"How the Pentagon Punished NSA Whistleblowers" -- The Guardian

[Nay]

For anyone who would like to read the backstory to Snowden's whistleblowing, here's a long but very informative article from the Guardian. This article is especially relevant for those citizens who think that Snowden is a filthy traitor. I personally think the traitors are elsewhere in the NSA.


When this newspaper began publishing the NSA documents in June 2013, it ignited a fierce political debate that continues to this day – about government surveillance, but also about the morality, legality and civic value of whistleblowing.

But if you want to know why Snowden did it, and the way he did it, you have to know the stories of two other men.

The first is Thomas Drake, who blew the whistle on the very same NSA activities 10 years before Snowden did. Drake was a much higher-ranking NSA official than Snowden, and he obeyed US whistleblower laws, raising his concerns through official channels. And he got crushed.

Drake was fired, arrested at dawn by gun-wielding FBI agents, stripped of his security clearance, charged with crimes that could have sent him to prison for the rest of his life, and all but ruined financially and professionally. The only job he could find afterwards was working in an Apple store in suburban Washington, where he remains today. Adding insult to injury, his warnings about the dangers of the NSA’s surveillance programme were largely ignored.



http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/may/22/how-pentagon-punished-nsa-whistleblowers

[OnyxCollie]

1. But, but, but, *Proper Channels*. nt

[2naSalit]

3. Yes, the chain of command

exists to keep whistle blowers from blowing the whistle.

[99th_Monkey]

6. +10 nt

[askeptic]

2. This article makes it pretty obvious Snowden couldn't have blown the whistle any other way

And it shows, to my chagrin, that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are still trying to punish Snowden and anyone else for exposing their un-Constitutional spying program. Manning's 35-year sentence looks particularly egregious in the light of these findings.

If Hillary is going to be different, she should be talking about whistleblowing and prosecuting those who obstructed it.

John Crane first heard about Thomas Drake when Crane and his colleagues at the Pentagon’s Office of the Inspector General received a whistleblower complaint in September 2002. The complaint alleged that the NSA was backing an approach to electronic surveillance that was both financially and constitutionally irresponsible. The complaint was signed by three former NSA officials, William Binney, Kirk Wiebe and Edward Loomis, and a former senior Congressional staffer, Diane Roark. Drake also endorsed the complaint – but because he, unlike the other four, had not yet retired from government service, he asked that his name be kept anonymous, even in a document that was supposed to be treated confidentially within the government.

...

In the course of their investigation, Crane and his colleagues in the inspector general’s office also affirmed the whistleblowers’ allegation that the Bush administration’s surveillance programme violated the fourth amendment of the US constitution by collecting Americans’ phone and internet communications without a warrant. “We were concerned about these constitutional issues even before we investigated their complaint,” Crane told me. “We had received other whistleblower filings that flagged the issue.”

...

Henry [replied] that he was the general counsel, the general counsel was in charge of handling things with the Justice Department and he would do things his way.”

Henry Shelley declined my repeated requests for an interview. In an email, he told me, “I am confident when this matter is fully resolved no wrongdoing on my behalf will be identified.”

There the disagreement between Crane and Shelley stalled. Or so it seemed until 18 months later. On the morning of 26 July, 2007, FBI agents with guns drawn stormed the houses of Binney, Wiebe, Loomis and Roark. Binney was towelling off after a shower when agents accosted him; he and his wife suddenly found themselves with guns aimed directly between their eyes, the retired NSA man recalled.

[cantbeserious]

5. Agree Completely

eom

[nationalize the fed]

4. k&r

[99th_Monkey]

7. KnR for exposure nt

[vanlassie]

8. Good read. Thanks.

[riderinthestorm]

9. BIG K&R! nt

[Blue_Tires]

10. I liked the Guardian *before* they decided to become

Snowflake's personal PR firm... Since then they've lost their way.