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> I'm always struck by the strange cognitive dissonance US law has for corporate whistleblowers vs governmental whistleblowers. It doesn't: there are multiple

by wtbob 11y ago

> I'm always struck by the strange cognitive dissonance US law has for corporate whistleblowers vs governmental whistleblowers. It doesn't: there are multiple different programs for reporting perceived illegal activity. Snowden never availed himself of any of these, but instead committed espionage.

throwaway7767 11y ago
> It doesn't: there are multiple different programs for reporting perceived illegal activity. Snowden never availed himself of any of these, but instead committed espionage. These programs had been used by multiple people before, with no results. They are for show, so that people like you can point to them to show that there's "oversight". Whistleblowing of the type done by Snowden is a last resort when there is no other option. The options you speak of are not credible avenues for change.
theandrewbailey 11y ago
He tried. He found out that because he wasn't a government employee, those programs treated him like shit.[0] > One of the things that has not been widely reported by journalists is that whistle-blower protection laws in the US do not protect contractors in the national security arena. There are so many holes in the laws, the protections they afford are so weak, and the processes for reporting they provide are so ineffective that they appear to be intended to discourage reporting of even the clearest wrongdoing. If I had revealed what I knew about these unconstitutional but classified programs to Congress, they could have charged me with a felony. One only need to look at the case of Thomas Drake to see how the government doesn't have a good history of handling legitimate reports of wrongdoing within the system. > Despite this, and despite the fact that I could not legally go to the official channels that direct NSA employees have available to them, I still made tremendous efforts to report these programs to co-workers, supervisors, and anyone with the proper clearance who would listen. The reactions of those I told about the scale of the constitutional violations ranged from deeply concerned to appalled, but no one was willing to risk their jobs, families, and possibly even freedom to go through what Drake did. [0] http://www.cnet.com/news/snowden-not-all-spying-bad-but-nsa-program-divorced-from-reason/ http://www.cnet.com/news/snowden-not-all-spying-bad-but-nsa-... Every time I've been a contractor[1], I've been treated likewise. [1]never been contracted out to a government agency of any level.
cryoshon 11y ago
The legality shouldn't even be part of the conversation. Government activity that is fascistic is usually going to be completely legal or made legal once revealed. We saw the government do this with the USA Freedom Act. Before that, they claimed to have authorization under the FISA and PATRIOT Acts. They do not want oversight, and the "abuses" are actually functioning exactly as intended. This is also why they endlessly lie to our faces about what is going on and don't get fired, even when they have been outed repeatedly. Also, there's the documented fact [0][1] that whistleblowers at the NSA who go through the "proper channels" ultimately gets you fired, ostracized, raided, and prosecuted. So really, it's a non-starter to claim that they should have reported illegal activity. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake#Drake_action_within_the_NSA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake#Drake_act... [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Binney_%28U.S._intelligence_official%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Binney_%28U.S._intelli...

by wtbob 11y ago

throwaway7767 11y ago

> It doesn't: there are multiple different programs for reporting perceived illegal activity. Snowden never availed himself of any of these, but instead committed espionage. These programs had been used by multiple people before, with no results. They are for show, so that people like you can point to them to show that there's "oversight". Whistleblowing of the type done by Snowden is a last resort when there is no other option. The options you speak of are not credible avenues for change.

theandrewbailey 11y ago

He tried. He found out that because he wasn't a government employee, those programs treated him like shit.[0] > One of the things that has not been widely reported by journalists is that whistle-blower protection laws in the US do not protect contractors in the national security arena. There are so many holes in the laws, the protections they afford are so weak, and the processes for reporting they provide are so ineffective that they appear to be intended to discourage reporting of even the clearest wrongdoing. If I had revealed what I knew about these unconstitutional but classified programs to Congress, they could have charged me with a felony. One only need to look at the case of Thomas Drake to see how the government doesn't have a good history of handling legitimate reports of wrongdoing within the system. > Despite this, and despite the fact that I could not legally go to the official channels that direct NSA employees have available to them, I still made tremendous efforts to report these programs to co-workers, supervisors, and anyone with the proper clearance who would listen. The reactions of those I told about the scale of the constitutional violations ranged from deeply concerned to appalled, but no one was willing to risk their jobs, families, and possibly even freedom to go through what Drake did. [0] http://www.cnet.com/news/snowden-not-all-spying-bad-but-nsa-program-divorced-from-reason/ http://www.cnet.com/news/snowden-not-all-spying-bad-but-nsa-... Every time I've been a contractor[1], I've been treated likewise. [1]never been contracted out to a government agency of any level.

cryoshon 11y ago

The legality shouldn't even be part of the conversation. Government activity that is fascistic is usually going to be completely legal or made legal once revealed. We saw the government do this with the USA Freedom Act. Before that, they claimed to have authorization under the FISA and PATRIOT Acts. They do not want oversight, and the "abuses" are actually functioning exactly as intended. This is also why they endlessly lie to our faces about what is going on and don't get fired, even when they have been outed repeatedly. Also, there's the documented fact [0][1] that whistleblowers at the NSA who go through the "proper channels" ultimately gets you fired, ostracized, raided, and prosecuted. So really, it's a non-starter to claim that they should have reported illegal activity. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake#Drake_action_within_the_NSA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Andrews_Drake#Drake_act... [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Binney_%28U.S._intelligence_official%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Binney_%28U.S._intelli...