Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Edward Snowden: The Whistleblower Behind the NSA Surveillance Revelations
It's not everyday that a whistleblower is actually willing to be identified.
The question of whether I, as a whistleblower, should be pardoned, is not for me to answer.
Most Swiss banks do have a whistleblower program, but they use it to punish those who avail themselves of it.
It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised - and it should be.
As for labeling someone a whistleblower, I think it does them - it does all of us - a disservice, because it "otherizes" us.
The sad truth is that societies that demand whistleblowers be martyrs often find themselves without either, and always when it matters the most.
Chelsea Manning, who's now set to be free May 17th [2017], after Obama shortened her sentence from 35 years to seven. According to her attorneys, she is already the longest-held whistleblower in U.S. history.
In the Enron scandal, whistleblower Sherron Watkins is now calling herself Enron Brokovitch. She testified Ken Lay was duped by the other executives. Oh, yeah. When is the last time you got duped and made $100 million?
There were no whistleblower protections that would've protected me - and that's known to everybody in the intelligence community. There are no proper channels for making this information available when the system fails comprehensively.
We have a way of dealing with information that has sort of personal - personally identifying information in it. But there are legitimate secrets - you know, your records with your doctor; that's a legitimate secret. But we deal with whistleblowers that are coming forward that are really sort of well motivated.
In the end, the Obama administration is not afraid of whistleblowers like me, Bradley Manning or Thomas Drake. We are stateless, imprisoned or powerless. No, the Obama administration is afraid of you. It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised - and it should be.