"Fusion Ken" Dilanian on Yanking Clapper, Brennan et al's Security Clearances: But They Need These Clearances In Case Trump Calls Up Them to Advise Him

As John Ekdahl says: wut

So the reason we permit these guys to keep their security clearances is actually twofold:

1. To keep them legal to accept classified information, in case the president needs to call them out of retirement to advise him on a national security matter.

With Comey and McCabe proven leakers, with Brennan looking like he arranged the Comey briefing just to leak it, and calling Trump a traitor every week, etc., I would say the likelihood that Trump will call up on these Genius Experts' Expert Genius to be about the likelihood that Kate Upton will pay me thirty million dollars to sit on my face.

2. Frankly, as way to pay them continuing non-pecuniary benefits in their retirement, because anyone with a security clearance will be paid more money than those without one in the fields where such a thing is valuable, e.g., defense industries, information security, etc.

I don't see why Trump would feel obliged to put money into their pockets by extending to them a benefit he is not required to extend to them.

So there are two reasons to keep these people cleared for classified reason -- one which could maybe, allegedly benefit the country, but which will never happen, due to the fact that these people belong to the Deep State which has been trying to get Trump blocked from taking office and now that he is president, removed from it.

The second is just a nice thing you do for your friends, to keep paying them off for services rendered, but they are not Trump's friends and the services they have rendered are a conspiracy to enact a coup against the duly elected president of the United States.

On the other hand, there is the risk of permitting them to retain their security clearances.

Given that there is absolutely no benefit to the country -- none at all, zero -- of letting them keep their clearances, the downsides risks stand all alone, with no upside potential to offset them.

What risks are being run? Well, these:

Clapper and Brennan are now being paid by media corporations whose mission it is to take down the duly-elected president of the United States. The fact that they have security clearances means that illegal leakers can leak classified information to them and avoid the worst penalties for leaking classified information, because the parties they are leaking to are legally authorized to see such information.

Now, this wouldn't apply to codeword-classified information, just general top secret (and below) information. And it wouldn't mean that there would be no penalties for leaking the information to them -- you can still be fired for leaking classified information to an unauthorized recipient.

But you could not, I think, be prosecuted under the Espionage Act for giving classified information to those not cleared to see it. The whole point of security clearances is that having one means you are authorized, generally, to see such information.

So Brennan and Clapper are NBC's and CNN's collection points for unauthorized classified leaks.

"Fusion Ken" Dilanian is squealing precisely because John Brennan will not be worth as much to himself or his employer NBC if his security clearance is terminated.

Also note that while technically, Brennan and Clapper might be authorized to see classified information, they still wouldn't be cleared to release it publicly (as the public consists of a great mass of unauthorized persons):

First of all, the First Amendment protects a lot of behavior which would otherwise be prosecutable under the Espionage Act. Newspapers technically violate classification laws a lot, but plead the First Amendment as a defense.

Second of all, you don't have to actually disclose the information to help a reporter himself get the information out there. Recall "Deep Throat," the FBI official Mark Felt, who would not reveal classified information to Bob Woodward, as he did not want to give Woodward any information which could be traced back to him and get him fired, but who would serve as a second source confirming (or repudiating, if false) information that Woodward had been leaked from a different source.

Brennan is no doubt serving a similar role for NBC, and Clapper for CNN. It seems likely, to me anyway, that these mercenaries are assisting those "news" outlets in pushing leaks out to the public by at least warning them away from the ones that seem to them wrong. Which tells their employers which leaks they receive seem accurate. By simply not saying "No, don't run that," they essentially tell NBC and CNN that they are not aware of any reason the leak would be provably false.

(A similar tactic was used by Woodward in getting information from a partially-willing source: He said "I'm going to run X story, and I'm going to count down from ten, interrupt me if you you know any reason I should not run X story.")

Lastly, these people can flat-out tell reporters classified information in a hint-hint way and get away with it. From James Comey's explanation as to why he did not prosecute Hillary Clinton for disclosing classified information in her unsecure email system which was shared with non-cleared persons: He said she employed the practice of "talking around" the classified information, which seems to be just hinting at it without being specific, trusting that anyone who knows the information you're talking about gets what you're talking about.

Supposedly this method of "talking around" classified information makes it legal -- per no less a legal authority than Jesus Christ's personal adviser James Comey.

Yet, I can think of many people who could figure out the information you're "talking around" who are not actually authorized to receive it. Reporters covering the story, for example, who have generally received hints and leaks about the information, and can piece the parts they don't know or haven't confirmed yet from your "talking around" the information.

Enemy intelligence services could also easily do this. You know, like the enemy intelligence service the FBI found that hacked Hillary's emails (which Strzok and Co. then took out of the official FBI statement on the matter).

If you just know a little of the story, you can figure out the rest if someone who knows the whole story "talks around" the classified information.

And Comey has decided such "talking around" by authorized persons to unauthorized persons is non-prosecutable. No "intent," you see.

So why shouldn't Brennan and Clapper take their good friend Comey's legal advice and just "talk around" the classified information they have to their worker-friends Jake Tapper and Fusion Ken Dilanian?

As there is no national security upside to letting these leakers and liars keep their security clearances and continue "monetizing" them -- as Trump correctly said -- and quite a bit of national security downside to letting them keep them, it's time to terminate the clearances.

posted by Ace of Spades at 05:37 PM

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