The National Security State and the Whistleblower
“Well, Doctor, what have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?”
“A Republic, if you can keep it.”
The Last Check on Abuses of Power
The National Security State and the Whistleblower
by MELVIN A. GOODMAN
CounterPunch JUNE 19, 2013
EXCERPT...
Since the Vietnam War, we have observed a system of judicial tolerance, with the Supreme Court only intervening on foreign policy matters to endorse the policies and powers of the president. This deferential attitude toward the White House has resulted in an absence of judicial scrutiny of illegalities, including warrantless eavesdropping and the destruction of the torture tapes at the CIA that documented torture going beyond methods authorized by the Justice Department. Ironically, the destroyer of the 92 videotapes of interrogations, Jose Rodriquez, who ignored a White House order not to destroy the tapes and should have faced at least obstruction of justice charges, has published a book sanctioned by the CIA that maligns the OIG for a “holier-than-thou attitude and the prosecutorial ways they routinely treated fellow CIA employees.”
In addition to the failure of Congress and the courts to provide necessary regulation and oversight of the national security process, the mainstream media has been complacent about its watchdog role regarding secret agencies in a democratic arena. The media require the efforts of contrarians and whistleblowers in order to penetrate the secrecy of the policy and intelligence communities, but typically ignore the reprisals taken against whistleblowers. Often, they disdain the information provided by whistleblowers that is critical of senior officials and government agencies–preferring to protect their access to these officials. David Ignatius of the Washington Post falsely claimed that journalists “instinctively side with leakers,” but he was quick to ridicule Edward Snowden, who has exposed NSA’s spying on millions of Americans‘ phone records and the internet activity of hundreds of millions of foreigners. Ignatius, moreover, has been an apologist for the CIA and has relied on clandestine operatives to present a one-sided picture of the CIA’s National Clandestine Service. His novel (“Agents of Innocence”) provided a laudatory account of CIA tradecraft, relying on sensitive leaks from a senior operations officer.
My own experience with the mainstream media as a whistleblower is revelatory. During my congressional testimony in 1991 against the nomination of Robert M. Gates as director of CIA, I provided background information to Elaine Sciolino of the New York Times in order to counter malicious rumors emanating from the White House that was designed to compromise my credibility. Sciolino initially reported this information accurately, but then tilted to support Gates’ confirmation. In a conversation several weeks after the confirmation hearings, Sciolino explained that it was becoming obvious that Gates would be confirmed and would be an important source to her as a CIA director. She added that, as I would return to the National War College as a professor of international relations, I would be of little further use. Sciolino noted that whistleblowers make good sources only in the short run, while journalists must rely on policymakers for long-term access and should not gratuitously offend them. This explains the conventional analysis offered by the press corps and its reluctance to challenge official sources.
As a result of the imbalance in the process of foreign policy decision making, we have come full circle from President Woodrow Wilson, who wanted to make the “world safe for democracy,” to Presidents George W. Bush and Obama, who find the world too dangerous to honoring constitutional democracy. The excesses of the Vietnam War; Watergate; Iran-Contra; and the Global War on Terror have contributed to the creation of a dangerous national security state and a culture of secrecy. Whistleblowers can help all of us decide whether the ends justify the means regarding these excesses.
CONTINUED...
http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/06/19/the-national-security-state-and-the-whistleblower/
Image: STASI prison East Berlin by Johan van Elk. Housed at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jmvanelk/7781938604/
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