Whistleblowers

By Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra | – Julian Assange has reached a deal with the United States Department of Justice to allow him to return to Australia after pleading guilty to violating American espionage law. Assange, 52, was released from London’s Belmarsh Prison, where he has spent more than five years and later was […]

Whistleblowers

The Lasting Legacy of Truth-Teller Daniel Ellsberg

Tomdispatch

By Norman Solomon ( Tomdispatch.com ) – On a warm evening almost a decade ago, I sat under the stars with Daniel Ellsberg while he talked about nuclear war with alarming intensity. He was most of the way through writing his last and most important book, The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner. […]

censorship

Daniel Ellsberg: The Most Dangerous Man in America

Peter G. Prontzos

Vancouver (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – Former Defense Department analyst Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers to the media in 1971, died on June 16. When Ellsberg (with the help of Anthony J. Russo) released the Pentagon Papers to the media in 1971, he expected to spend the rest of his […]

CIA

Trump isn’t the First: the Government has often Persecuted Whistleblowers

The Conversation

By Jennifer M. Pacella | – When President Donald Trump likened a whistleblower’s White House sources to spies and made a lightly veiled reference to execution, he highlighted a longstanding peril facing those who come forward to alert the public to governmental wrongdoing. Blowing the whistle carries major risks. BlueSkyImage/Shutterstock.com In many instances, whistleblowers find […]

Arab Spring

Along with pardoning Manning, Obama should have repealed 1917 Espionage Act

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – In a daring and bold move that showed his profound humanitarian side, President Obama has commuted the 35-year sentence of Chelsea Manning, a transgender woman and former military intelligence analyst who in 2010 leaked hundreds of thousands of State Department cables and also some Iraq and […]

Bill of Rights

Obama Prosecutes another Whistleblower to Senate for “Espionage”

contributors

By John Kiriakou | (Foreign Policy in Focus) Jeffrey Sterling learned the hard way that the feds will throw the book at anyone who embarrasses them. Jeffrey Sterling recently stood before a judge as his sentence was read. The former CIA officer, the judge declared, would spend 42 months — that’s three and half years […]

Central Intelligence Agency

Double Standard: Petraeus Avoids Prison, But Whistleblowers Not So Lucky

contributors

Newsy | – “Retired Gen. David Petraeus was sentenced Thursday for mishandling classified government documents, but why was his punishment relatively light?” Newsy: “Petraeus Avoids Prison, But Whistleblowers Not So Lucky”