The Toothless Nature of Obama’s Recent Directive is No Accident or Mistake

Last Friday, Firedoglake’s Kevin Gosztola took on Obama and his NGO entourages in Washington on the administration’s recent cosmetic and toothless directive to provide an appearance of protection for government whistleblowers. As always, Mr. Gosztola aces the subject through a well-supported and very well-reasoned argument:

President Barack Obama has issued a directive that appears to finally provide whistleblower protections for intelligence agency employees in government. The directive declares employees able to access classified information “can effectively report waste, fraud and abuse while protecting classified national security information.� It also includes a “prohibition� against retaliation against employees, who report “waste, fraud and abuse.�

…the more than two thousand words in this presidential directive are just that: words. It is an acknowledgment that there is a problem. It puts a general belief the president has that national security whistleblowers should have some semblance of rights in writing. But, it does not offer a way for whistleblowers to challenge the decision of an agency to fire them in court.

…

The directive comes less than thirty days before Election Day. The Obama 2012 campaign and its supporters like to talk about GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney and how he keeps pushing the reset button so he can get around scrutiny. Here Obama is pushing the reset button. He is asking critics of his war on whistleblowers to silence themselves at least until after the election. Read more È

Peter B. Collins presents Journalist Gareth Porter and analyst Kevin Gosztola of FireDogLake. Porter offers two credible sources that contradict the White House assertions that civilian deaths from drone strikes are few to zero. Like Stephen Colbert’s “truthiness�, this claim is based on the arbitrary standard that all adult males near a target are “militants�, which is undefined. As a Vietnam War historian, Porter also compares the manipulation of this information to the spin and lies of the 1960′s and 1970′s. He also offers cogent comments on Israel’s intentions to attack Iran.

At about 37 minutes into the podcast, Gosztola joins us to talk about his article on state secrets, which he calls a “horrendous creation of the judiciary.� He describes recent cases where judges have deferred to the administration, even when they were offended by lies and stonewalling. We talk about the Sibel Edmonds case and many other whistleblowers who face retaliation and fatuous claims that information that’s already public can be called “secret�.

Listen to the preview Here
 

Here are our guests Gareth Porter & Kevin Gosztola unplugged!

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As always Fire Dog Lake’s Kevin Gosztola is on top of the latest news, developments and implications involving government whistleblowers and transparency. Here are a few excerpts from Mr. Gosztola’s latest article:

For over a month now, members of Congress have been engaged in a bipartisan offensive against “leaks.â€� The offensive was launched after details on Obama’s “kill list,â€� cyber warfare against Iran and the CIA underwear bomb plot sting operation in Yemen became public information. The offensive yielded the appointment by Attorney General Eric Holder of two US attorneys to investigate two of the “leaksâ€� (no attorney was appointed to investigate how details on a covert drone program were released) yet this has not satisfied politicians and Congress people from both the Democratic and Republican Party in the US continue to introduce and speak out in favor of proposals to clamp down on the free flow of information. Read more È

I will be at FireDogLake Book Salon this evening (Saturday, June 30, 2012). The two-hour session will be hosted and moderated by Kevin Gosztola. We’ll be discussing and taking your questions and comments on my memoir Classified Woman, the persecution and prosecution of government whistleblowers, government censorship and excessive secrecy, and more! Mr. Gosztola is one of the most respected experts on these issues. He has been covering these topics for years through sound and objective analyses and articles at FDL.  FDL has consistently supported government whistleblowers and truth-tellers, and has done so without any partisanship spin or angles. It is an honor to be there and have this opportunity.

The session will start at 5:00 p.m. (Eastern).You can register and join the discussion session here.

Signed Copy of Sibel Edmonds’ recently released memoir Classified Woman: The Sibel Edmonds Story