CARELESS USE OF THE WORD "CARELESS"

James Comey, the Director of the F.B.I., has proven his mettle as an upright individual by standing up to the Bush Administration, although a staunch Republican, when asked to so something that he felt was illegal,  Perhaps, as a measure of his independence, although he exonerated Hillary Clinton, he also accused her of being careless.

The Republican mob has reacted to this as if "carelessness" was a capital offenses for which, at the very least, required immediate incarceration without benefit of trial.  

The word, however, has no legal meaning, whatsoever, in the context in which it was used.  There is no legal penalty for "carelessness", nor was it appropriate to to make any such judgement "ex officio", indeed the term is considered, by many, to be too ambiguous to have any real legal meaning.

Since, at his hearing before Congress, Mr. Comey was shown, by one of the House members, that the three emails that were believed to have been classified, at the time they were sent, were not marked as such in accordance with the State Department's own manual, I suspect he regrets having used the term, but it is too late now.