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Obama Promise To ‘Protect Whistleblowers’ Just Disappeared From Change.gov
The whistleblower statement is online, buried in a less prominent location multiple clicks deep. While I regret the technical error, my sentiments are unchanged.
–Peter
(On the day Bradley Manning’s verdict is announced, Orwell’s Memory Hole is indeed alive in the United States. This excellent article was not written by me, and originally appeared on TechDirt)
The folks from the Sunlight Foundation have noticed that the Change.gov website, which was set up by the Obama transition team after the election in 2008 has suddenly been scrubbed of all of its original content. They noted that the front page had pointed to the White House website for a while, but you could still access a variety of old material and agendas. They were wondering why the administration would suddenly pull all that interesting archival information… and hit upon a clue.
A little bit from the “ethics agenda”:
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.
Yeah. That statement seems a bit embarrassing at the very same time Obama’s administration is threatening trade sanctions against anyone who grants asylum to Ed Snowden. Also… at the same time that we get to see how whistleblower Bradley Manning’s “full access to courts and due process” will turn out. So far, it’s been anything but reasonable, considering that the UN has already condemned Manning’s treatment as “cruel and inhuman.” And people wonder why Snowden left the country…
MY COMMENT: Yeah, Hope and Change my ass.
Bonus: Make you own Hope and Change poster here.
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Melissa said...
1Also interesting considering the US’s recent stunt with Robert Seldon Lady, and protecting him from the Italian court of law.
Thank you for posting this, and for all the awareness you bring to your audience. 🙂
– M
07/30/13 1:26 PM | Comment Link
wemeantwell said...
2Here’s a good article on the Robert Lady embarassment.
07/30/13 2:30 PM | Comment Link
pitchfork said...
3Ah yes…living proof the complete meltdown of Hope and Change has been placed on a Nation sized billboard for the entire planet to see in all it’s blatant, shameless glory. Meanwhile..Amerika yawns and changes channels on the TEH VEEH.
Folks..one day, you may be able to tell your great grandchildren you lived to witness the complete destruction of America at the hands of psychopathic murderers, who then created the Orwellian NSA Surveillance State they now live under…forever.
Of course, you will tell them in SECRET. After all, Senator Church knew that at some point, the PTB would pass legislation instituting SEDITION laws. Please explain to your great grandchildren what that means. It may save their life.
07/30/13 2:48 PM | Comment Link
Rich Bauer said...
4“And people wonder why Snowden left the country…”
Because he has seen the future presidense?
“As a former prosecutor who was appointed by President George W. Bush on Sept. 10, 2001, I just want us to be really cautious,” Chris Christie said, “because this strain of libertarianism that’s going through both parties right now and making big headlines, I think, is a very dangerous thought.”
Yep, freedom is dangerous thought. And people thought Barry, the thin black man, was the Anti-Christie:
http://11oclocknews.typepad.com/the_11_oclock_news/2013/07/christie-should-go-to-church-to-learn-about-danger.html
07/30/13 3:07 PM | Comment Link
pitchfork said...
5re: the Lady article….
quote:”This is simply the living definition of what it means to exist in a one-superpower world for the first time in history. For Washington, the essential rule of thumb goes something like this: we do what we want; we get to say what we want about what we do; and U.N. ambassadorial nominee Samantha Powers then gets to lecture the world on human rights and oppression.”unquote
Embarrassment indeed. Unfortunately America at large only get’s embarrassed when Kim Kardashian’s ass get’s too big. However, it appears that one CAN embarrass the USG..if you have living proof of their abominations. Lady isn’t gonna be one of them though. The learned their lesson, thanks to Edward. Meanwhile, they are burning Manning at the stake today for all the world to see. And they don’t give a flying fuck what anyone says about it. I give it one year before Feinstein or Graham introduces SEDITION legislation. Mark my words.
These jackals have no shame. America is dead. Gone. The only thing that will save this world now is …well…you know. And I for one, hope it happens as it will still be better than life under a face smashing Jackboot …forever.
In the meantime..bartender..bring me the bottle.
07/30/13 3:16 PM | Comment Link
Sheldon said...
6If you look at change.gov and the Ethics agenda, the content is still there.
07/30/13 4:22 PM | Comment Link
wemeantwell said...
7–change.gov no longer exists. It simply redirects to the generic White House site.
–On the WH site, under the issues tab I clicked on Ethics.
–Then on Presidential Actions
–Then on First Principles that promised info on making govt more open and the link pointed to a missing page (404 error)
–Then on the First Principles item on the right-hand column
–That led to a page with several headings, all of which just looped back to the original page when I clicked “Read More.”
Can you provide a link to the whistleblower protection statement that is prominantly featured on the original site (see http://web.archive.org/web/20130425082834/http://change.gov/agenda/ethics_agenda/)?
07/30/13 4:53 PM | Comment Link
Sheldon said...
8You need to click the dark link “Continue to change.gov”
Then you get to the site. For reference:
http://change.gov/agenda/ethics_agenda/
07/30/13 5:00 PM | Comment Link
wemeantwell said...
9Found it, thank you for the correction.
change.gov
lower left corner click Continue to change.gov
Agenda tab
Ethics link
scroll down
07/30/13 5:03 PM | Comment Link
pitchfork said...
10quote:”Found it, thank you for the correction.”unquote
Will wonders ever cease. Living proof that if Obama’s lips are moving..he’s lying through his fucking teeth.
Frankly, I don’t give a shit. Acts speak louder than words and seeing everything that this stinking, lying, deviant psychopath has already done is enough for me. I despise him, and the government he was elected to run. He should be in prison, hanging by his neck notwithstanding. Alongside all the rest of these murdering sonsobitchs, including Alexander, Clapper, Hayden, the CIA torturers and Bush & Co. et al. If Nuremberg and those who’ve lost their lives over the last 200 yrs mean anything, it’s to show the world we are not above hanging our own war criminals. And THAT..is exactly what we must do to regain the moral highground. Unfortunately..this Supranational Soverign piece of shit called the United States government…doesn’t give a flying fuck about morals. In fact, they are living proof that the ruling class is in fact..Satin personified.
07/30/13 8:18 PM | Comment Link
meloveconsullongtime said...
11“…this Supranational Soverign piece of shit called the United States government…doesn’t give a flying fuck about morals”:
Actually they do. They want to abolish morals.
07/30/13 10:26 PM | Comment Link
Rich Bauer said...
12Have We Entered the “Dead Zone” ?
Stephen King wrote the “Dead Zone,” a story about Johnny, a guy who woke from his coma just in time to see his country go to sleep as Greg Stillson, a veiled reference to AC – and I don’t mean Atlantic City – was coming to power. Sometimes I feel like Johnny when I read the powers-that-be think it’s okay to spy on US because the ENDS OF US JUSTIFY THE MEANS.
How long have we been in a coma, allowing idiots like Clapper and Alexander take away our rights to privacy? Frank Church warned US:
That capability at any time could be turned around on the American people and no American would have any privacy left, such [is] the capability to monitor everything: telephone conversations, telegrams, it doesn’t matter. There would be no place to hide. If this government ever became a tyranny, if a dictator ever took charge in this country, the technological capacity that the intelligence community has given the government could enable it to impose total tyranny, and there would be no way to fight back, because the most careful effort to combine together in resistance to the government, no matter how privately it was done, is within the reach of the government to know. Such is the capability of this technology…. I don’t want to see this country ever go across the bridge. I know the capacity that is there to make tyranny total in America, and we must see to it that this agency and all agencies that possess this technology operate within the law and under proper supervision, so that we never cross over that abyss. That is the abyss from which there is no return.
Interestingly, Stillson met his end in Church.
Interestingly, the anagram for Greg Stillson is “telling gross.” One should never bet against AC.
08/1/13 7:12 PM | Comment Link
Orwell’s Memory Hole | Kommentare aus der AMAZONAS-Box said...
13[…] Orwell’s Memory Hole Sonntag, 4.8.2013 Der Ausdruck war mir noch kein Begriff, aber jetzt kam mir ein anschauliches Beispiel in die Browser: https://wemeantwell.com/blog/2013/07/30/obama-promise-to-protect-whistleb… […]
08/4/13 3:12 PM | Comment Link