Subject: Re: Coming soon
It is a nice thought, but don't count on it.

I worked the Snowden fallout for 517 days (but who was counting?). The likelihood of him seeing incarceration in the US is very low, for many reasons. She's even less likely - she's better resourced, higher ranked, and assuredly has better mobility options.

Don't downplay the rank thing. We had a phrase, different spanks for different ranks. A coworker of mine once accidentally brought home some of the most sensitive information in government. So sensitive it was only distributed in hard copy, and those all had bar codes, and they were scanned and inventoried monthly (more on that in a moment). When he realized he did this he was horrified - the correct response. He turned himself in to security, and they attempted to hang him (metaphorically) from the nearest tree. He did escape with only a General Officer Letter of Reprimand as he 1) did this accidentally, and 2) turned himself in (now think to politicians who lack either of these characteristics, and more on this too in a moment).

I wrote him a letter in defense, particularly because the accountability program was dead broke. As he had this for six months, it should have been noted five months earlier at the latests. But they were fakin' the funk on the accountability process, and I actually called for the head of security and the head of inventory to be sacked, not him, and called for an immediate, two-person verified, 100% accountability of all of these documents, by independent actors. My coworker didn't get promoted and was barely able to finish 20 years.

This was an Army officer, mid-career. Let's move up the ranks and observe the spanks:

Petraeus *willfully* leaded classified information to an unauthorized recipient - his lover, Paula Broadwell (also my West Point classmate, wheee). So, 1) not accidentally, and 2) didn't turn himself in. Very, very different than my coworker.

What happened to Dave P? Pled guilty to a misdemeanor, paid a fine, rode off into the sunset with no loss of rank or real consequence.

Now let's move to the top. Hilary's email server brouhaha. Assuredly an awful decision, assuredly crawling with foreign hackers, assuredly not containing only anodyne information. Spanks? There are no spanks at the top.