Saturday, August 20, 2016

Punished For Telling The Truth ???

Here is the saga of yet another persecuted US whistleblower:

Jeffrey Sterling, one of the most recent victims of the U.S. government’s war on whistleblowers, may be at risk of dying in a Colorado prison.

In an interview published Tuesday in The Colorado Independent, the wife of the CIA whistleblower warned that his health is failing due to inadequate medical care at FCI Englewood, the federal prison where he is serving a sentence of three-and-a-half years.

“I’m concerned my husband may die,” Holly Sterling told the Independent’s Corey Hutchins. “I’m extremely concerned.”

Beginning Tuesday evening, a small group of activists held a 24-hour vigil near FCI Englewood to raise awareness of the whistleblower’s plight.

In May 2015, Jeffrey Sterling was convicted on nine felony charges, including seven charges of violating the Espionage Act, for revealing information about Operation Merlin, a secret CIA operation carried out under President Bill Clinton to undermine Iran’s nuclear program.

However, as Shadowproof’s Kevin Gosztola noted in October, the evidence against Sterling was largely circumstantial. “At trial in January, the government presented no emails showing Sterling and Risen had ever communicated about ‘Operation Merlin’ or even classified information,” he reported.

Instead, Gosztola and others have argued that Sterling was targeted for speaking out against racism at the CIA. Gosztola wrote:

“Sterling communicated with [New York Times journalist James] Risen, but it was about a lawsuit he filed against the CIA alleging racial discrimination. The lawsuit went all the way to the Supreme Court and was eventually dismissed because the government invoked the ‘state secrets privilege’ to avoid litigation of his claims.”

Sterling’s wife shared with the Independent a complaint filed by the whistleblower on Aug. 11 about the “unresponsive and dismissive medical care” he’s received in prison. The Independent reported that, according to the complaint, Sterling “continually suffers chest pressure, shortness of breath, sweating and an uneven heartbeat, but isn’t receiving adequate care, and instead is being told to drink more water.”

In addition to seeking outside medical attention, Sterling has requested that the prison transfer his medical records to his wife so she can have them reviewed by a specialist.

Arn Menconi, the activist and Green Party candidate for Senate who organized the vigil outside FCI Englewood, told the Independent that Sterling is one of many victims in a federal war on whistleblowers.

“Americans should know that President Obama has indicted more whistleblowers than any president in history and this is to send out a signal so that others working in security will not come out and reveal what our government is doing,” Menconi told the Independent.

You can read the rest @
http://www.mintpressnews.com/cia-whistleblower-jeffrey-sterling-close-death-federal-prison/219653/

Do we owe our allegiance to the US Constitution, or to agencies like the CIA which appear to frequently violate both the spirit and the letter of that document?

Did Iran's nuclear program violate any international laws? Was it intended as a means to make nuclear weapons? The answer to both questions appears to be NO.

Does Israel's nuclear program violate any international laws? Does it produce undeclared nuclear weapons? The answer to both questions is YES.

The US government needs to crack down on Israel like it has cracked down on Iran. If it will not, then I say the wrong person is behind bars.

Free Sterling and imprison Bill Clinton instead.

By the way, I suspect that Sterling is receiving the same sort of "medical care" offered to all prisoners - substandard at best. It's the American way.

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