The conservative radio personality, Chris Plante (WMAL, Washington, DC) opines that the most insidious power of the media is their power to ignore. While it is certainly true that the chief editor of a major newspaper or the producer of a network newscast has the ability to spike or kill a story, which is essentially their way of “ignoring” the news if you will, what is more subtle, deceitful—and dare I suggest corrupt—is their penchant to frame a story to fit a specific narrative. They no longer report the news, but they do shape a message.

Anyone in the intelligence community and DOD holding a top secret clearance with Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI)—a type of classified information concerning or derived from sensitive intelligence sources, methods, or analytical processes—knows that not only is Hillary Clinton (and her minions) lying but that the media—unable to completely ignore the multifaceted issue—has shifted to shaping the narrative. The KGB disinformation service couldn’t have done a better job.

To transfer any classified information onto an unclassified system, you have to work at it. To transfer classified information from a secure classified system and move it to an unclassified system is not only difficult, it is illegal. Those within the intelligence community know this action, in all of its forms, is called espionage. The essence of espionage is the unauthorized movement of classified documents out of a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, a SCIF, and into the hands of “any person not entitled to receive it.” The men and women with TS/SCI who toil in the IC and DOD, working with the nation’s most trusted secrets, know that if they were to secure a private email server and move any shred, chad, or hint of classified information onto that server, the FBI would be on them like stink on a dead fish with a one-way ticket to a federal brig. And they would be charged with espionage.

Seventy years ago, a long-term Democrat, the former government lawyer and senior State Department official, Alger Hiss, removed classified information from the U.S. State Department. Classified documents that moved in and out of the Secretary’s office, stopped at his desk where he typed copies on his office typewriter. He slipped the copies into a briefcase and provided them to his Soviet agent who photographed and microfilmed them. When the FBI finally retrieved the spools of microfilm, the Hiss Papers printed out to a stack 4 ½ feet tall. The FBI case against Alger Hiss was a clear-cut case of espionage, however, the Justice Department only authorized a lesser charge—perjury—due to the statute of limitations.

The espionage case against Alger Hiss and the case against Hillary Clinton are eerily similar. Both were long-term Democrats, former lawyers, and senior State Department officials that removed classified information “from its proper place of custody…or to be lost, stolen, abstracted, or destroyed.” It is an undeniable fact that both systematically transferred thousands of pieces of classified information out of the State Department’s offices at Foggy Bottom.

Additionally, there is the issue of 33,000 missing emails. Maybe Julian Assange of WikiLeaks fame could help us out here and release those documents. It may be noteworthy that if Mrs. Clinton’s missing emails were ever recovered and printed out, that stack of papers would reach over 10 ½ feet tall.[*] Alger Hiss was a lightweight compared to Hillary Clinton, as his production for the Soviet Union’s KGB was still considered impressive for him to receive several awards in absentia. The former Secretary of State, “gave her State Department emails containing Top Secret and other classified information to her lawyer.” I’m fairly certain, David Kendall was not a fully cleared individual and transferring classified material to someone not authorized to receive them is an act of espionage.

Congressman Trey Gowdy introduced Americans to the legal issue known as “spoliation of evidence.” When some item of relevant evidence—whether documents, physical objects or data—relevant to an ongoing legal matter—is destroyed, discarded or modified in some way, the U.S. legal system allows investigators to presume that the missing evidence was unfavorable to that party and furthermore allows them to draw conclusions accordingly. The classic junior high school excuse, “the dog ate my homework,” or “they were emails dealing with Chelsea’s wedding or yoga” isn’t valid under the law when the disappearance and their handling is suspicious.

Even Inspector Clouseau would find the admission of 33,000 emails, scrubbed or “wiped clean” from a private server, to be highly suspicious. The intentional destruction or negligent loss of evidence suggests that Hillary Clinton believed that her emails were harmful to her, and that consciousness of guilt led her to destroy, hide or lose them. The media will never acknowledge Secretary Clinton’s intentional destruction her emails—classic spoliation of evidence—even if they were beat over the head with it.

A recent survey found that not a single member of the White House correspondent pool was a Republican. Journalists and those correspondents take their orders from senior editors and producers. When it’s 44-to-zero Republicans, the numbers are on their side and so is their ability to control and dictate the White House message and Democrat party narrative. Today, no news or story from the mainstream media can ever be trusted or considered, in the immortal words of Sergeant Joe Friday, “Just the truth, ma’am.”

Dr. Paul Kengor’s exposé on Frank Marshal Davis, The Communist, demonstrated that the one-time editor traveled to the Soviet Union and learned the fine art of propaganda and disinformation from instructors from the KGB. Sixty years later, it appears America’s journalism schools now teach the same propaganda coursework and disinformation strategies as Cold War Moscow. The old Soviet press gave their all for the Motherland and warped the news as required to ensure it fit Stalin’s and the Communist Party’s message. Isn’t that what is going on with today’s media? A better question may be, “Who isn’t a socialist or a closet communist in today’s Democrat-centric media,” carrying the water for the White House, running a Soviet-style disinformation campaign and obscuring the facts in the case of Hillary Clinton?

The President recently endorsed the Democrat nominee for President. The media obfuscated the fact that the FBI received what was tantamount to “marching orders” from the chief law enforcement officer. If the FBI Director insists and submit charges; treason, espionage or something lesser, the Justice Department will ignore the evidence and will never approve an indictment of Mrs. Clinton. And the media will have done its job of ignoring the facts and maintaining the Clinton campaign’s narrative that this was nothing but Republican witch hunting.

Mark Hewitt is the author of the espionage thrillers Special Access and Shoot Down.