By Jesselyn Radack

[UPDATED BELOW]

(updated below – Update II)

For two years I have been writing about the criminalization of whistleblowing, or as Glenn Greenwald has put it more aptly, the “war on whistleblowers.”  I’m an attorney with the Government Accountability Project, the nation’s leading whistleblower organization.

How did I get into this line of work?  Because I myself was a whistleblower when I worked as a Legal Advisor at the Justice Department and blew the whistle when my advice not to interrogate “American Taliban” John Walker Lindh without an attorney (and, parenthetically, not to torture him) was ignored and then “disappeared” from the file in contravention of a federal court discovery order. After I blew the whistle, the Justice Department retaliated against me by, among other things, placing me under criminal investigation, referring me to the state bars in which I’m licensed as a lawyer based on a secret report to which I did not have access, and putting me on the “No-Fly” List. (The D.C. Bar charges are still pending 8½ years later.) I write about the experience in my new book TRAITOR: The Whistleblower and the American Taliban. Glenn Greenwald, for whom I am substituting here, wrote an eloquent foreword for the book.

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Following similar raids in St. Louis and Oakland, hordes of NYPD officers this morning forcibly cleared Zuccotti Park in Manhattan of all protesters; New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg took "credit" for this decision. That led to this description of today's events from an Occupy Wall Street media spokesman, as reported by Salon's Justin Elliott:

A military style raid on peaceful protesters camped out in the shadow of Wall Street, ordered by a cold ruthless billionaire who bought his way into the mayor’s office.

If you think about it, that short sentence is a perfect description of both the essence of America's political culture and the fuel that gave rise to the #OWS movement in the first place.

* * * * *

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Last night in San Francisco I had the pleasure of meeting Glenn Greenwald in person for the first time and interviewing him about our ailing democracy, the occupy movement and the "too big to jail" phenomenon. (Glenn's new book, "With Liberty and Justice for Some" has just been published.) The room was packed with Glenn's fans, and he lit the place up with his razor-sharp responses to my questions — as anyone who reads his column would expect. In the clip above, he's answering my question about the servitude of our media to the nation's elite class.

Fora.TV was there filming for us, and the whole interview is now available online.

(Salon Core members, check the Core page for a coupon code to watch for free.)

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On July 22, 2011 a bombing and shooting massacre was carried out in Norway by an individual motived by fanatic anti-immigrant and Islamophobic beliefs; an atrocity which shocked the world and which could only honestly be described as terrorism. The perpetrator, himself an ethnic Norwegian, hoped to bring about political change through acts of wanton violence against civilians, many of them children and young adults. That this was indeed terrorism is important to note, given that at present Western civilization is purportedly at war with terrorism itself, as well as, crucially, those who provide inspiration and support to terrorists. In this battle those who are even tangentially related to acts of terrorism or purveyors of terror are liable to be incarcerated without due process, tortured, and even killed without public outcry. From the perspective of the state, such is the seriousness of terrorism and such are the extraordinary measures which must be taken to prevent terror from being carried out.

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For most citizens, one of the mysteries of life after the crisis is why such a massive act of looting has gone unpunished. We've had hearings, investigations, and numerous journalistic and academic post mortems. We've also had promises to put people in jail by prosecutors like Iowa's attorney general Tom Miller walked back virtually as soon as they were made. 

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Lake’s first article, published on July 27, is titled "Classified report: Russia tied to blast at U.S. embassy" and confidently asserts that Russian guilt has been proven by the US intelligence community. The central argument of the article is the following:

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Here is my case. First, no one who understands the American Constitution can reasonably doubt the right of the builders to build. Secondly, the building site is very close to the site of a violent tragedy that seared the soul of every American, including Muslim Americans. Thirdly, the builders of the proposed Islamic Center say they want to help heal the nation and there is a preponderance of evidence that that is true, based not least on the fact that the last administration viewed the leadership of this group as a pro-American bridge to the Muslim world.

Fourth, there are many Americans, about 65 or 70 percent, including many family members of the victims, who have very strong emotional resistance to building on this site. Some of them may have other feelings such as hate, fear, etc., but the vast majority of these people are not right-wing hate mongers.

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Last year, Glenn posted some statements from now-Deputy National Security Advisor John Brennan on counterterrorism. The post contributed to pressure that led Brennan to withdraw his candidacy to be CIA Director (which is how he ended up as Deputy NSA, which doesn't require congressional approval).

In addition to passages on rendition and torture, Glenn linked to an NPR story attributing Obama's switch on counterterrorism issues -- particularly his infamous flip-flop on retroactive immunity for the telecoms that had illegally spied on Americans -- to Brennan.

What's important in that statement is Obama's reference to "the information I've received." He's advised on intelligence matters by John Brennan, the former director of the National Counterterrorism Center. Like many intelligence professionals, Brennan says the FISA program is essential to the fight against terrorism.

By adopting Brennan's view, Obama improves his standing with the intelligence community; for someone looking ahead to a presidential administration, that's important.

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Sarah Palin and Senator Chuck Grassley are working together to spread lies regarding the substance of pending healthcare reform legislation. Last week, Sarah Palin posted a note on Facebook, which states that:

The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's "death panel" so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their "level of productivity in society," whether they are worthy of healthcare. Such a system is downright evil.

Not to be outmatched by his conservative colleague, Senator Grassley stated yesterday that people "[s]hould not have a government run plan to decide when to pull the plug on grandma. . . ."

Palin and Grassley are liars

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In a previous post on my own blog, I questioned the seemingly sudden concern about the perils of "big government" among healthcare reform protestors. Many of these individuals undoubtedly failed to contest (and probably supported) governmental excess that led to "senseless wars, government regulation of uteruses, police intrusion into the bedrooms of consenting same-sex adults and the maddening state and federal governmental effort to make sure that Terry Schiavo remained in a persistent vegetative state." On Wednesday, an article distributed by the Associated Press confirmed my original understanding of the protestors' opposition to big government: It is selective and contradictory.

Big government for you, but not for me!

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If, as the latest reports indicate, Eric Holder is serious about prosecuting the worst torture and abuse of "war on terror" prisoners that occurred during the Bush administration, then there's some key evidence he's going to want to take a look at: photographs. Although Bush Justice Department prosecutors claimed they didn't have the facts to support prosecuting anyone for the mysterious deaths and disappearances of detainees hauled out of Bagram and Abu Ghraib in body bags, the photographs -- which two courts have now ordered the Obama administration to turn over -- would seem likely to provide some of the missing evidence.

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Ever since the Los Angeles Times reported last weekend that Attorney General Eric Holder is inching closer to investigating detainee torture that occurred during the "war on terror", the debate over whether the Holder probe is a good thing has intensified -- and distracted a few of us from the spectacle of the town hall brawls.

Andrew Sullivan at The Atlantic called it "the worst of both worlds" because Holder is reportedly considering prosecuting the actual interrogators who exceeded the interrogation limits set out by John Yoo & Co. in Justice Department memos, rather than the authors of the memos and the torture policy themselves. That "risks essentially legitimizing the torture it does not prosecute," Sullivan argues.

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"At the Intersection: Race, Sexuality, and Gender," a comprehensive report released this week by the The Human Rights Campaign Foundation, is an excellent look at some of the third rails of cultural discussion that usually results in most conversations falling into silence for fear of conflict, offending someone, or having to realize one's own biases in front of others.'

One cannot develop cultural competency if the conversation is encouraged, but not taken in by those who need to listen and absorb the information to break down barriers. We saw the schism in the last election.

The November 2008 passage of Proposition 8 in California clearly showed what could happen when a group listens solely so it can repress others. Research has revealed that organizing efforts by religious and conservative forces were extensive, proactive and heavily funded. Such an observation is important because it also reveals that progressive -- or in this case, LGBT-specific -- organizing efforts were less effective at listening, canvassing, targeting and activating Californians in the same ways that conservative forces were. This ineffectiveness was a result of many significant forces, some of which included lack of access to populations historically left out of debates, basic information about these populations, and the resources -- including cultural competency needed -- to effectively reach the targeted populations.

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Longtime readers of the my blog know that I've taken on the subject of the politics of black hair (or to be precise, kinky hair) several times, commenting on the travails of black women who are culturally addicted to "creamy crack" -- the horrid, toxic relaxers used to chemically straighten hair. It's all in order to avoid any natural naps showing at the root, and the billion-dollar industry that caters to this beauty choice based on loathing the natural texture of one's hair that has roots back to the days of slavery and the definition of what is "good hair."

Lots of people were interested in these posts, others pooh-poohed the notion that the politics of hair had any significance in "post-racial America" or reflected any socio-pathologies that needed to be addressed. In the black community, it's almost taboo to discuss the issue, and, quite frankly, I am grateful that the brilliant Chris Rock has written and stars in the documentary "Good Hair" directed by Jeff Stilson (co-writers are Jeff Stilson, Lance Crouther and Chuck Sklar). If there's any way to break down the walls of silence to discuss this topic with candor, Rock can do it.

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With the whole debate about healthcare reform swirling about, for the lay person, the level of misinformation, scare tactics and political posturing on both sides is tiresome. I discussed it earlier this month over at my blog ("Healthcare in the U.S. -- stop bickering and fix it"). I'll share a few snippets of that here.

Those of us who do have decent insurance are rightfully concerned that government mucking around in the system and playing politics with something that should be a right -- equal access to GOOD medical care for all -- is going to end up a big mess.

I'm not going to debate the merits of one plan or another here; I'm just looking at healthcare as a "frequent flyer" consumer with pre-existing conditions who sees doctors and specialists several times a year, and has adequate insurance that still has left me with long waits to see a specialist (3 months is not unheard of), and dealt with substandard care.

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Like Glenn, I write a lot about civil liberties, which have been at the heart of the national conversation since the beginning of the War On Terror and the expansion of the national security state. But my interest in civil liberties predates 9/11 and until then was usually pointed at the far more prosaic issues of police and prosecutorial misconduct (and the inevitable conclusions any study of those things brings to the issue of the death penalty). Nowadays, the theme of civil liberties seem to be a sub-plot to a James Bond flick rather than "To Kill A Mockingbird." And yet, I think the two are intertwined much more closely that we think. In our apparent acceptance of torture as a legal method of interrogation, the bar of civilized official behavior has been lowered to the point where we are accepting torture in everyday life as if it's nothing. Indeed, we are using it as a form of entertainment.

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Editor's note: Glenn Greenwald is on vacation this week. Digby is guest-blogging today.

We weren't sure he was going to even go this far, but according to news reports over the weekend, Attorney General Holder has decided on a "narrow" investigation into torture. In fact, it's so narrow that it won't investigate any of the torture that was authorized by DOJ functionary John Yoo at all. Using inverted pretzel logic, they are apparently going to go after those who failed to follow John Yoo's directives.

For instance, according to the LA Times, Holder will not investigate allegations of waterboarding in themselves, but rather if they failed to properly follow their waterboarding instructions to the letter:

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It takes commercial airliners 10 hours to make the trip; email circles the globe in just seconds. On June 20, 2008, a news release from the Obama campaign landed in the email in‑box of Glenn Greenwald, who blogged from his widely read netroots home base, Unclaimed Territory. Although he's an A‑list blogger who helps the netroots formulate its agenda each day for the ongoing combat of U.S. politics, Greenwald actually works out of his first-floor home office in Rio de Janeiro. When he clicked on the Obama release after it traveled more than 5,000 miles that June day, the blogger was appalled.

Obama's statement addressing pending legislation regarding government-sponsored wiretapping did not create much interest among the Beltway press corps, but it lit a fuse within the blogosphere. In June 2008 a congressional agreement was being crafted to rewrite the nation's electronic surveillance laws at the request of the Bush White House, which demanded extraordinary executive powers in its pursuit of terrorist suspects, including the right to wiretap some U.S. citizens without the need of a warrant.

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When Tom Daschle joined the law and lobbying firm Alston & Bird in 2005, The Washington Post detailed the critical role played by Bob Dole -- special counsel to the firm (who "has been reported to earn $800,000 to $1 million annually") -- in recruiting Daschle to join (h/t).  The article quoted Dole as explaining why Daschle would be such a valuable addition with a sentence that ought to be taught in every sixth-grade civics class around the country to explain how our Government works:

Dole said the Democrat would be a valuable asset to the firm even though Congress is run by the GOP these days.

"He's got a lot of friends in the Senate, and I've got a lot of friends in the Senate, and, combined, who knows -- we might have 51," Dole joked. "It's going to work fine. You need some flexibility and diversity. I don't think any successful firm is all Democrat or all Republican."

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