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Erick Erickson: Hillary told lies. Big ones. In a sane world, this would be disqualifying

HILLARY CLINTON: I opted for convenience to use my personal email account, which was allowed by the State Department, because I thought it would be easier to carry just one device for my work and for my personal emails instead of two.
FBI DIRECTOR JAMES COMEY: Secretary Clinton used several different servers and administrators of those servers during her four years at the State Department, and used numerous mobile devices to view and send e-mail on that personal domain.
CLINTON: I responded right away and provided all my emails that could possibly be work-related, which totaled roughly 55,000 printed pages, even though I knew that the State Department already had the vast majority of them. We went through a thorough process to identify all of my work related emails and deliver them to the State Department. At the end, I chose not to keep my private personal emails.
COMEY: The FBI also discovered several thousand work-related e-mails that were not in the group of 30,000 that were returned by Secretary Clinton to State in 2014. We found those additional e-mails in a variety of ways. Some had been deleted over the years and we found traces of them on devices that supported or were connected to the private email domain.

In a normal world, what the FBI discovered about Clinton’s emails would disqualify her from office. But these are not normal times.

CLINTON: I did not email any classified material to anyone on my email. There is no classified material. So I’m certainly well-aware of the classification requirements and did not send classified material.

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COMEY: From the group of 30,000 e-mails returned to the State Department, 110 e-mails in 52 e-mail chains have been determined by the owning agency to contain classified information at the time they were sent or received. Eight of those chains contained information that was Top Secret at the time they were sent; 36 chains contained Secret information at the time; and eight contained Confidential information, which is the lowest level of classification. Separate from those, about 2,000 additional e-mails were “up-classified” to make them Confidential; the information in those had not been classified at the time the emails were sent.
CLINTON: But whether it was a personal account or a government account, I did not send classified material and I did not receive any material that was marked or designated classified, which is the way you know whether something is.
COMEY: With respect to the thousands of emails we found that were not among those produced to State, agencies have concluded that three of those were classified at the time they were sent or received, one at the Secret level and two at the Confidential level.
CLINTON: Well, my personal emails are my personal business, right?
COMEY: With respect to potential computer intrusion by hostile actors, we did not find direct evidence that Secretary Clinton’s personal e-mail domain, in its various configurations since 2009, was successfully hacked. But, given the nature of the system and of the actors potentially involved, we assess that we would be unlikely to see such direct evidence. We do assess that hostile actors gained access to the private commercial email accounts of people with whom Secretary Clinton was in regular contact from her personal account. We also assess that Secretary Clinton’s use of a personal e-mail domain was both known by a large number of people and readily apparent. She also used her personal e-mail extensively while outside the United States, including sending and receiving work-related e-mails in the territory of sophisticated adversaries. Given that combination of factors, we assess it is possible that hostile actors gained access to Secretary Clinton’s personal e-mail account.
In a normal world, what the FBI discovered about Clinton’s emails would disqualify her from office. But these are not normal times. The FBI Director laid out an impressive case against Mrs. Clinton, but will not recommend an indictment. One must wonder if it is because James Comey wants to stop Donald Trump or has visions of Vince Foster dancing in his head. One must also remember that this is the same FBI that interviewed the Orlando terrorist, Omar Mateen, twice and decided he was harmless.

US, Russia expel each other's diplomats in flare-up over Moscow police attack

Video of the scuffle.

Russia said Saturday that it had expelled two U.S. diplomats Moscow claimed were working undercover for the CIA in retaliation for Washington's explusion of two Russians last month.
The State Department announced Friday that it had expelled the two Russians on June 17, in response to an attack on an American diplomat outside the U.S. embassy in Moscow 11 days earlier.
State Department spokesman John Kirby said the attack was "unprovoked and it endangered the safety of our employee."
The Russian Foreign Ministry claimed the American, who was one of the two expelled, was a CIA agent who refused to provide his identification documents and hit the guard in the face. Moscow says the policeman was fulfilling his duties defending the embassy.
"Instead of the CIA employee, who was in disguise, as we understand, it could have been anyone — a terrorist, an extremist, a suicide bomber," Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told state-owned NTV television this week.
Kirby disputed those statements.
"The Russian claim that the policeman was protecting the embassy from an unidentified individual is simply untrue," he told reporters.
A video of the scuffle, released earlier this week by NTV, shows a man exiting a taxi in an area resembling an embassy entrance and striding toward the doors. The guard bursts out of a sentry box and tackles the man, who is able to crawl through the entrance doors. Kirby declined to comment on the video.
The incident was the latest in what the State Department calls harassment and ill-treatment of American diplomats working in Russia. Moscow denies those accusations and says the U.S. is spreading disinformation about Russia.
Ties between Moscow and Washington have sunk to Cold War levels in recent years over Russia's annexation of Crimea, its support of separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine and its actions in Syria.

Clinton, Sanders teams wrangle at Democratic platform meeting over TPP, health care, minimum wage | Fox News

Hillary Clinton on Saturday proposed increasing federal money for community health centers and outlined steps to expand access to health care across the nation.
Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, made the proposal as a nod to primary rival Sen. Bernie Sanders, at the Democratic National Convention's full Platform Committee meeting in Orlando, Fla.
However, Sanders, who has yet to endorse Clinton, failed in his quest to include opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal in a draft of the Democratic Party's policy positions because several amendments against the deal were voted down by Clinton supporters.
The platform will be announced at the party's nominating convention in Philadelphia starting July 25.
On health care, Clinton's campaign says the proposal is part of her plan to provide universal health care coverage in the United States. Clinton also is reaffirming her support for a public-option insurance plan and for expanding Medicare by letting people age 55 year and older opt in.
"We have more work to do to finish our long fight to provide universal, quality, affordable health care to everyone in America," Clinton said in a statement, with the convention just a few weeks away.
Clinton's campaign noted that Sanders had promoted doubling money for primary care services at federally qualified health centers. Money for these centers was increased under the Affordable Care Act, an effort led by the Vermont senator.
According to the Clinton campaign, the candidate’s proposal would make money for these centers permanent and expand it by $40 billion over the next 10 years. Her campaign said the money would be mandatory and not subject to annual appropriation. The proposal would more than double the money for the centers, which currently get $3.6 billion annually.
Sanders, in a conference call after the Clinton campaign's announcement, said her proposal "will save lives" and "ease suffering" and represented "an important step forward in expanding health care in America and expanding health insurance and health care access to tens of millions of Americans."
The health care proposal follows on Clinton's recent announcement of new ways to tackle college affordability, including a plan that ensures families with annual incomes up to $125,000 pay no tuition at in-state public colleges and universities.
That initiative also was seen as a response to Sanders' call for free tuition at all public colleges and universities, an idea popular with the young voters who flocked to his rallies.
Clinton's policy overtures come as Sanders appears to be close to supporting her candidacy.
Two Democrats with knowledge of Sanders' plans told The Associated Press that Sanders was closing in on offering his public endorsement of Clinton. The Democrats spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations they were not authorized to disclose.
Clinton's campaign has announced a stop in New Hampshire on Tuesday but did not say whether Sanders also would attend.
Sanders told reporters that the two campaigns "are coming closer and closer together in trying to address the major issues facing this country." 
Clinton and Sanders frequently clashed over health care during the primaries. Sanders campaigned on a "Medicare for all" plan that would have provided universal coverage. Clinton said that would undercut President Barack Obama's health law, rely too heavily on GOP governors and reopen a contentious debate with Republicans in Congress.
Clinton's health care priorities have centered on capping out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs and providing tax credits for families facing high medical costs.
She has reiterated her support for a "public option" for states to set up their own health insurance plan to compete against private insurers.
Sanders was instrumental in passing legislation that would allow that.
Both supported a public insurance option at the national level but opposition from moderate Democrats prevented that proposal from being included in the health overhaul law.
Sanders scored a major victory Friday when the committee approved  an amendment calling for increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour.
The self-described "democratic socialist" had repeatedly called for the increase during his surprisingly strong campaign for the Democratic nomination. Clinton, had backed a $12 minimum wage, while saying she approved a $15 minimum wage in certain places.
An early draft of the platform contained language more consistent with Clinton’s position, saying that “Americans should earn at least $15 an hour” without explicitly calling for that to be the new federal minimum.
However, the 187-member committee approved an amendment saying an increase from the current federal minimum of $7.25 an hour to $15 should happen “over time."
On the trade deal, during a combative meeting in a hotel ballroom, members of  full Platform Committee voted down amendments to explicitly oppose the deal and to oppose a vote on it in Congress.
Instead, they endorsed an amendment that included stronger language governing trade deals, including the TPP.
Sanders and Clinton have come out against the trade deal, but President Obama supports it.
Clinton supporters, including labor leaders, believed that toughening the trade language made enough of a statement without directly opposing the president, whom they did not mention during their public comments.
The amendment said that trade deals "must protect workers and the environment and not undermine access to critically needed prescription drugs." It went on to say that Democrats would apply those standards "to all trade agreements, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership."
Labor leaders said after the vote that their amendment made clear where they stand on TPP and that they oppose "bad trade deals." But Sanders backers expressed their frustration with boos and angry shouts.
Sanders supporter Benjamin Jealous, a former president of the NAACP argued that language opposing the TPP would help Democrats win the presidential election in November. "I want us to stop making it harder for us to win and start making it easier for us to win," he said.
Since Clinton effectively clinched the presidential nomination, Sanders has aggressively campaigned to include his progressive policies in the party platform. He has won a number of concessions, including a win Friday with an amendment calling for increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 over time, indexed to inflation. The previous platform draft had not included explicit language on a $15 federal minimum wage.
The party guidelines also have language endorsing steps to break up large Wall Street banks and urging an end to the death penalty. But Sanders is looking for more before the meeting concludes. He wants the platform to support a carbon tax to address climate change and seek a freeze on hydraulic fracking.
The roughly 15,000-word platform is a nonbinding document that serves as a guidepost for the party. After the Orlando meeting, the document will be voted on at the convention in Philadelphia this month. The Orlando meeting is not the final stop for the Sanders' efforts. He could seek to revive some of these issues at the convention.
Sanders has so far avoided endorsing Clinton, but appears to be closing in on backing her campaign. He told reporters Saturday that the campaigns are "coming closer and closer together in trying to address the major issues facing this country."

At least 5 police officers injured during protests in Minnesota

Authorities in Minnesota said at least five police officers were injured in a protest sparked by the recent police killings of black men in Minnesota and Louisiana on Saturday night.
St. Paul police said the officers were injured after some protesters threw rocks, firecrackers and other debris at them.
The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported that many arrests were made.
According to Fox 9, protesters also hurled bricks, glad bottles, construction rebar and liquids at the officers. A Molotov cocktail was also thrown toward the officers.
Police used smoke bombs to clear demonstrators blocking Interstate 94. About 200 protesters refused to leave the roadway just after midnight as police in riot gear began to move in on the crowd.
The interstate reopened at about 1:30 a.m., according to Fox 9.
The protest, which started with a march from the governor's mansion around 8 p.m., was among several demonstrations nationwide following the deaths of 32-year-old Philano Castile, who was shot during a traffic stop allegedly while reaching for his wallet, and 37-year-old Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Sterling, who was also black, was shot after a scuffle with officers outside a convenience store.
Mike Martin was at the protest with a guitar strapped to his back trying to promote peace. However, he told the Associated Press than a police officer pepper sprayed him. He said he was trying to move the crowd along and keep the peace.
"I guess I wasn't moving fast enough for him," said Martin, who estimated the officer was six feet away and sprayed without warning. "He just got it out and bam, I saw a cloud. It's burning pretty bad."
Tyree Johnson, who said he was Castile's cousin, said officers on the highway fired pellets and gas in his direction.
Misty Macon, 20, of St. Paul, said the protest was mostly peaceful, even as at least one protester aimed a firework at an officer. She said she saw about 30 people being peacefully taken away by officers, who said they warned protesters they would be subject to arrest if they didn't disassemble.
The night after Castile was killed, five police officers were fatally shot and others were wounded during protests in Dallas. Authorities identified the Dallas shooter as an Army veteran who was later killed by police.
Sterling's and Castile's families denounced the attack on the Dallas officers.