53percenter's Blog

The Senate Judiciary Committee now says that early drafts of former FBI Director James Comey’s statement on Hillary Clinton’s private server accused the former Democratic Presidential candidate of “gross negligence” – a crime, punishable by law – rather than “extreme carelessness.”

Sources who viewed both documents – the early drafts and the later statement, which Comey delivered in the summer of 2016- say the the former document made reference to the possibility that Clinton might be criminally liable for using a private server, based in her Chappaqua home, to handle classified emails that passed through the Secretary of State’s office.

“There is evidence to support a conclusion that Secretary Clinton, and others, used the email server in a manner that was grossly negligent with respect to the handling of classified information,” the draft said, sources claim.

The version Comey finally delivered, which was penned weeks before the FBI had finished interviewing key witnesses, including top Clinton aides Cheryl Mills and Huma Abedin, said Clinton was merely “extremely careless” in her handling of classified material.

There is a key difference between “negligence” and “carelessness:” the former is a crime, punishable by law. The latter is merely a slap on the wrist – a way to chastize the Presidential candidate without spurring on any further Justice Department action. Clinton could have faced charges, if the FBI concluded that the information she shared could reasonably be “used to the injury of the United States.”

Comey told Congress, in testimony earlier this year, that he did not believe any prosecutor would pursue actions that qualified as “grossly negligent.” But deciding whether to pursue charges wasn’t technically up to Comey; the FBI was in charge of the investigation, and could recommend prosecution, but ultimately the Attorney General’s office would determine whether to hold Clinton accountable.

Sources close to the Senate Judiciary Committee told The Hill that the committee is now examining whether there was an internal disagreement, within the FBI, over whether to suggest Clinton could be charged.

Over the weekend, here’s what happened in Saudi Arabia:

• Saudi Arabia’s anti-corruption committee, led by Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman, son of King Salman, arrested 17 princes and top officials – enemies of the heir to the crown. The biggest name by far was Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, who owns major stakes in Citigroup, Twitter, and News Corp.
• Saudi Prince Mansour bin Muqrin, was killed in a helicopter downing near the Yemeni border. Muqrin’s father was the king’s half-brother, and was the next in the line of succession before King Salman replaced him with the crown prince.
• Lebanon’s Sunni prime minister, Saad Hariri, resigned his position while in Saudi Arabia, and announced that he feared assassination by Iran. Hariri’s father was murdered in 2005; Hezbollah is suspected in that assassination.
• Saudi Arabia shot down a ballistic missile over Riyadh. They blamed Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, and later claimed that technology in the missile came from Iran.
• Finally, on Monday, Saudi Arabia said that Lebanon had declared war on it thanks to attacks on the country by terrorist group Hezbollah.

So, what the hell is going on?

This appears to be the Saudi dynasty’s first move toward standing up to the growing Iranian influence in the region. In the wake of President Obama’s Arab Spring, the Iranian sphere of influence has radically increased, while polarizing the Middle East along Sunni-Shia lines: Iran has crafted a swath of power from Iran through Lebanon, and has aggregated power in Yemen to Saudi Arabia’s south, while Saudi Arabia is now openly allied with Egypt, Jordan and Israel. Saudi Arabia is feeling threatened, as they should.

But just as importantly, the Saudi regime itself may be teetering. Saudi Arabia is already at 12 percent unemployment, and its population is disproportionately young; it is also heavily divided between more moderate Muslims and terror-supporting fundamentalists. In the past, this has raised suspicions that the Saudi government was paying off fundamentalist terror groups to ensure its own survival. Saudi Arabia’s oil industry has also taken a heavy hit in recent years thanks to new technological developments, and the government’s desire to outpace Iranian oil production in order to damage the Islamic Republic economically. Iran knows this, and they’ve been talking about it openly for years. In 2015, Iranian Revolutionary Guard Major General Mohammad Ali Jafari stated, “Al Saud is teetering on the edge of collapse.”

All of this may be exaggerated, but the Saudi regime has an interest in doing three things: making clear to the population that the greatest threat is an external one springing from Iran; re-enshrining support from the American government, through modernization and willingness to fight terrorism; solidifying domestic rule. That appears to be what the Saudis are doing.

The question is whether this will actually lead to war. There’s little question that as Iran rises, the Saudis must grow more active; by the same token, Iran doesn’t want war now, particularly if the United States were to come in on the Saudi side. Saudi Arabia knows that, and may be attempting brinksmanship before the winds of power shift against them.

Mega-church Pastor Carl Lentz of Hillsong, New York, may be yet another one of those trendy pastors who look cool in a pair of tight skinny jeans while preaching about Jesus, and then stands for nothing substantial when pressed against the wall on serious issues.

Though Hillsong, New York, has been flirting with the SJW Gospel for some time now, pastor Lentz’s latest refusal to outright condemn abortion as sinful — a slam-dunk of a theological question that a two-year-old could answer correctly — indicates the congregation is now being led by a spiritually blind man.

Speaking on The View last week before a group of pro-abortion feminists, Lentz did not emphatically defend the unborn when asked by the catty hosts regarding his position, and instead offered an effeminate, watered-down, limp-wristed appeal to relativistic hogwash.

“So, it’s not a sin in your church to have an abortion?” pro-abortion host Joy Behar asked.

Lentz responded: “That’s the kind of conversation we would have finding out your story, where you’re from, what you believe. … I mean, God’s the judge. People have to live to their own convictions. That’s such a broad question, to me, I’m going higher. I want to sit with somebody and say, ‘What do you believe?’”

“So it’s not an open and shut case to you?” Behar asked.

“Some people would say it is,” Lentz responded. “To me, I’m trying to teach people who Jesus is first, and find out their story. Before I start picking and choosing what I think is sin in your life, I’d like to know your name.”

That may be all well and good on the engagement with individual people, and surely, Christ asks we not condemn anyone’s soul. The question of abortion being sinful has nothing to do with the spiritual disposition of the sinner and everything do with the objective nature of the act. Abortion is either a sinful action or it’s not. The only in-between is the culpability of the act, which only God can judge. If the question probed to Lentz were “do you condemn people who have abortions?” then his answer would be correct. That is not the case here, however.

Later, co-host Sara Haines asked Lentz his position on homosexuality and abortion; again, he gave a watery response.

“Hillsong is seen as this hip, progressive church that’s drawn huge millennial crowds, but it’s still evangelical,” Haines said. “So, where do you stand on social issues that young people are particularly passionate about, like gay marriage [and] abortion? Like, how do you address those types of things?”

Lentz replied: “I think our job is still to help people — not necessarily change how they think — but try to point them to what God has said, what we believe the Bible [has] to say. We believe that God is good, that God loves everybody, that Jesus was here to set people free, and that’s still the good news of the gospel.”

LifeNews highlighted that an alarming number of Evangelical pastors, especially the younger generation, have adopted Lentz’s mode of thought.

Lentz has received a lot of publicity and criticism for his remarks, but he is not atypical. Studies indicate many pastors are hesitant to speak about abortion. A 2016 Pew Research Center poll found that just 29 percent of respondents heard their clergy member speak about abortion during a religious service. Most who did said their clergy spoke out against abortion (22 percent), while a few (3 percent) said their clergy spoke in support of abortion.

The NFL needs to switch their slogan #TAKEAKNEE to #TAKEASEAT, beg their fans to forgive them for disrespecting the flag, and focus their energy on getting fans to return to games, or risk seeing their stadiums turn into ghost towns.

Over the last year, the NFL’s viewership and ratings have sunk to dismal levels, with polls showing that only 46% now view the NFL positively. Compare that to four years ago when the NFL’s approval rating stood at a comfortable 64%.

Halfway through the season, the NFL has shown no signs of improvement. Players kneeling during the National Anthem with no repercussions have taken a toll, as ticket sales and images from games demonstrate.

Here are a few shots from this weekend from games that, regardless of the appeal or lack thereof of the matchups, were far more empty than the NFL is used to seeing pre-#TAKEAKNEE:

The San Francisco 49ers — where the #TAKEAKNEE controversy originated when Colin Kaepernick declared that he was “not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color” — appears to have it the worst. No surprise though, considering the team now has a record of 0-9.