Know all ye by these presents that Annie Machon is hereby honored with the traditional Sam Adams Corner-Brightener Candlestick Holder, in symbolic recognition of her courage in shining light into dark places.
“If you see something, say something.” Long before that saying came into vogue, Annie Machon took its essence to heart.
MI5, the British domestic intelligence agency, recognized how bright, enterprising, and unflappable Annie was and recruited her as soon as she completed her studies at Cambridge.
The good old boys in MI5 apparently thought she would have a malleable conscience, as well — such that she would have no qualms about secret monitoring of the very government officials overseeing MI5 itself, for example.
Annie would not be quiet about this secret abuse. Her partner, David Shayler, an MI5 colleague and — like Annie — a person of integrity and respect for law, became aware of an MI6 plan to assassinate Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
They decided to blow the whistle and fled to France. (Many years later, a woman of high station but more flexible integrity openly gloated over Gaddafi’s brutal assassination.)
After three years on the lam, hiding mostly in France, they returned to the UK, where Annie was arrested (but never charged with a crime). The powers-that-be, however, chose to make an example of Shayler (not unlike what they are now doing to Julian Assange).
Shayler’s whistleblowing case dragged on for seven years, during which he did a brief stint in the infamous high-security prison where Julian Assange still rots (having been denied bail, yet again). A strong mitigation plea by Annie helped reduce Shayler’s remaining prison time. All in all, though, what he was forced to endure took a hard toll on him.
More broadly, the issues that surfaced around whistleblowing at the time remain largely the same two decades later. Annie Machon has been a very prominent and strong supporter of Julian. She has also been a much admired mentor to less experienced women and men as they seek to become better informed on issues of integrity and courage, and take Annie up on her offer to “help them meet interesting people”, as she puts it.
We would be remiss today were we not to call to mind the courageous example of our first two awardees, Coleen Rowley (FBI) and Katharine Gun (GCHQ), who took great risks in exposing malfeasance and in trying to head off the attack on Iraq. And, as Julian Assange did when he won this award, we again honor his treasured source, Chelsea Manning, for her continuing courage and scarcely believable integrity.
Ed Snowden, our Sam Adams awardee in 2013, noted that we tend to ignore some degree of evil in our daily life, but, as Ed put it, “We also have a breaking point and when people find that, they act.”
Annie is still acting, as one can see as this World Ethical Data Forum unfolds.
Presented this 17th day of March at the World Ethical Data Forum by admirers of the example set by the late CIA analyst, Sam Adams.
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Burr’s CIA torture cover-up makes America less safe, less respected
The Charlotte Observer, March 3, 2016
Highlights:
He tried to bury reports on CIA torture, won’t hold hearings
It hurts America’s security and reputation
From Larry Wilkerson, a retired U.S. Army colonel and former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell. He is the Distinguished Adjunct Professor of Government and Public Policy at the College of William & Mary in Virginia. He is a Republican.
As he runs for re-election, U.S. Sen. Richard Burr is airing $300,000 in television ads that tout his record as chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee. The truth, however, is that Burr’s handling of this key job has done our nation and North Carolinians a huge disservice.
The biggest challenge that confronted Burr as he took the helm of Intelligence in January 2015 was to come to grips with President George W. Bush’s torture program.
The committee’s six-year investigation had just revealed grim details of lawlessness and barbarism in the Central Intelligence Agency’s enhanced interrogation program. In every way, Burr has shown himself to be the ultimate protector of the criminals at the CIA, not their overseer.
His first act as chairman was an attempt to recall the committee’s 6,900-page “torture report” from the White House and executive agencies. He also tried to bury the Panetta Review, a still-secret internal CIA assessment of the torture program that, according to Intelligence members who have read it, is a “smoking gun” bolstering the negative conclusions of the committee’s own report.
And Burr refuses even to hold hearings on CIA misconduct like “rectal feeding,” sexual abuse and the torturing to death of detainees in its custody.
As a result, some presidential candidates now vie over who will order the harshest techniques. One promises more waterboarding, while another says he would go even further.
Read more here: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article63773397.html#storylink=cpy
VIPS Offers Advice to Candidates
Former Secretary of State Clinton, whose campaign is brimming with establishment foreign policy advisers, has chided Democratic rival Sen. Sanders for lacking a roster of experts. But ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern says an untapped resource for any candidate is the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
By Ray McGovern
A Memo to: Dr. Ben Carson, Hillary Clinton, Ted Cruz, John Kasich, Marco Rubio, Bernie Sanders, Dr. Jill Stein, and Donald Trump
The media brouhaha over naming your campaign advisers on foreign policy prompts this reminder of a unique resource available, gratis, to all of you. That resource is our nonpartisan group – Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS). If we were into self-promotion, we would add to our (virtual) letterhead: “serving satisfied customers since 2003.”
We are about apolitical analysis; we are into spreading unvarnished truth around; we do not shape our analysis toward this or that debating point. Thus, we eschew the moniker “campaign adviser.” But that doesn’t mean we wouldn’t provide apolitical and unvarnished advice to anyone who seeks it.
Unique? We are on the outer edge of atypical in the sense that we are a fiercely nonpartisan, tell-it-like-it-is group of professionals with long experience in intelligence and related fields and with no policy or personal axes to grind. We are Republicans, Democrats and Independents. Abundant proof that party preference plays no role in our analysis can be seen in our enviable record – in the substantive work we have produced over the past 13 years – both before and after the ill-advised attack on Iraq in March 2003.
Also distinguishing us from “campaign advisers,” none of us in VIPS lust for a high position in a new administration; none are heavily invested in arms industries; none of us ask for a retainer. In other words, there are no strings attached to the substantive analysis we provide to all our readers and listeners. If objective, disinterested analysis is your cup of tea, we suggest that you check out VIPS’s record, to include the multiple warnings we gave President George W. Bush in the months before the attack on Iraq.
(More at Consortiumnews.)
Will Julian Assange of WikiLeaks Go Free After U.N. Finds He Is Being Arbitrarily Detained?
Posted on February 4, 2016 by dandelionsalad
“Don’t Shoot the Messenger” – Julian Assange, Embassy of Ecuador, Knightsbridge, London
Image by chrisjohnbeckett via Flickr
US, other nations targeted Assange & WikiLeaks – whistleblower
RT America on Feb 4, 2016
Whistleblower and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange may be freed from his four-year refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. Will he still face charges from foreign or American governments even if he’s cleared by a UN council? RT’s Lindsay France is joined by whistleblower and privacy advocate Jesselyn Radack to get a full view of what Assange still has to face.
(Full article with more links here.)
Obama Seeking Unlimited War Powers Under Pretext of Anti-Daesh Fight
US historians claim that the proposed Authorization for the Use of Military Force against Daesh that Congress is preparing will give President Barack Obama unlimited powers to declare war contrary to the US Constitution.
WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The proposed Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) against Daesh that Congress is preparing will give President Barack Obama unlimited powers to declare war contrary to the US Constitution, US historians told Sputnik.
“The proposed AUMF, with its intent to give virtually unlimited powers to the President, is a direct assault upon the Constitutional order of the United States, a virtual coup d’etat,” ex-US Army Major and former Judge Advocate General (JAG) lawyer Todd Pierce told Sputnik on Friday.
According to the US Constitution, sole power to declare war rests with the Congress. However, the AUMF, which enjoys strong bi-partisan support, will give the US president the legal authority to unleash war operations in any country where he determines Daesh may be a threat.
Read more: http://sputniknews.com/analysis/20160130/1033959644/obama-seeking-unlimited-powers-aumf.html#ixzz3ynA94cpM
Interview of Larry Wilkerson on The Empire Files
Bush Military Official: The unfixable corruption inside the establishment and the corporate interests driving foreign policy: Abby Martin's Empire Files
Posted by The Ring of Fire on Wednesday, December 30, 2015
Abby Martin of The Empire Files interviews retired Colonel Larry Wilkerson on the unfixable corruption inside the establishment and the corporate interests driving foreign policy.