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Snowden has nothing to worry about. He should come back home. Here: Protect Whistleblowers: Often the best source of information about waste, fraud, and abuse

Snowden has nothing to worry about. He should come back home. Here: Protect Whistleblowers: Often the best source of information about waste, fraud, and abuse in government is an existing government employee committed to public integrity and willing to speak out. Such acts of courage and patriotism, which can sometimes save lives and often save taxpayer dollars, should be encouraged rather than stifled. We need to empower federal employees as watchdogs of wrongdoing and partners in performance. Barack Obama will strengthen whistleblower laws to protect federal workers who expose waste, fraud, and abuse of authority in government. Obama will ensure that federal agencies expedite the process for reviewing whistleblower claims and whistleblowers have full access to courts and due process. Barack H. Obama, The Obama-Biden Plan. http://change.gov/agenda/ethics_agenda/ http://change.gov/agenda/ethics_agenda/

fnordfnordfnord 13y ago
This is comedy gold.
etherael 13y ago
Which might be relevant if recent revelations hadn't reclassified this from noble ideal to hilarious parody and/or epitome of hypocrisy.
alexqgb 13y ago
Worth remembering: The Whistleblower Protection Act covers Federal employees only, not private contractors. Moreover, efforts to expand the law to protect contractors as well have been repeatedly rebuffed in Congress.
- eli 13y ago
  That's misleading/false. The "Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act" specifically protects intelligence contractors. (Now I'll grant you that it probably isn't an attractive option for a lot of reasons, but there is a way for people like him to blow the whistle on illegal government activity without going to jail.)
  - venomsnake 13y ago
    But it is legal ... that is the problem.
  - alexqgb 13y ago
    No @eli, you've just got your facts wrong. What you're referring to is not the same thing as the Whistleblower Protection Act. Critically, the Act to which you refer isn't concerned with protection at all. It simply designates the path that reports should follow in getting to Congress. Retaliation against those who use it goes unaddressed. Tellingly, the Act has not been used once since its passage. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_Protection_Act http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_Protection_Act http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Community_Whistleblower_Protection_Act http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Community_Whistl...
    - eli 13y ago
      Huh? Which facts were wrong? Yes, they're different laws. The WPA doesn't apply to DoD at all AFAIK, so the fact the point made above that contractors are exempt is irrelevant. The law that covers the NSA is the ICWPA and it applies equally to contractors and employees. As I said above, I agree it's not a real great law and I could understand not wanting to take advantage of it. But reporting things to the IG or Congress is how you blow the whistle on classified intelligence programs. That's the process. I can't imagine it being a good idea to allow any low-level contractor to blow the cover of a classified program because they have decided it's wrong or unconstitutional.
      - alexqgb 13y ago
        You were wrong in saying I was making misleading and / or false statements about Snowden's lack of protection and you're wrong in your belief that the law you cited offers protection to whistleblowers. The Whistleblower Protection Act - which is what I was originally talking about - has two seperate features. The first is to provide a well-defined pathway for reporting abuses to Congress. The second is to provide protection from retaliation against those who use this path. The point I made is that this Act covers Federal employees only, and not private contractors. What you referred to was a different law, written specifically for NatSec agencies. Like the Whistleblower Protection Act, it delineates a clear path for reporting abuse to Congress. And unlike the more general Act, it opens this path to private contractors as well as direct employees of the government. However—and this is critical—it does NOT provide the shield against retaliation that the Whistleblower Protection Act provides. In other words, if you're a private contractor (i.e. unprotected) and you use it to speak truth to power, you'd better be prepared to run. So like I said, as a private security contractor, Snowden doesn't enjoy meaningful protections in the event that he blows a whistle. All he's got is a path for doing so that he may use at his own (very considerable) risk. Again, as noted, not a single complaint has reached Congress via this channel. Not one. That should give you an idea as to how important the protections that Snowden doesn't enjoy really are.
eli 13y ago
Surely you agree that there needs to be some sort of organized process for whistleblowers, right? You can't just have government employees exposing secrets without punishment because they don't like something.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

fnordfnordfnord 13y ago

This is comedy gold.

etherael 13y ago

Which might be relevant if recent revelations hadn't reclassified this from noble ideal to hilarious parody and/or epitome of hypocrisy.

alexqgb 13y ago

Worth remembering: The Whistleblower Protection Act covers Federal employees only, not private contractors. Moreover, efforts to expand the law to protect contractors as well have been repeatedly rebuffed in Congress.

eli 13y ago
That's misleading/false. The "Intelligence Community Whistleblower Protection Act" specifically protects intelligence contractors. (Now I'll grant you that it probably isn't an attractive option for a lot of reasons, but there is a way for people like him to blow the whistle on illegal government activity without going to jail.)
- venomsnake 13y ago
  But it is legal ... that is the problem.
- alexqgb 13y ago
  No @eli, you've just got your facts wrong. What you're referring to is not the same thing as the Whistleblower Protection Act. Critically, the Act to which you refer isn't concerned with protection at all. It simply designates the path that reports should follow in getting to Congress. Retaliation against those who use it goes unaddressed. Tellingly, the Act has not been used once since its passage. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_Protection_Act http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistleblower_Protection_Act http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Community_Whistleblower_Protection_Act http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Community_Whistl...
  - eli 13y ago
    Huh? Which facts were wrong? Yes, they're different laws. The WPA doesn't apply to DoD at all AFAIK, so the fact the point made above that contractors are exempt is irrelevant. The law that covers the NSA is the ICWPA and it applies equally to contractors and employees. As I said above, I agree it's not a real great law and I could understand not wanting to take advantage of it. But reporting things to the IG or Congress is how you blow the whistle on classified intelligence programs. That's the process. I can't imagine it being a good idea to allow any low-level contractor to blow the cover of a classified program because they have decided it's wrong or unconstitutional.
    - alexqgb 13y ago
      You were wrong in saying I was making misleading and / or false statements about Snowden's lack of protection and you're wrong in your belief that the law you cited offers protection to whistleblowers. The Whistleblower Protection Act - which is what I was originally talking about - has two seperate features. The first is to provide a well-defined pathway for reporting abuses to Congress. The second is to provide protection from retaliation against those who use this path. The point I made is that this Act covers Federal employees only, and not private contractors. What you referred to was a different law, written specifically for NatSec agencies. Like the Whistleblower Protection Act, it delineates a clear path for reporting abuse to Congress. And unlike the more general Act, it opens this path to private contractors as well as direct employees of the government. However—and this is critical—it does NOT provide the shield against retaliation that the Whistleblower Protection Act provides. In other words, if you're a private contractor (i.e. unprotected) and you use it to speak truth to power, you'd better be prepared to run. So like I said, as a private security contractor, Snowden doesn't enjoy meaningful protections in the event that he blows a whistle. All he's got is a path for doing so that he may use at his own (very considerable) risk. Again, as noted, not a single complaint has reached Congress via this channel. Not one. That should give you an idea as to how important the protections that Snowden doesn't enjoy really are.

eli 13y ago

Surely you agree that there needs to be some sort of organized process for whistleblowers, right? You can't just have government employees exposing secrets without punishment because they don't like something.

deleted 13y ago

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