This is for anyone who thought that Hillary Clinton deep-sixing her emails was some kind of innocent activity.
Excerpted from Nick Confessore\’s and Michael S. Schmidt\’s article for the New York Times:
When the Clintons last occupied the White House, Sidney Blumenthal cast himself in varied roles: speechwriter, in-house intellectual and press corps whisperer. Republicans added another, accusing Mr. Blumenthal of spreading gossip to discredit Republican investigators, and forced him to testify during President Bill Clinton\’s impeachment trial.
Now, as Hillary Rodham Clinton embarks on her second presidential bid, Mr. Blumenthal\’s service to the Clintons is again under the spotlight. Representative Trey Gowdy of South Carolina, a Republican who is leading the congressional committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, plans to subpoena Mr. Blumenthal, 66, for a private transcribed interview.
Mr. Gowdy\’s chief interest, according to people briefed on the inquiry, is a series of memos that Mr. Blumenthal – who was not an employee of the State Department – wrote to Mrs. Clinton about events unfolding in Libya before and after the death of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi. According to emails obtained by The New York Times, Mrs. Clinton, who was secretary of state at the time, took Mr. Blumenthal\’s advice seriously, forwarding his memos to senior diplomatic officials in Libya and Washington and at times asking them to respond. Mrs. Clinton continued to pass around his memos even after other senior diplomats concluded that Mr. Blumenthal\’s assessments were often unreliable.
But an examination by The Times suggests that Mr. Blumenthal\’s involvement was more wide-ranging and more complicated than previously known, embodying the blurry lines between business, politics and philanthropy that have enriched and vexed the Clintons and their inner circle for years.
While advising Mrs. Clinton on Libya, Mr. Blumenthal, who had been barred from a State Department job by aides to President Obama, was also employed by her family\’s philanthropy, the Clinton Foundation, to help with research, “message guidance” and the planning of commemorative events, according to foundation officials. During the same period, he also worked on and off as a paid consultant to Media Matters and American Bridge, organizations that helped lay the groundwork for Mrs. Clinton\’s 2016 campaign.
Much of the Libya intelligence that Mr. Blumenthal passed on to Mrs. Clinton appears to have come from a group of business associates he was advising as they sought to win contracts from the Libyan transitional government. The venture, which was ultimately unsuccessful, involved other Clinton friends, a private military contractor and one former C.I.A. spy seeking to get in on the ground floor of the new Libyan economy
To summarize:
-Sidney Blumenthal, a left wing Clinton henchman, feeds then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton information – which she accepts and passes along even though senior members of the organization she heads have warned her his material is not reliable.
-And, it turns out, Blumenthal is playing all sides. He not only is on the Clinton Foundation payroll (is that why Ms. Clinton ignored her own State Department pesonnel\’s assessment of Blumenthal\’s material?) but he is “consulting” for “business associates” who are feeding him this material, and who stand to benefit if he can funnel it through Hillary Clinton.
That dirty enough for you?
There, folks, is another reason for Hillary Clinton to hide from media, as she has done for an entire month now…
…and another reason why Hillary Clinton, an empty pants-suit with no accomplishments of any kind, but scandal after scandal swirling around her and Hubby Bubba, should be nowhere near the Oval Office.
