Guest Blogged by Winter Patriot...

Russell Tice is due in court at 1:00 on Wednesday, August 2nd.

From wikipedia:

As we mentioned last week, Tice is being supported by National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC), a group founded by Sibel Edmonds in order to help current whistleblowers and encourage new whistleblowers to come forward.

By serving a subpoena on Russ Tice, according to my conversation last week with Ms. Edmonds, the feds are trying to "kill two birds with one stone"; in other words they are trying to silence Tice on the secret illegal spying, while making an example of him to intimidate other potential whistleblowers.

It's August of what will probably be the hottest year ever recorded, but I am so cold!

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

The federal government has opened a new chapter in its continuing assault on the truth and the people who tell it. On Wednesday, Russell Tice, a former National Security Agency (NSA) and Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) analyst, received a subpoena requesting him to testify before a federal grand jury.

Why? According to a press release issued today by National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC), Tice seems to see it simply as an attempt at intimidation.

But another reason lurks just beneath the surface: Tice has knowledge that, if it ever became public, would pose a serious challenge to one of the current administration's favorite projects --- secret and illegal spying on law-abiding American citizens.

Fortunately for Russell Tice, and for all Americans who love the truth and the freedom to express it, he is not alone in this. He's getting considerable support from NSWBC, an organization founded by Sibel Edmonds to support truth-tellers in government.

We have the press release sent out early today by NSWBC, which explains everything I've been saying. We also have an op/ed piece written by Sibel Edmonds, in which she makes a compelling plea for more whistleblowers to come forward. I will post both documents in full below and I encourage you to read them.

But that's not all we have ...

As controversy swirls again around House Speaker Dennis Hastert and whether he is or isn't under investigation by the DoJ on bribery related charges as ABC News is reporting (and standing by), now might be a good time to remind of you this earlier exclusive which The BRAD BLOG reported in February concerning FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds' charges that Hastert may be involved with yet another bribery scandal.

In light of today's new story, it may well be worth taking a look back at that previous piece including a detailed statement from Edmonds wherein she calls on Hastert to "come clean" in regard to $500k in un-itemized campaign donations and his relationships with various Turkish interest groups.

She's fought her case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. It was the very same day that the facade cracked on the front of the building and a chunk of marble --- just above an allegorical statue representing "Order" and just below the words "Equal Justice" --- came crashing to the ground. The highest court in the land refused to hear her case.

Along the way, the Dept. of Justice has done everything in their power (and then some) to keep her quiet. They invoked the rarely used "State Secrets Privilege" to shut her up --- going so far as to use it, without explanation, to remove her and her own attorneys from the courtroom when arguing their case against her.

In at least two unclassified Senate briefings, FBI officials confirmed the validity of her reports, but the information from those briefings was then retroactively classified by the DoJ --- which served to gag the Congress from further investigation on the matter. The DoJ even retroactively classified a 60 Minutes profile on her --- after it had already aired!

All of that, even after the DoJ's own Inspector General's report found Sibel Edmonds' allegations to be "credible" and "serious" and "warrant[ing] a thorough and careful review by the FBI." The unclassified version of that report was only released by the DoJ after prodding from Congressional members and the 9/11 Commission.

Ranking Senate Judiciary Committee Members Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Pat Leahy (D-VT) both publicly support her case and would like to allow the Congress and the American public to hear more.

Want to know what it is that she knows? What it is that she feels we the people ought to know about? And what it is that has led her to form the National Security Whistleblowers Coalition to support other patriots like herself who are trying to expose crimes and corruption from within our own government? We do. And we hope you do too.

Therefore, The BRAD BLOG is pleased to support a new petition calling on Congress to hold a joint Senate and House Judiciary Committee investigation, with open hearings into all of these matters.

Government of the people, by the people, and for the people. You all remember that, right? Let's make this happen. Please sign her petition right now.

And please spread the word to other blogs and bloggers (and perhaps even the MSM may want to get in on the act --- it is their country too, after all), and ask them to do the same. This one's important.

We've reported over the last few months about various aspects of Edmonds' case. However, for those unfamiliar with the larger pictures of Edmonds' allegations and what she would like to testify about before the Congress and the American people --- all based on what she heard and saw first-hand while working as an FBI translator just after 9/11 --- please see the following bullet point summary of just a few of her explosive whistleblowing allegations...

On Friday, CIA Director Porter Goss wrote an op-ed for the New York Times claiming that national security whistleblowers are harming U.S. intelligence interests. That, as a "pre-emptive" attack on next week's U.S. House sub-committee hearings on the need for new whistleblower protection litigation.

Today, Sibel Edmonds, the former FBI translator turned whistleblower --- who knows a thing or two about what protections are and aren't available to patriots who wish to reveal unlawful behavior inside America's intelligence agencies --- posts a reply to Goss which cleans his clock. I mean: Cleans. His. Clock.

Read it in full to learn what's really at stake in this issue. But as a tease, here's her closing graf:

In the September 2005 issue of Vanity Fair, a lengthy feature article on former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds discussed a number of claims that Edmonds has by and large been disallowed from expressing publicly.

Her attempts at whistleblowing on the malfeasance and cover-ups she alleges to have witnessed during her time at the bureau in late 2001 and early 2002 --- during which she translated covert wiretaps recorded prior to 9/11 --- have been silenced by the U.S. government. An arcane "states-secret privilege" has been applied to her which effectively "gag orders" her from discussing her claims including allegations which the Dept. of Justice's own Inspector General found to be "credible" and "serious" and "warrant[ing] a thorough and careful review by the FBI," according to a declassified version of their investigation into her claims.

One of the allegations discussed by reporter David Rose in the VF article concerned FBI intercepts out of Chicago that Edmonds claims to have listened to. Reportedly, those intercepts suggest that U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL), may have been bribed by a large number of small "donations" emanating from shadowy Turkish interest groups. Such donations, $199 and smaller, are not required to be itemized in public filings according to Federal Election Commission rules.

Rose's article reports that Hastert's campaign received nearly $500,000 in such "un-itemized contributions" between 1996 and 2000. By contrast, Tom DeLay (R-TX), one of the House's best fundraisers, received just under $100,000 in such contributions. Only one other congressman, Clay Shaw (R-FL), received more in such contributions than Hastert, bringing in just over $550,000, during that same period.

In late 2000, Hastert announced he would support a resolution in the House declaring the killings of Armenians in Turkey from 1915 to 1923 to have been a "genocide". Armenians have long been pushing for such a resolution in Congress to little avail until Hastert's sudden interest in the effort. The Turkish government has long opposed such a resolution.

The VF article claims the reported content of one of the Chicago wiretaps is of "a senior official at the Turkish Consulate" claiming that "the price for Hastert to withdraw the resolution would have been at least $500,000." After Hastert was able to see the resolution through the House International Relations Committee, he withdrew it just minutes before the full House was to have voted on it, citing a plea from President Bill Clinton who is said to have warned the measure would harm U.S. interests.

The February issue of Vanity Fair finally offers a rebuttal of sorts from Hastert's counsel, Randy Evans, in the form of a letter to the editor. That letter, as printed in VF, is posted below, followed by Edmonds rebuttal which she submitted to us over the weekend for publication by The BRAD BLOG...

Edmonds' reply to Evans' letter, in which she calls on Hastert to fully disclose his un-itemized contributions and explain apparent contradictions in his claims about his relationship with Turkish interest groups follows...

The BRAD BLOG has obtained a statement from "Gag Ordered" FBI Whistleblower, Sibel Edmonds, Founder and Director of the National Security Whistleblowers Coaltion, in response to Al Gore's just completed speech earlier today in Washington D.C.

Gore's address, sponsored by a bi-partisan coalition, warned that our "constitution is in grave danger" and called for, amongst many other things (highlights of speech here), the creation of new Whistleblower Protections for members of the Executive Branch and others.

Edmonds, due to a rarely invoked "State Secrets" privilege by the Dept. of Justice, is legally barred from discussing remarkable and troubling findings she made as an FBI translator after 9/11, in regard to a number of explosive matters of national security.

She emailed the following statement to The BRAD BLOG moments ago:

In a Guest Blog of her own here at BRAD BLOG in late December, Edmonds called for whistleblowers from within various national security agencies to step forward and reveal illegal activities by the agencies, as a "patriotic duty" to the country.

Several days later, NSA whistleblower, Russell Tice, revealed to ABC News that he was one of the New York Times' sources who had provided the paper with information concerning the alleged illegal, warrantless wire-tapping of U.S. citizens in apparent violation of the Foreign Intelligence Security Act of 1978. Tice is also a member of Edmonds' National Security Whistleblowers Coalition.

Guest Blogged by Sibel Edmonds & William Weaver

ED. NOTE: FBI whistleblower, Sibel Edmonds' story has been partially told over the last several years in several different media outlets, including a lead story on CBS' 60 Minutes and more recently, a detailed feature in Vanity Fair. The information she has been able to reveal publicly about her experience during her time translating for the FBI has so far been limited given the arcane "States Secrets" privilege that the Dept. of Justice and the Bush Administration has invoked to effectively place a "gag order" on the information she has shared with internal FBI investigators as well as the Dept. of Justice's Inspector General who found her allegations "credible" and "serious" and "warrant[ing] a thorough and careful review by the FBI." Edmonds was fired by the FBI after voicing allegations including those about possible espionage inside the bureau. She has also testified to the 9/11 Commission, U.S. Senators Grassley (R-IA) and Leahy (D-VT) and many other officials on both the Senate Judiciary and Intelligence Committees. Her case recently made its way to the Supreme Court who refused to hear it on November 28, 2005, thus ending her legal options to have her case heard publicly. More info on her and her co-writer William Weaver follows her editorial below.

Without whistleblowers the public would never know of the many abuses of constitutional rights by the government. Whistleblowers, Truth Tellers, are responsible for the disclosure that President George W. Bush ordered unconstitutional surveillance of American citizens. These constitutional lifeguards take their patriotic oaths to heart and soul: Rather than complying with classification and secrecy orders designed to protect officials engaging in criminal conduct, whistleblowers chose to risk their livelihoods and the wrath of their agencies to get the truth out. But will they be listened to by those who are charged with accountability?

The Whistleblowers Law of Congressional Hearings holds that the higher ranking the official who testifies the less the likelihood that the truth will be revealed. With this in mind, it is impossible to proceed to the viscera of what happened to whom and when without asking those who are charged with putting policy decisions into the actual stream of practice. High officials have perverse incentives to hide what is done in their orders by the employees below them. It is indispensable that Congress reach deep inside the National Security Agency and other agencies, seeking out employees at the operational level to determine how the President's illegal order was carried into action. To assure that this occurs, we need for people with information from the agencies involved to come forward and ask to be interviewed by Congress. The National Security Whistleblowers Coalition calls on people with knowledge of unconstitutional surveillance of American citizens to contact NSWBC and let us know that they are willing to provide congress with information and testimony. Anonymity, if desired, will be scrupulously honored. NSWBC will provide contact information to Congress and investigative authorities, and will follow up to ensure that these witnesses were in fact interviewed in good faith by congressional staff and committees and allowed to participate in the hearing process. NSWBC will be the conduit between agents and Congress for those like Russ Tice, a former intelligence agent at the National Security Agency, who announced his willingness to disclose to Congress illegal acts by officials at his former employer. At NSWBC we know what we are asking people to do: Our organization is made up exclusively of veteran intelligence and law enforcement officers, agents and analysts.

Now is the time to come forward, not to reveal legitimately classified information, but to make yourselves available as witnesses and to serve the true supervisor of us all: the Constitution. Ordinarily one would expect the congress to be the guardian of our freedom by living up to its storied role as a check and balance to the President and the Executive Branch. But for four years, members of our Congress in supposed oversight committees were aware of illegal spying on American citizens. Co-opted by an unscrupulous commitment to secrecy and the state, intelligence oversight committees in Congress must step out of the way for a People's hearing on the matter of presidentially ordered illegal surveillance. Congress must engage in a broad, public hearing of these matters.

Accountability, in the end, always comes down to the public's right to know, the right to have the most basic knowledge about what its servants are doing with its money and its authority. Ambassador Maxwell Taylor, when asked what he thought about the public's right to know of what the government is doing on its behalf, infamously responded the he did not "believe in that as a general rule." Fortunately, that is not a general rule that comports with our system of government. Citizens cannot make informed choices if they do not have the facts. Public servants should not be forced to choose between career and conscience, between commitment to oath and commitment to colleagues, and if we live by our words, laws, and principles they will not have to. Protecting all employees of the People are that:

• Their higher loyalty is to the Constitution and the rule of law;
• Information may never be classified as secret merely because it is embarrassing or incriminating, or to cover up criminal and unlawful conduct;
• There is no agreement that public servants may sign that will require them lie to the Congress or courts;
• The United States' Code of Ethics for Government Service explains carefully and clearly in an assured voice that "Any person in government service should put loyalty to the highest moral principles and to the Country above loyalty to persons, party, or Government department."

Contact: Sibel Edmonds-Director, National Security Whistleblowers Coalition, sedmonds@nswbc.org

Sibel Edmonds, NSWBC Founder & President, sedmonds@nswbc.org
Sibel Edmonds, a former FBI language specialist, was terminated from the bureau after reporting security breaches, cover-up, and blocking of intelligence with national security implications. Since that time, court proceedings in her whistleblower case have been blocked by the imposition of "State Secret Privilege," and Congress has been prevented from discussion of her case through retroactive reclassification by the Department of Justice. Edmonds, fluent in Turkish, Farsi and Azerbaijani; holds an MA in Public Policy and International Commerce from George Mason University, and a BA in Criminal Justice and Psychology from George Washington University.

About National Security Whistleblowers Coalition
National Security Whistleblowers Coalition (NSWBC), founded in August 2004, is an independent and nonpartisan alliance of whistleblowers who have come forward to address our nation's security weaknesses; to inform authorities of security vulnerabilities in our intelligence agencies, at nuclear power plants and weapon facilities, in airports, and at our nation's borders and ports; to uncover government waste, fraud, abuse, and in some cases criminal conduct. The NSWBC is dedicated to aiding national security whistleblowers through a variety of methods, including advocacy of governmental and legal reform, educating the public concerning whistleblowing activity, provision of comfort and fellowship to national security whistleblowers suffering retaliation and other harms, and working with other public interest organizations to affect goals defined in the NSWBC mission statement. For more on NSWBC visit www.nswbc.org

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