s emails in a backup known as a .pst file, but that officials couldn’t locate one for the period of time that covers Clinton’s tenure as secretary. But the department has found a .pst file for Pagliano’s work at the department as a contractor after Clinton left office, Trudeau said. That period is beyond the scope of the RNC’s lawsuit.

It’s not clear why some backups for Pagliano’s emails were found but not others. A small number of emails to and from Pagliano have also been found in the records of other State Department employees and Clinton aides with whom he corresponded.

The State Department has also previously released one email that Pagliano sent to Clinton in 2012. It's not clear why that email wasn't turned over to the RNC. 

“The Department acknowledges that we must work to improve our systems for records management and retention,” Trudeau said. “As part of this ongoing effort, the Department is now automatically archiving Secretary Kerry’s emails as well as the emails numerous senior staff.”

A lawyer for Pagliano didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The court filing Monday wasn’t the first time the department acknowledged having no email records of the time Pagliano worked for Clinton at State. Last year, Politico reported that the department told Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley it was unable to locate a backup of Pagliano’s emails.

But the RNC’s allegation that Pagliano or the State Department may have taken steps to keep the emails from public view underscored the significant role that the email controversy is likely to play in the presidential election.

The RNC has filed six lawsuits under the Freedom of Information Act seeking emails of Clinton and her aides, information about potential conflicts of interest between Clinton’s work as secretary and her family’s foundation, as well as information about training that department employees received on how to handle classified information.

Reviews of thousands of emails that Clinton turned over from her private server to the State Department have found information that some officials say is classified, though it wasn’t marked as such when it was disseminated.

Presumed Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, who has taken to calling his rival “crooked Hillary” in stump speeches, has made the question of Clinton’s honesty and transparency a central part of his campaign.

And a federal judge ruled recently that a watchdog group that has sued for information about how the email server was set up may interview former top Clinton aides, including her chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, and Huma Abedin, one of her closest assistants. 

Pagliano’s work for Clinton has also been a subject of scrutiny for congressional Republicans. Last December, Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley told Secretary of State John Kerry that getting more details about Pagliano was his committee’s “highest priority request.”

Pagliano, for reasons he has never explained, invoked his Fifth Amendment right not to testify before the Judiciary Committee.

Pagliano has a long history with Clinton. After running technology for her 2008 campaign, he went to work for her political action committee. For his services setting up the email server Clinton used exclusively as secretary, Pagliano was paid directly by Clinton and her family.

Pagliano then came to work for Clinton at State but continued to be paid by the Clintons to maintain the server, the Washington Post reported. Pagliano didn’t list the outside income on mandatory financial disclosure forms.

For its part, the State Department may still find some of Pagliano’s emails, which are the subject of other lawsuits, as well.

“We are continuing to search for Mr. Pagliano’s emails which the Department may have otherwise retained,” Trudeau said. When it comes to FOIA [the Freedom of Information Act], the State Department works diligently to produce all responsive records in our possession.”

Mystery: Emails From Hillary’s Top Geek Are M.I.A.

Obama official says he pushed a ‘narrative’ to media to sell the Iran nuclear deal

Rhodes pulls a Jonathan Gruber! As you're reading this remember Rhodes brother is the head of CBS news. I thought all along he was the one who pushed, "it was the video" to the "literally know nothing reporters". And now I'm sure of it.

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One of President Obama's top national security advisers led journalists to believe a misleading timeline of U.S. negotiations with Iran over a nuclear agreement and relied on inexperienced reporters to create an "echo chamber" that helped sway public opinion to seal the deal, according to a lengthy magazine profile.

Ben Rhodes, the deputy national security adviser for strategic communications, told the New York Times magazine that he helped promote a "narrative" that the administration started negotiations with Iran after the supposedly moderate Hassan Rouhani was elected president in 2013. In fact, the administration's negotiations actually began earlier, with the country's powerful Islamic faction, and the framework for an agreement was hammered out before Rouhani's election.

The distinction is important because of the perception that Rouhani was more favorably disposed toward American interests and more trustworthy than the hard-line faction that holds ultimate power in Iran.

On Friday, White House press secretary Josh Earnest disputed the notion that there was anything misleading about the administration's advocacy of the agreement. 

"I haven't seen anybody produce any evidence that that's the case," he said at his daily briefing. "I recognize there might be some people who are disappointed that they did not succeed in killing the Iran deal. Maybe these unfounded claims are the result of sour grapes. The truth is, the administration, under the direction of the president, engaged in an aggressive campaign to make a strong case to the American people that the international agreement to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon enhanced the national security of the United States."

White House press secretary Josh Earnest addressed claims that one of President Obama's top security advisers, Ben Rhodes, promoted misleading information about the Iran deal. "I haven't seen anybody produce any evidence that that's the case," Earnest said. (White House) 

(aka... sending in another liar to cover for the first one)

Rhodes, 38, said in the article that it was easy to shape a favorable impression of the proposed agreement because of the inexperience of many of those covering the issue.

"All these newspapers used to have foreign bureaus," he said. "Now they don't. They call us to explain to them what's happening in Moscow and Cairo. Most of the outlets are reporting on world events from Washington. The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old, and their only reporting experience consists of being around political campaigns. That's a sea change. They literally know nothing."

Rhodes set up a team of staffers who were focused on promoting the deal, which apparently included the feeding of talking points at useful times in the news cycle to foreign policy experts who were favorably disposed toward it. "We created an echo chamber," he told the magazine. "They [the seemingly independent experts] were saying things that validated what we had given them to say."

The manager of the White House's Twitter feed on Iran, Tanya Somanader, said one reporter, Laura Rozen of the Al-Monitor news site, became "my RSS feed. She would just find everything and retweet it." 

Rozen, in an email, said she does not know Somanader and that David Samuels, the author of the magazine piece, did not ask her about the staffer's claim before publishing his story. "As I read it, [Somanader] says my Twitter feed was a source of info for her . . . Samuels seems to mischaracterize that to say the opposite."

She said she has had a long interest in U.S. policy on Iran and covered "over 20 rounds of the Iran nuclear deal negotiations" over four years. "I do retweet lots of info, from lots of sources" — including, she noted, the Russian Ministry of Defense, "which I hardly expect most to take at face value or as an endorsement." She maintained that her coverage of the Iran nuclear diplomacy "was certainly not done as a favor to or in support of any administration."

Rhodes's assistant, Ned Price, told the newspaper that the administration would feed "color" — background details — to their "compadres" in the press corps, "and the next thing I know, lots of these guys are in the dot-com publishing space, and have huge Twitter followings, and they'll be putting this message out on their own."

In the article, Rhodes speaks contemptuously of the Washington policy and media establishment, including The Washington Post and the New York Times, referring to them as "the blob" that was subject to conventional thinking about foreign policy. 

"We had test-drives to know who was going to be able to carry our message effectively, and how to use outside groups like [the anti-nuclear group] Ploughshares, the Iran Project and whomever else. So we knew the tactics that worked," Rhodes says. Speaking of Republicans and other opponents, including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Rhodes adds that he knew "we drove them crazy."

In the piece, he also casts doubt on the moderate nature of Iran's regime: "I would prefer that it turns out that Rouhani and [Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Javad] Zarif are real reformers who are going to be steering this country into the direction that I believe it can go in, because their public is educated and, in some respects, pro-American. But we are not betting on that."

Rhodes's boss, President Obama, has been a strong and consistent advocate for the agreement with Iran, which requires the country to curtail its nuclear program — notably its ability to produce fissile material that could be used in nuclear bombs — in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions. He reinforced the misleading administration timeline in announcing the agreement last July. "Today, after two years of negotiations, the United States, together with our international partners, has achieved something that decades of animosity has not," he said then.

Rhodes's freewheeling and cynical comments reminded several White House and national security reporters of an infamous 2010 story in Rolling Stone magazine in which Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, and aides mocked civilian government officials, including Vice President Biden. McChrystal apologized for the comments but later tendered his resignation, which Obama accepted.

The Times article notes that Rhodes is a published short-story writer and aspiring novelist who is a skilled "storyteller."

"He is adept at constructing overarching plotlines with heroes and villains, their conflicts supported by flurries of carefully chosen adjectives, quotations, and leaks from named and unnamed senior officials," Samuels wrote. "He is the master shaper and retailer of Obama's foreign-policy narratives."

And what is to be gleaned from the last two paragraphs? "The literally know nothing" MSM is still only too happy to put their head on the chopping block if it serves their Master.

Obama official says he pushed a ‘narrative’ to media to sell the Iran nuclear deal

NC faces Monday deadline to answer feds on transgender bathroom law

North Carolina is running up against a Monday deadline – set by the Obama administration – to either scrap the state's controversial transgender bathroom law or face legal action and risk losing federal funds.

Meanwhile... Sanctuary Cities  in blatant violation of federal law continue to get all the money they want. 

http://www.ojjpac.org/sanctuary.asp

I'm getting off track here, hate to say this, but have you noticed how Democrats deliver for their constituents? The Obama administration is set to win yet another in NC. I guarantee it. The House and Senate is in our control. How did we benefit taking control of Congress?  Name me one f**king thing of consequence these two bastards ever accomplished? 

Did they stop funding for Sanctuary Cities like they said? Did they put a stop to Barry's deficit spending, the crushing national debt? They were outraged over the PP videos and threatened to defund them. What happened? They funded PP! 

In fact, the guy who shot the video is being prosecuted!!! 

Hey NC if you're relying upon Republicans for help let me introduce you to what's cumming to a commode near you... the one  next to your daughter. 

"She'll" probably sue because there's no urinal fixed to the wall in the ladies room. Loretta Lynch will liken it to a glaring violation of "her" civil rights.

Republican Gov. Pat McCrory, who told "Fox News Sunday" he will make a decision by the end of the day, said the issue goes well beyond North Carolina now that the Justice Department is getting involved. 

But he would not say what his decision will be when repeatedly pressed for an answer, saying only that he's exploring "all legal options."

One option could be a court challenge.

The state law requires transgender people to use bathrooms that correspond with the sex on their birth certificate. McCrory says the North Carolina law applies only to government offices, universities, and road-side rest stops, not every bathroom in the state.

The Justice Department, though, sent McCrory a letter Wednesday stating the law violates federal civil rights laws.

The governor said he asked the department for an extension and was given only until the close of business Monday.

"I don't think that three working days is enough time for such a pretty big threat," he told Fox News. "It's the federal government being a bully, making law."

McCrory also said he doesn't have the legal authority to change laws and that the expectation that he can is "unrealistic." 

McCrory, who signed the bill into law in March, said last week that the department seems to be breaking new ground in claiming the North Carolina law violates Civil Rights Act protections against discrimination in education and the workplace.

And he said the administration's warning means the issue is no longer confined to North Carolina.

"This is not just North Carolina," said McCrory, arguing that every university that accepts federal funding is now in the same situation as those in his state.

Meanwhile, the administration is expected to soon take the bathroom issue further, to ensure that transgender student rights are fully protected under federal law, according to Politico. The move reportedly would be related to a federal law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in federally funded education programs and activities, and multiple agencies are expected to be involved.

NC faces Monday deadline to answer feds on transgender bathroom law

Barack Obama takes on Donald Trump

"I continue to believe Mr. Trump will not be president," Obama said at a news conference in California after a meeting with southeast Asian leaders. "And the reason is that I have a lot of faith in the American people. Being president is a serious job. It's not like hosting a talk show, or a reality show."

Al Green...hit it Barry.

Video 240

No time to for Netanyahu at the WH when work like this needs to be done.

Headline:

President Obama appears on Alaskan reality show.

(Seriously... I'm not making this shit up)

Barry Z at the WH Correspondence Dinner:

(Rapper in Chief)

Video 241

And of course there's this:

via

https://earloftaint.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/a-very-hard-job.jpg

Click 

(If I'm not mistaken he did more late night talk shows than Johnny Carson)

Really Barry… Give me a fucking break! 

Too bad you didn't have your wife's ass. You could have made a guest appearance on Keeping up with the Kardashians. 

--------------------------------

Barack Obama: I don't think Donald Trump will be President

Washington (CNN)President Barack Obama has a message for Donald Trump — being president is tougher than being on a reality show and the American people are too "sensible" to elect him.

"I continue to believe Mr. Trump will not be president," Obama said at a news conference in California after a meeting with southeast Asian leaders. "And the reason is that I have a lot of faith in the American people. Being president is a serious job. It's not like hosting a talk show, or a reality show." 

He went on: "It's not promotion, it's not marketing. It's hard. And a lot of people count on us getting it right." 

The comments marked a political resurgence for a lame-duck President in his final year in office. Obama offered surprisingly frank assessments of the campaign to replace him, taking shots at Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio. He also hinted hint that he was sympathetic to Hillary Clinton's position on the difficulty of enacting political change, as she faces a tough challenge from a candidate in Bernie Sanders, who has fired up Democratic primary voters who are demanding sweeping reform.

Obama was clear on one thing -- he's happy not to be in the race himself.

"The thing I can say unequivocally, I am not unhappy that I am not on the ballot."

(Not as happy as we are)

Barack Obama takes on Donald Trump

Mitt Romney met privately with Bill Kristol, who is leading the effort to draft an independent candidate

Talk about desperation! 

I'm thinking if this actually takes place, after a hard fought primary with 17 candidates slugging it out, Mitt Romney is just going to waltz in and snatch the brass ring? This is supposed to unify the party? Trump has a tendency to cry about being treated unfairly. This time, I would have to agree with him. On its face, this is blatantly unfair and is sure to create an even bigger chasm in the party. Sorry Mitt... but if you listen to Kristol and try to pull this off it'll be your third failed attempt at the WH. And this time rightfully so.

Look... is Trump a flawed candidate? Sure he is. But look at the alternative. A case in point which is critical. The Supreme Court. With the death of Scalia, and Ginsburg basically on life support, Killary is a sure lock on two appointments and very possibly three... even if she serves just one term! Imagine the Supreme Court with three more Kaganesque/Sotomayor types serving lifetime appointments? 

We won't have to worry about who's going to pay for the border wall.

There won't be one.

------------------------------------

Former GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney in 2013 at the Conservative Political Action Conference. (Nicholas Kamm /AFP/Getty Images)

In spite of his insistence that he will not run, Mitt Romney is being courted this week by a leading conservative commentator to reconsider and jump into the volatile 2016 presidential race as an independent candidate.

William Kristol, the longtime editor of the Weekly Standard magazine and a leading voice on the right, met privately with the 2012 nominee on Thursday afternoon to discuss the possibility of launching an independent bid, potentially with Romney as its standard-bearer.

“He came pretty close to being elected president, so I thought he may consider doing it, especially since he has been very forthright in explaining why Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton should not be president of the United States,” Kristol said in a phone interview Friday, during which he confirmed that he and Romney had a “little meeting in Washington.”

But knowing Romney’s reluctance, Kristol told Romney that if he remains unwilling to run, many top conservatives would appreciate having the former Massachusetts governor’s support for an independent candidate, should Kristol and other right-leaning figures enlist a willing contender.

“Obviously, if there were to be an independent candidacy, Romney’s support would be very important,” Kristol said. “I wanted to get his wisdom on whether it was more or less doable than I thought.”

“It was not like, ‘You should do it.’ I wouldn’t presume he’d do it. But I’m hoping that he begins to think about it a little more,” Kristol said. “His name is one of the names that is part of the discussion.”

William Kristol, the longtime editor of the Weekly Standard, is leading an effort to draft an independent candidate for president. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

The closed-door huddle was held at the J.W. Marriott hotel in Washington, which is just blocks from the White House. It was requested by Kristol, according to a person close to Romney who requested anonymity to discuss the session. Kristol said the conversation was held over glasses of water.

Kristol has been working informally for weeks to seek out a prominent political or military figure who could be drafted into the general-election contest, such as retired Marine Gen. James N. Mattis, who recently declined such overtures.

Later Thursday, both Kristol and Romney attended an awards gala for American Friends of The Hebrew University, an area group that supports the Jerusalem-based school.

At the dinner, when asked in front of the attendees about possibly running as an independent this year, Romney said he was not interested.

“No, I’m certainly going to be hoping that we find someone who I have my confidence in who becomes nominee. I don’t intend on supporting either of the major-party candidates at this point,” Romney said, according to the Washington Examiner.

But, Romney added, “I am dismayed at where we are now, I wish we had better choices, and I keep hoping that somehow things will get better, and I just don’t see an easy answer from where we are.”

A Romney spokesperson was not available for comment Friday evening.

In a speech in Salt Lake City, former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney denounced support for candidate Donald Trump, saying Trump "is playing the members of the American public for suckers." 

Mitt Romney met privately with Bill Kristol, who is leading the effort to draft an independent candidate