News Items

  • Media Advisory: Whistleblowers to Speak About Surveillance and Cyber Issues

    “President Barack Obama is set to sign an executive order on Friday aimed at encouraging companies to share more information about cybersecurity threats with the government and each other, a response to attacks like that on Sony Entertainment. … Obama will sign the order at a day-long conference on cybersecurity at Stanford University in the heart of Silicon Valley.”

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  • Delegation of U.S. and UK Whistleblowers in London: News Conference on “Special Surveillance Relationship” — News Advisory

    Whistleblowers from four American and British “national security” agencies will hold a news conference in London on November 21 in a direct challenge to surveillance policies of the U.S. and UK governments. The whistleblowers — from the NSA, FBI, State Department and GCHQ — will speak about the effects of their governments’ policies on freedom of the press and democracy. They are traveling as a delegation co-sponsored by the U.S.-based organizations RootsAction.org and ExposeFacts, a project of the Institute for Public Accuracy. The news conference is being hosted by the Foreign Press Association.

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  • In Response to the Government’s Lynching of James Risen

    It has been a sharp learning curve for Jim Risen, but by having numerous grand juries and two administrations relentlessly hounding him, he has learned how deeply the government’s malevolence descends. But there was always one steadfast assertion he wound not compromise, Jim Risen assured his sources, from the very start of their first encounter, that he would never divulge their identities nor what information they provided him with.

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  • Militarization of U.S. Police: Ferguson, Mo.

    Community policing reforms came about as a corrective to the 1950-60s professional police model which created a large gulf between police and citizens. Few noticed that underlying all the CP rhetoric was a little noticed yet foretelling trend of para-militarism as found in SWAT teams. What we’re witnessing today, though, with the influence of the Dept. of Homeland Security since 9/11 — along with growing emphasis on military hardware and tactics — is the expansion of police militarization throughout entire police departments — and indeed, the entire police institution.

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  • Unconstitutional acts of war in Iraq

    President Obama ignored the wise direction of President George Washington when he casually told the nation — and Congress — that U.S. military forces will engage in acts of war in Iraq for an extended period of weeks and maybe months. Bombing, he said in a brief statement last week, is needed here and there, but he promised there will be no U.S. boots on the ground. … The announcement seemed almost an afterthought as the president headed for vacation in Martha’s Vineyard. He neglected to seek approval of Congress before authorizing bombardment of the military forces of ISIS, the…

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  • News Conference: Edward Snowden’s Passport, Political Asylum and Related Issues

    Ray McGovern, Coleen Rowley and Norman Solomon spoke at this news conference, sponsored by RootsAction.org and hosted by the Institute for Public Accuracy.

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  • NSA Veterans and Whistleblowers Respond to Obama Speech

    Minutes after President Obama’s major address on NSA surveillance on Friday, Jan. 17, the Institute for Public Accuracy held a news conference with noted NSA veterans and whistleblowers.

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  • The War on Poverty at Fifty

    Fifty years after Lyndon B. Johnson made it the centerpiece of his first State of the Union address on January 8, 1964, the War on Poverty remains one of the most embattled—and least understood—of Great Society initiatives.

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  • Edward Snowden: Profile in Courage

    Edward Snowden may go down in history as one of this nation’s most important whistleblowers. He is certainly one of the bravest.

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  • Obama’s Economic Race Legacy

    From the start, President Barack Obama has shown little interest or loyalty in the issues that affect the poor, working class and people of color in the United States. For almost his entire first term he didn’t utter the words poor or poverty. Early on he reminded African Americans: ‘I’m not the president of black America. I’m the president of the United States of America…’

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  • Trump’s Big Pershing Lie

    “Over 100 years after the U.S. killed tens of thousands of people in the Philippines, if Trump tried to walk around there without armed guards, he’d get killed. Unfortunately, such policies continue under both Democratic and Republican administrations. Currently, President Obama — with CIA director John Brennan — is engaging in a drone assassination program.…

  • Syria War Fueled by Outside Forces and Propaganda

    “Washington-based reporters tell us that one potent force in Syria, al-Nusra, is made up of ‘rebels’ or ‘moderates,’ not that it is the local al-Qaeda franchise. Saudi Arabia is portrayed as aiding freedom fighters when in fact it is a prime sponsor of ISIS. Turkey has for years been running a ‘rat line’ for foreign…

  • Failed Gitmo Policy; Is Torture Over? Was it Tool for War?

    “For years the administration barely even tried to close the prison. All the while, men detained there suffered physical and psychological abuse, including by forced-feeding. Right wing demagogues repeated the vicious lie that all the prisoners are ‘worst of the worst,’ and erected legislative barriers to closing Guantanamo.”

  • Rubio’s New Generation of Iraq War Lies

    “The new generation of Republican leaders appear to be as willing to rewrite history as the older generation. Sen. Marco Rubio’s claim that at the time of the March 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq that Saddam Hussein was ‘in open violation’ of U.N. resolutions and that the international community refused to act is completely false.”

  • New Prominence: CIA Whistleblower Case

    “The President has a unique opportunity to do the right thing and to respond positively to more than 150,000 people urging a pardon for Jeffrey Sterling. And by pardoning Jeffrey Sterling he can ensure that his legacy is not one of waging war on whistleblowers.”

  • U.S. Bombing Libya: “Operation Deja Vu”?

    “Jets from the United States have bombed Libya periodically to attempt to kill Al Qaeda and I.S. leaders. These strikes are illegal — they have not come with permission from any standing government. They have also been ineffective.”

  • Wife of CIA Whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling Asks Obama to Pardon Him

    “Sterling’s conviction is a gross miscarriage of justice… The Espionage Act case against Sterling was the first — and so far only case — handed over to a jury and the unjust result epitomizes the wrongheadedness of using the Espionage Act against whistleblowers.”

  • Trump’s “America First” vs Clinton’s “War Machine”

    “Hillary has been much attacked for the deaths of U.S. diplomats in Benghazi, but her tireless promotion of the overthrow of Muammar Qaddafi by NATO bombing is the far graver disaster. Hillary strongly promoted NATO-led regime change in Libya, not only in violation of international law but counter to the most basic good judgment.”

  • Whistleblowers on Apple’s Privacy Stance

    “It’s nice occasionally to have a company that has the balls to stand up to the government. The government — especially people like [CIA Director John] Brennan — is trying to brow beat everybody using the threat of terrorism. This allows the government to continually expand its powers.”

  • On Syria, U.S. and Russia in “Game of Chicken”?

    “On Saturday, Obama called Russian President Vladimir Putin. It’s not known what they discussed about a possible invasion of Syria. However, if Obama threatened to intervene if Russia doesn’t end its military support for the Syrian military offensive, we could be in the middle of the most serious game of chicken since the Cuban missile…

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