The President and security clearances
Proving once again that they know nothing, the media has twisted it’s knickers over Trump and his supposed request for security clearances for his kids. This from Reuters;
Trump was referring to media reports on Monday that he was seeking security clearance for three of his children and his son-in-law.
Such clearance would allow Trump to discuss matters of national security with his daughter, Ivanka, sons Eric and Donald Jr. and son-in-law Jared Kushner. Federal law prohibits him from hiring family members to serve in his administration, but all four played key advisory roles through the campaign.
The President-elect has denied that he made the request, but it doesn’t matter if he did or not. The president is the supreme arbiter of security clearances. He’s the head of the government’s executive branch – the branch that executes the functions of government. One of those functions is deciding who does and who doesn’t have access to certain information.
The agencies that issue those clearances work for the President – they are his agent in the entire process, so he doesn’t have to review and sign off on every background investigation. In other words, if the president wants to grant you clearance to information, all he has to do is wave his hand and viola! You’re cleared.
He’s also the final authority on what is considered classified information.
But this is the media and they want to act like they’re watching out for us, hoping we’re all low information voters.
Category: Dumbass Bullshit
If Dee Dee Myers, Bradley Manning, and Jamie Gorelick can get a clearance, anyone can get a clearance.
If Hillary Clinton can get a keep a security clearance…
YEH! if Mighty Mouth can get and keep a security clearance, why not NORMAL people?
Hell yes they should have clearances! They are right there, with access to the President, easy for something classified to be seen or heard by them, with clearances, at least they know what they can and cannot do with that information…this is a no brainer,,,,DO IT!
Is it just me, or is the media sounding more and more desperate to sound “relevant” and “important”?
Because they are neither at this point in the spatio-temporal continuum.
Like they care. Not one word would have been dedicated to clearances in a potential HRC administration.
What is so rich is that this comes from the DNC/MSM propaganda arm that repeatedly told us there was no there there in regard to the Clinton Crew’s multiple classified info crimes, including her maid’s regular access to her SCIF in her Georgetown home. By MSM thinking, if Trump really sought clearances for his family that is way worse than Hillary’s and her staff’s multiple criminal acts with highly classified info. So asking for clearance (a lawful act) is reprehensible, but thousands of violations of the laws protecting state secrets is okay. Progtardism is definitely a mental disease.
Speaking of whom – did you see the hissy fit the media has been pitching over not being allowed to go along to Trumps private dinner with his family?
“Not transparent!” indeed. Tell you what, idiots. If you want to be invited, it is a good idea to not insult the host. And even then, don’t expect an invitation to a family dinner. You’re not even on the standing of the 4th cousin in Hope Arkansas who married his sister…
^^^^^ This^^^^^
If you change ‘relevant’ to ‘irrelevant’ and ‘important’ to ‘downright ignorant and stupid’, then they are just that – desperate.
I bet mailbox doors to aviation fuel that they will complete the required annual training to access classified material. I wish that the press showed this level of concern when Hillary Clinton had her housekeeper printing her “not marked classified” documents.
If it’s illegal for the prez to appoint his relatives, perhaps they’d care to explain the case of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.
Or is this just another one of those things that are okay as long as it’s a democrat doing it?
The Rules do not apply to Damocrats, it appears.
Until they do – then !KARMA!
The Federal Anti-Nepotism Statute was passed in 1967 as part of the Federal Post Act of that year.
It’s the new media, those who are willing to give the new administration time to set-up, time to adjust, time to make its course withy due deliberation. Just kidding. The assholes in the new media are the same assholes that we have had to put up with for eight+ years. I cannot wait until the stories about all of the poor people spending winter in tents and scrounging for discarded pizza in the dumpsters start. Happens every time a Republican is elected. They all disappear when a Dem is elected. It’s uncanny how that works.
Remember when Bush called one reporter an asshole – and the paper didn’t contest the fact, just fussed that he mentioned it at all.
I remember some similar bullshit when Bush was elected. Then fast-forward to 2008 and suddenly Moochelle’s interior decorating and the new Obama family dog are the big-ticket news items for the new president.
The really insulting thing is that they think nobody notices the double standard.
what is even funnier is how the Dems believe the media is entirely in the pockets of the far right.
Yeah. I haven’t heard much about those millions of homeless poor or the “homeless” veterans of the evil war machine in the past 8 years. The MSM just stopped covering that stuff. What happened to Code Pink? Until Obama took over, it was a major news story every time six or more of them showed up for a protest.
Security clearances? After a couple of years now of overlooking Wide Load’s bypassing security altogether, this? Bwahahahahahaha.
My first thought exactly.
It’s obvious that the media is having a collective mental breakdown. Just wish they would do it more privately. They have become a national embarrassment.
Well I’m not certain I’m the lone voice of dissent here, but I have some thoughts on the prospect of this concept.
It’s my understanding that Trump is turning the business over to his kids, unlike other presidents who have stock/investment holdings that are easily placed into a blind trust to avoid conflicts of interest Trump has a business with his name on it. His children running that business while he serves is no issue for me, his children running that business while having access to intelligence information that could have business implications for a multi-billion dollar business is however at least the appearance of a “potential” conflict of interest. I’m not suggesting they would do anything untoward, but if I’m not willing to let the Clintons slide on something like this I think we have hold Trump accountable as well.
Just my two cents, probably worth about half that much.
You’re right about that. Of course, the MSM is making a tremendous deal over a rumor that Trump might’ve asked for a clearance for his hot daughter, having just spent the last year alternating between ignoring and whitewashing Hillary Clinton’s deliberate and blatant breaches of security. Plus, Trump is brand-new to the game and learning the finer points as he goes. Clinton’s been occupying high-level positions in the federal government for far too long to claim that she didn’t know she wasn’t supposed to do it.
No argument about the transparent bias of the media. And I’ve no quarrel with Trump asking about this stuff, I’m hoping some of his more effective leadership explain that perhaps the right choice here is to divest some of the children from the business if they intend to remain as advisers in the White House…whether they actually completely divorce themselves from the business or not we’ll never know and quite frankly I don’t really care I find it hard to believe that parents won’t discuss important things with their children when they’ve shared a lifetime of business decisions and common interest. I am just pointing out it looks sketchy and since pay for play was a big part of the campaign it might be wise to avoid stepping right into that in the first 90 days of the post election period.
He could get ahead of some of the concerns by publicly stating that Trump businesses will not compete for or accept federal contracts.
So, if he sends a classified email to one of his kids at least it will be proper and legal; unlike Hillary sending one to Chelsea Hubble.
I see what you did there. Hubble…..hehehehehe
As long as he doesn’t have a private email server in a bathroom closet in Trump Towers, I really don’t give a shit if his kids have security clearances as long as they use them in connection with their father’s governance and not private enterprise. I am sure Michelle the decorator, has a clearance and she’s ugly as sin.
I forgot, Michelle, the lover of fat kids everywhere.
How soon is madbus leaving? I hope the tires on his limo go flat before he gets halfway down Pennsylvania Avenue.
Maybe we can send madbus off with his own “experimental” one-man submarine that is programmed to go to the bottom of the Marianas Trench and stay there?
Now, there’s a thought!
Doina Chiacu wrote this story and she’s a hack. She cites Trump’s denial on Twitter about requesting security clearances, but is apparently too lazy to check the original source of what could amount to no more than a wild-ass rumor. She was also singled out last year for writing a story on a laughably tiny Code Pink protest at Dick Cheney’s house over failure to close Guantanamo, and not once mentioning in the story that the Obama White House has had control of Guantanamo for the past seven years.
Are you sure? I thought Obama got a Nobel Peace Prize for closing Guantanamo.
I thought he got that for winning the GWOT by refusing to let anyone user that term anymore.
Could you imagine if obama was just an ordinary civilian and had to fill out an SF-86? How many flags would go off for his: use of multiple names/aliases; drug use; foreign travel; associating with known felons; associating with groups dedicated to the violent overthrow of the US government; foreign acquaintances; family member backgrounds; school transcripts; etc.
The past eight years has been THE MOST opaque administration in our lifetimes and likely all of US History and the media’s flower monkeys go apeshit over Trump sneaking off to a private dinner? Weapons grade hypocrisy.