In my previous exchanges with TheL8Elvis, he has argued that there was at least a procedural breach, but disagrees that it crosses the line of criminal. I find that angle somewhat weak, but not by any means impossible... it would depend on the loopholes she took advantage of to use the separate system.
I don't think she should have been able to separate her emails like that in the first place. The vast majority of jobs, particularly where the role of work is this important there's usually a standard involved that bars this sort of activity. But you're dealing with a position that's elected, meaning she could very well keep her job (or as in this case become POTUS) provided she's not indicted and all.
Again though... I say this fully aware we have scandals from the Republicans on similar precedent. I can get behind people who at least agree what she did should not have happened as long as it can push measures to prevent or highly discourage either party from doing it in the future. I just wonder if that's a realistic expectation in general... nothing against people I've already gotten into some level of agreement with.
The bit about not criminal is, I think, a bit more possible than you give it credit for. Of course, for this I am leaving out the apparent incidents of Clinton specifically directing staff to remove headers and in-line classification markings; if that occurred then the criminality is obviously there.
What I am referring to is the stuff that originated elsewhere in an unclassified form and was forwarded and discussed by DoS staff and Clinton herself. e.g., NYT articles on drones that were later deemed to discuss classified material.
It is not merely conceivable but plausible that such things would be discussed without recognizing their classified nature. SCI/SAP programs do not advertise themselves -- even among the intelligence community. It would rather defeat the purpose. And not everyone with a clearance knows everything that is supposed to be treated as classified; this is not incompetence or malfeasance; it is the nature of the beast.
And even when such things are known to be classified at some level, it does not automatically mean that those who know some classification exists must treat every mention of it as classified.
Long ago as a young officer in Military Intelligence, someone recommended a fictional novel (a thriller) to me. I bought it and read it and was shocked to learn that this book revealed programs whose products I was familiar with; the book mentioned not only the programs but at least two specific code words referencing those programs. The code words were themselves classified. I broke no laws by keeping that book on my book shelf at home nor in recommending it as a good fictional read to my family and friends. Some of Leftus's posts indicates he thinks otherwise, but I disagree.
More importantly, if I had not known that these programs and code words actually existed, I would undoubtedly not have broken any laws in regard to security violations. The view that many of the now-classified emails on HRC's server fall into that category is not a ridiculous one and, in fact, remains quite possible.
