Readers,
You know what would be convenient? Not paying my taxes this year. You know what else would be convenient? If I didn’t have to keep any business records, or pay for the things I want to purchase at the store, or obey the speed limit on the way to work.
While I do sometimes (often) ignore speed limits, I don’t do those other things, despite their convenience, for one very compelling reason – they’re illegal. I would fully expect legal repercussions – civil, criminal or both – for engaging in the aforementioned behaviors.
So why then, are people not more outraged at Hillary Clinton’s blatant disregard for the rules surrounding the use of e-mail while she served as Secretary of State? Rather than using a sanctioned, government-sponsored e-mail address for her electronic communications, she set up and operated a private e-mail server from her home. When questioned about why she did so, she replied that it was more convenient than carrying separate devices linked to the appropriate accounts.
Being a high-ranking government official isn’t always a convenient job. That’s presumably why they’re so well compensated for their efforts. And in a position in which one is expected to handle government secrets and classified information, security takes firm priority over convenience.
Not only that, but by establishing her own server, it appears that Mrs. Clinton has something to hide. While her communications through a government e-mail address would have been subject to public records requests or court issued subpoenas, Mrs. Clinton is solely in control of what gets produced from her private server.
In fact, she took the liberty of not producing more than 30,000 e-mails that she decided were personal and not of public interest. I’m not certain of any other circumstance when a person being investigated is allowed to determine what is or is not relevant to the investigation. Rather, it looks to me as if Mrs. Clinton is obstructing the investigation into whether her actions were legal, which in and of itself is criminal.
But, as they say, rules were made to be broken, especially for those above such petty things as the law. At the very least, hopefully people will look back and remember Mrs. Clinton’s lack of transparency if she still has the gall to make a bid for the presidency in 2016.
Until next month,
Esther Fournier
Publisher & Editor
American Recycler News
Published in the April 2015 Edition of American Recycler News
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