The secret life of a whistleblower

A GQ Magazine profile of Joseph Darby, offers a rare, in-depth look at the soldier who blew the whistle on abuses at Abu Ghraib and a stunning view of the life of a whistleblower in protective custody. (W. S. Hylton, The Conscience of Joe Darby, August 6)

In fascinating detail, author Hylton describes the media circus that converged on the Darby family, and the frustration of knowing the truth while being under a gag order. Of Darby's wife, Bernadette, author Hylton writes:

"Each day, she would catch another snippet of the hostility brewing around her. There was the candlelight vigil in Cumberland, Maryland, to show support for the disgraced soldiers, including the ones who did the torturing, about a hundred supporters standing in the pounding rain, as if beating and sodomizing prisoners were some kind of patriotic duty. Some of Bernadette's family even let her know that other members of the family were against her now, that they couldn't support a traitor."

Many a whistleblower has been damned with that word, "traitor." It is a verdict rooted in ignorance and fear of accountability. And, in Darby's case, there was a keen irony.

"The people in Somerset County who turned their backs on Joe, well, those people would probably feel very different if they knew the rest of the story. That it really wasn't about softening prisoners, gathering intelligence, or trying to win the war. That it wasn't even about losing control in the heat of the moment. It was about getting up in the middle of the night and going somewhere you weren't supposed to go, then beating and raping people there. It was premeditated violent crime. And as long as that stays hidden, so will Bernadette and Joe, outcasts in their own community, two more victims of Abu Ghraib. "

Hopefully, Americans will learn something from the case of Joseph Darby. Hopefully, the next time someone blows the whistle, the verdict will be "thank you." Because, if abuses like Abu Ghraib were to become routine, when the Englands and Sivits came marching home, they might come looking for us.

Tales of government secrecy run amuck

At a hearing, Tuesday, by the Government Reform Committe's national security panel, witnesses described the sorry state of government classification of information. Documents marked secret included a plot against Santa Claus, a former dictator's cocktail preferences, and a study that concluded 40 percent of Army chemical warfare masks leaked. (Michael Sniffen, AP/Napa News, Government secrecy thwarts terrorist efforts)

"There are too many secrets," remarked Rep. Chistopher Shays, R-Conn. The director of the Archives' Information Security Oversight Office, J. William Leonard, reported that the problem is growing. And, some of the classification was done, illegally, to hide wrongdoing or to avoid embarrassment, said Steven Aftergood, of the Federation of American Scientists, who cited the government's report on prison abuses at Abu Ghraib as an example.

Accountability: an empty promise

The importance of whistleblowers and whistleblower protections to protecting national security are described in the commentary, An Empty Promise of Accountability? (Insight on the News, August 9). Authors Tom Devine and Greg Watchman, of the Government Accountability Project, write:

The WPA's [Whistleblower Protection Act's] inadequacies have emboldened wrongdoers to gag or retaliate against those who expose their abuses of power. When U.S. Park Police Chief Theresa Chambers warned that 9/11-related cuts meant fewer cops on the beat, she was fired. When Transportation Security Administration Red Team members found guns still getting through airport checkpoints, they were silenced. Department of Energy employees were punished for disclosing security failures at nuclear weapons facilities. Richard Foster, the Chief Actuary for Medicare, was threatened with termination if he provided correct cost information to Congress. This pattern of whistleblower mistreatment and cover-up deprives the Congress and the public of vital information about government wrongdoing, and poses a substantial threat to an open, accountable government.

Devine and Watchman urge Americans to ensure that Congress passes pending legislation that would "stem the tide of retribution against those who bring government wrongdoing to light" for "without these citizens' brave acts, Congress and the public would remain in the dark about illegal conduct that threatens our safety, wastes our hard-earned tax dollars, and undermines public confidence in our institutions.

To learn more about the WPA and reform legislation, visit the Government Accountability Project's website, at www.whistleblower.org.

Compassion or suppression?

Reportedly, "compassion" will be the theme at the upcoming Republican convention in New York,” but “repression” seems more fitting considering the Administration’s plans, described by Adam Nagourney of the New York Times ("Bush Promises to Offer Detailed Plans at Convention, August 22).

“Mr. Bush's advisers said they were girding for the most extensive street demonstrations at any political convention since the Democrats nominated Hubert H. Humphrey in Chicago in 1968. But in contrast to that convention, which was severely undermined by televised displays of street rioting, Republicans said they would seek to turn any disruptions to their advantage, by portraying protests by even independent activists as Democratic-sanctioned displays of disrespect for a sitting president.”

Nagourney adds, “Republicans are pressing for a quick and quiet adoption of a platform to minimize dissent over issues that have divided the party, in particular immigration restrictions and a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.”

There is a bit of Nixonian arrogance in the assumption that “respect” for the President is more important than respect for Constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech and conscience. Some seem to have forgotten that the President took an oath to uphold that Constitution - not just the part that gives authority to the Executive - but, all of it.

And, there is more than a bit of absurdity in the plans of a “homeland security President” to sacrifice the security of all citizens in favor of continuing the flow of cheap labor to a few cheap-skate industries - protests of federal border agents nothwithstanding.