News Items

  • Calls to Suspend Syrian Refugee and Other Recent Anti-Muslim Statements by Government Officials

    Compiled by the Institute for Public Accuracy with Arun Kundnani and Deepa Kumar. Kundnani said: “While it’s very easy to denounce Trump’s recent repugnant, bullying statements — and much of the political class has — it’s important to keep several things in mind: First, as the compilation of statements by elected officials makes clear, he made these statements after many officials from across the country made scores of statements playing on unfounded fears against Syrian refugees and other Muslims.”

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  • Classified Politics: A System and a Clinton in Disrepute

    It is most unlikely, however, that Hillary Clinton will fall victim to accusations that rely on improper over-­classification. The State Department and White House, including President Obama himself, sought to protect her and to minimize the effects of her behavior. The case is extremely high­-profile, Democrats in Congress would attack any borderline classification, and a host of well-­paid lawyers would rise to her defense. Improperly classified items or those deemed Sensitive but Unclassified may be redacted from publicly released documents, but it is hard to imagine that Mrs. Clinton would be falsely accused of felonies.

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  • Video of Sterling News Conference

    Please enjoy the full video of Holly Sterling’s news conference, which was her first such appearance since her husband’s trial and imprisonment. The news conference also featured Thomas Drake, Delphine Halgand, Ray McGovern, and Jesselyn Radack.

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  • Open Letter to President Obama from Holly Sterling

    Does the government have no shame in destroying one man’s life and wasting tens of millions of dollars of taxpayers’ money to punish a man who had the audacity to do two things: Stand up for his constitutional rights and utilize proper channels provided to him to express concern for the citizens of our country? I am deeply saddened by our lives’ events that Jeffrey and I have suffered and endured. You publicly committed to a transparent government led by your administration, yet it has been shrouded in mistruth and secrecy.

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  • Unprecedented News Conference: Wife of Imprisoned CIA Whistleblower to Speak Out

    Jeffrey Sterling was convicted under the Espionage Act as a source for New York Times reporter James Risen’s book State of War. He began serving his three-and-a-half year prison sentence in June. His wife’s news conference will be the first time the spouse of a CIA whistleblower has made such an appearance.

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  • Cultural Shift Needed on Police Militarization

    Police militarization is a 25 year long trend that has only grown in momentum over time. The restrictions on militaristic gear directed by the White House while important symbolically, will certainly not substantively impact this trend in and of itself. Police militarization at this point is as much a cultural problem as it is a material one, and reversing the cultural trend toward police militarization will require more far reaching efforts.

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  • Watch the Short Documentary “The Invisible Man: CIA Whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling”

    “‘The federal courtroom in northern Virginia where Holly and Jeffrey Sterling returned for the sentencing on May 11 was the scene of a disturbing, though scantly reported, simulation of justice in late January. At the outset, covering the trial, I noted that ‘prospective jurors made routine references to ‘three-letter agencies’ and alphabet-soup categories of security clearances.’ Steeped in a local atmosphere of deference to mega-employers like the CIA and Pentagon along with numerous big contracting firms nearby, ‘the jury pool was bound to please the prosecution.’”

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  • On Jeffrey Sterling: From the Filmmaker of “Invisible Man”

    “The most shocking element of this story it that Jeffrey Sterling seems to be punished because he ‘pulled on Superman’s cape’ first with a racial discrimination suit they were able to squash and then by reporting what he considered a dangerous CIA operation to the proper government channels for hearing such a concern.”

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  • News Conference: Whistleblowers Weigh In on Policy

    William Binney (NSA), Thomas Drake (NSA), Daniel Ellsberg (Pentagon Papers), Raymond McGovern (CIA), Jesselyn Radack (Justice Department), Coleen Rowley (FBI) and Kirk Wiebe (NSA) spoke at this news conference, sponsored by ExposeFacts.org, a project of the Institute for Public Accuracy.

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  • Netanyahu Victory Opens Door for One-State Solution

    Just before the election, Israel Prime Minister Netanyahu ruled out the creation of a Palestinian State, which means that he repudiated the two-state solution to the dispute between the Israelis and the Palestinians. This has been the pronounced objective of American foreign policy since the Madrid Conference and the Middle East Peace Negotiations in 1991 held under the auspices of the United States government and with the full support of the international community.

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  • Focus on Whistleblowers

    MARSHA COLEMAN-ADEBAYO Coleman-Adebayo is president of the No Fear Institute, which is organizing Whistleblower Week in Washington next week. A conference there will seek “to protect individuals’ civil rights and justice as well as the rights of truth tellers who report hazardous, illegal and unsafe conditions, and waste, fraud and abuses of authority in government…

  • “The Truth About Veteran Suicides”

    The House Veterans’ Affairs Committee is holding a hearing Tuesday at 10 a.m., “The Truth About Veteran Suicides.” It will be webcast on their website. Among those testifying is Steve Rathbun from the University of Georgia, who has been cited in a CBS News investigation on veteran suicides: “In 2005 … in just those 45…

  • Gas Prices

    JOAN CLAYBROOK TYSON SLOCUM Claybrook is president of Public Citizen. Slocum is director of Public Citizen’s Energy Program. Claybrook said today: “Oil executives and speculators are getting rich on the backs of American consumers. Indeed, on average, it costs a company such as Exxon Mobil about $20 to extract a barrel of oil, which in…

  • McCain Health Plan

    The following physicians — members of Physicians for a National Health Program — are each available for a limited number of interviews. AARON CARROLL, MD Carroll is assistant professor of pediatrics and director of the Center for Health Policy and Professionalism Research and the Indiana University School of Medicine. ROCKY WHITE, MD White, who comes…

  • Escalation of U.S. Air War

    In a front-page piece headlined “U.S. Role Deepens in Sadr City,” the Washington Post reports today: “In the Sadr City clash, the U.S. soldiers responded by firing rockets armed with high-explosive, 200-pound warheads, killing 28 fighters, [Lt. Col. Steve] Stover said. In a separate incident in Sadr City, a fixed-wing aircraft dropped a bomb at…

  • Aftermath of Supreme Court Voter ID Decision

    JUSTIN LEVITT WENDY WEISER Levitt is counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice and author of the paper “The Truth About Voter Fraud.” Weiser is deputy director of the Center’s Democracy Program. Following the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision Monday on the Indiana voter ID law, the Center issued a statement: “Under Indiana’s law, voters must…

  • Rev. Wright: Dialogue Beyond the Sound Bites

    Rev. JOHN DECKENBACK Rev. GRAYLAN S. HAGLER Deckenback is conference minister for The United Church of Christ (the same denomination as Rev. Jeremiah Wright). Hagler is national president of Ministers for Racial, Social and Economic Justice of The United Church of Christ and senior minister of the Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ in Washington,…

  • Police Brutality and Racism

    AP reports: “Three detectives were acquitted of all charges Friday in the 50-shot killing of an unarmed groom-to-be on his wedding day, a case that put the NYPD at the center of another dispute involving allegations of excessive firepower.” DE LACY DAVIS The founder and president of Black Cops Against Police Brutality and a retired…

  • Food Crisis and Biofuels

    The Washington Post reports on its front page today: “More than 100 million people are being driven deeper into poverty by a ‘silent tsunami’ of sharply rising food prices, which have sparked riots around the world and threaten U.N.-backed feeding programs for 20 million children, the top U.N. food official said Tuesday.” MARIA LUISA MENDONÇA…

  • Fallout from New York Times “Pentagon Pundits” Story

    The recent New York Times front-page article “Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand” discloses Pentagon records which “reveal a symbiotic relationship where the usual dividing lines between government and journalism have been obliterated. “Internal Pentagon documents repeatedly refer to the military analysts [on TV] as ‘message force multipliers’ or ‘surrogates’ who could be counted on…

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