On the News With Thom Hartman

Subject: On the News With Thom Hartman

When faced with a moral delemma, and you are faced with upholding two commitments, which one trumps which one? 

John Kiriakou, CIA whistle blower, is sentenced to 30 months for apparently making the wrong choice. 

In taiking his possition with the CIA, John placed his hand on a Bible and swore to defend and uphold the Constitution of the United States of America. 

At the same time he pledged to not expose confidential CIA secrets. 

That was back when he believed that the CIA lived by that same Constitution he had promised to defend. 

That was before he discovered that the CIA was lying when it said publicly that the USA did not use torture.  He learned that not only did the CIA permit such methods as water boarding, but also sleep deprivation and what they called the Cold Room. 

So now suppose that you are John Kiriakou, sworn to uphold two contridicting pledges. 

Do you blow the whistle on the CIA, or do you protect your comrades as they go about the business of secret torture? 

Such decisions are not confined to our government's most secret of agencies.  Think of having to decide if you should report your fellow officer for taking hush money, when you have sworn to uphold your brother/sister police officers.  If you blow the whistle, what happens to your career? 

What about the Bishop who discovers that one of his priests is "dipping the wick" in the rumps of Alter Boys?  You are committed to defend the Church.  How do you go about that pledge? 

Or here's one I had the priviledge of dealing with.  We spent years developing a program in our agency.  It now was among the three top such programs nationally.  I, and others, began to suspect that the program supervisor was mismanaging the program resources.  We had to take immediate action.  Our choices were to bring charges against the man or move him outside the agency. 

To expose him could impact the program, and with it the livelihoods of a large number of blind people.  To move him out of the agency meant "rewarding" him with an opportunity he couldn't resist.  Neither choice was a good one. 

Unless you've had to make such choices you have no idea of how it tears at your very fiber. 

I salute John Kiriakou for his bravery in standing true to his commitment to protect and uphold our Constitution at all costs. 

And I hope that President Obama removes the charge and drops the 30 month sentence.  Since Obama refuses to go after the torturers who are making our nation look like all other Terrorist Nations, then at least let's not prosecute our brave friends. 

 

Carl Jarvis

***

    From: On the News with Thom Hartman. 

 

In America, if you commit a war crime and torture someone – nothing happens to you. But if you blow the whistle on this war crime – then get ready to go to jail. On Friday, CIA whistleblower, John Kiriakou, was sentenced to 30 months in jail, for releasing classified information that exposed the CIA's use of waterboarding. Kiriakou is one of six current, or former, government officials, who've been slapped with criminal charges from the Obama administration for leaking classified information. That's more crackdowns on government whistleblowers than all other Presidential administrations combined. We should not be jailing brave individuals who exposed war crimes in an effort to stop them. But, we should be locking up George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and the rest of their ilk, who knowingly allowed the United States to become a nation that tortures. It will take a long time to heal the deep moral wounds these men inflicted on our nation.

***

 

WallStream" media, its all the news that is fixed to print
-Frank Ventura