News
“If you blow the whistle, you should be thanked. You should be protected for doing the right thing. You shouldn’t be ignored and you certainly shouldn’t be punished.”
These were the surprising words of President Obama on 7 August 2014, as he signed a $16 billion bill to improve veterans’ access to medical care. The bill followed a report from the Department for Veterans’ Affairs, which confirmed many of the complaints whistleblowers had been making – waiting lists were indeed being manipulated to hide how long veterans were having to wait for medical appointments…. (full article here)
McGovern, who is also a member of Courage’s advisory board, said:
Obama’s record speaks for itself; he has prosecuted more than twice as many whistleblowers – for espionage, no less – than all former presidents combined. As for those whose crimes have been whistle-blown upon, like those who did the torture, Obama continues to call them ‘patriots’. Former CIA operative John Kiriakou, who opposed torture, sits in a Pennsylvania prison because he revealed the name of one of the torturers.
Too bad Kafka is dead.
By Annie Machon, June 6, 2014
Globe-rattling disclosures from NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden began a year ago and have shaken how the world understands the capacity of the U.S. government and its allies to pry into almost every facet of the lives of almost anyone, as former British intelligence official Annie Machon recalls:
A year ago I stumbled across a story about a troubling new surveillance program developed by the National Security Agency: Prism. While nobody was identified as the source of the disclosure, I was awestruck by the bravery of this unknown person who had made this information available to the public.
At the time the Obama administration had been waging an aggressive war on whistleblowers even as U.S. officials responsible for actual aggressive war on Iraq and the torture of “war on terror” detainees were escaping accountability. (Full article here)
Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence is a movement of former CIA colleagues of former intelligence analyst Sam Adams, together with others who hold up his example as a model for those in intelligence who would aspire to the courage to speak truth to power. SAAII confers an award each year to a member of the intelligence community or related professions who exemplifies Sam Adam’s courage, persistence, and devotion to truth – no matter the consequences. Read more about the history here.
The annual Sam Adams Award has been given in previous years to truth tellers Coleen Rowley of the FBI; Katharine Gun of British Intelligence; Sibel Edmonds of the FBI; Craig Murray, former UK ambassador to Uzbekistan; Sam Provance, former US Army Sgt; Maj. Frank Grevil of Danish Army Intelligence; Larry Wilkerson, Col., US Army (ret.), former chief of staff to Colin Powell at State; Julian Assange, of WikiLeaks: Thomas Drake, of NSA; Jesselyn Radack, formerly of Dept. of Justice and now National Security Director of Government Accountability Project; Thomas Fingar, former Deputy Director of National Intelligence and Director, National Intelligence Council, and Edward Snowden, former contractor for the National Security Agency; Chelsea Manning, US Army Private who exposed (via WikiLeaks) key information on Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as State Department activities; and to retired National Security Agency official William Binney, who challenged decisions to ignore the Fourth Amendment in the government’s massive — and wasteful — collection of electronic data.
