Clintonian parsing

Andrew McCarthy wrote on March 11,

In her characteristically underhanded way, Mrs. Clinton waited until after she was done “answering questions” to have her lackeys distribute a sheet explaining that she has withheld from the government files and likely deleted from the private servers she refuses to relinquish an astonishing 31,830 e-mails from her time as secretary of state. The icon of the “personal is political” crowd says they . . . were personal. You’ll just have to take her word for it.

...She could have deleted documents throughout her tenure as secretary of state, long before the State Department asked her for records two years after she left office. That’s the way she rigged the system.

Clinton rigged up a system where the presumption was against retention: She made herself, rather than federal law applied by government record-keepers, the sole arbiter of what the government got to keep in its files.

...Against that background, consider what was perhaps the most ludicrous argument Mrs. Clinton made at her press conference: Because the Clintons have Secret Service protection, the private Clinton server system was physically protected by federal agents. So what? The Clintons could have had the entire United States Marine Corps on scene and it wouldn’t have made a difference. We’re not worried about someone busting in with a sledgehammer to wreck the server. We’re worried about cyber espionage.

...The fact that Mrs. Clinton says she did not store classified documents on her private server, which is very likely true, does not discount the distinct possibility that she discussed classified matters in private e-mails. We would not be able to judge that absent reviewing the e-mails. If any of the 31,830 withheld e-mails from the private, non-secure system — involving America’s top diplomat who was in constant discussions with other important diplomats, top military and national-security officials, her trusted advisers, and even the president of the United States — touched on classified matters, that could land Mrs. Clinton in very hot legal water. It would be a powerful incentive to hit the “delete” key.

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