At UN,
Hillary Takes
Hand-Picked Qs
About Deleted
Emails,
Gration in the
Can
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS, March
10, updated --
Once Hillary
Clinton chose
the UN as the
backdrop for
her press
availability
to address
email-gate,
the UN
Security
Council media
stakeout area
began to fill
up.
Questions
included,
isn't it the
government
which is
supposed to
review what is
public and
private in a
government
official's
email? (See,
for example, this
FOIA response
with cell
phone numbers
redacted.)
Awaiting
Hillary, the
UN moved the
flags of the
15 Security
Council
members to the
side, in front
of the replica
of Picasso's
Guernica. But
the blue sheet
saying
“Security
Council”
remained.
From an
ill-attended
press
conference
about women in
parliaments,
at which the
front row
middle seats
were blocked
off with a
signs, “Andrea
Mitchell” and
“NBC,” Inner
City Press
passed through
the glass
turnstiles to
the stakeout.
The
aforementioned
Andrea
Mitchell was
already there
in front.
Incongruously
an officer of
what's called
the UN
Correspondents
Association
was also in
front, getting
whispered to.
BuzzFeed
needless to
say was in the
(Glass) House,
as were a
number of TV
faces.
The speeches
in the
Economic and
Social Council
chamber
continued,
from English
into German,
much praise of
corporations
and their work
for women's
rights. When
it was over,
Hillary
Clinton and
entourage came
to the
stakeout,
which hushed.
After some
opening
remarks about
Beijing + 20
and the 47
Senators'
letter said to
only help
Iran, Hillary
turned to her
emails - and
for the first
pre-selected
questions,
conveniently,
to the UN
Correspondents
Association,
which offered
thanks and,
predictably, a
softball.
Update:
UNCA later
told "In
the Loop"
that by
tradition it
gets the first
question. For
the UN
Security
Council
stakeout,
where Hillary
Clinton spoke,
that is
entirely
untrue. (Even
in the
sit-down UN
Press Briefing
Room, where
Clinton did
not appear, this
"set-aside" is
contested.
It would be
worth
examining with
whom this
first UNCA
(softball)
question for
Hillary
Clinton was
arranged...
(Inner City
Press quit
this UNCA
after their
board tried to
demand changes
or removal
from the
Internet of
articles about
Sri Lanka
and conflicts
of interest,
among other
topics, then
co-founded the
new Free
UN Coalition
for Access
which presses,
as relevant
here, for a UN
Freedom of
Information
Act.)
Questions
started
getting
somewhat
better: why
did Hillary
delete what
she called
private
emails? A
journalist
tried to ask
about
Ambassador
Scott Gration,
reportedly
fired for
similarly
evading the
Federal
Records Act,
but the
journalist got
shouted down.
Inner City
Press,
tweeting and Vining in the back, started
shouting
“Scott
Gration”
during each
brief lull. At
the end
Hillary
Clinton said
to go online
and read the
inspector
general's
report (and
yes, there is
more: Gration
working off
Gmail in a
bathroom in
the Nairobi
embassy, here.)
A UN true
believer
complained
that the press
didn't call
about gender
equality, only
email-gate.
But it was
Hillary who
chose this
venue, and who
chose the
questions, at
least the
first one.
This may not
end well.
Watch this
site.
, 
