This is a project of Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers.
http://www.ellsberg .net/content/ view/34

Truth Telling Project
Project Activities | Writings & Interviews | Press Coverage | Links
The Truth-Telling Project encourages whistleblowing in the national interest. It urges current and recently retired government officials to reveal the truth to Congress and the public about governmental wrongdoing, lies and cover-up. It aims to change the norms and practices that sustain the cult of secrecy, and to de-legitimize silence that costs lives.

It is becoming increasingly clear that a dominant practice of the Bush administration is cover-up, on urgent matters of life and death; cover-up of the real motives for the war and of the foreseeable costs and problems of the occupation; cover-up of Presidential inattention before 9-11 to warnings of imminent attacks by Al Qaeda; and above all, concealment of the judgment of the Administration's own counter-terrorism chiefs that war in Iraq is a disaster for the war on terrorism.

There are surely hundreds if not thousands of officials within the Bush administration who know about these and other cover-ups and the dangers they conceal, but who have not spoken out. I am now leading an effort, called the Truth-Telling Project, to encourage such insiders to go to Congress and the press and tell the truth, with documents.

I believe we are in a national crisis, which justifies and requires acts of unauthorized truth-telling. I am calling for such patriotic whistle-blowing to take place right now.

I am devoting myself full-time to encouraging patriotic revelation of the lies, cover-ups, and abuses of the Bush administration. The Truth-Telling Project aims to reach current insiders, as well as journalists, lawyers, lawmakers, and the American public with a message transcending party or administration:

Truth-telling to Congress and the public is not disloyal in America: it is an expression of the higher loyalty officials owe to the Constitution, the rule of law, and the sovereign public. It is a courageous, patriotic, and effective way to serve our country. The time to speak out is now.

—Daniel Ellsberg, August 2004

Project Activities

A Call to Patriotic Whistleblowing
The first activity of the Truth-Telling Project was to help organize and draft a Call to Patriotic Whistleblowing, addressed to current government insiders, signed by 11 former government employees. The Call was released to the public at a press conference in Washington, DC on September 9, 2004.
The Truth-Telling Coalition
The Truth-Telling Coalition, comprised of high-level national security truth-tellers, as well as non-profit whistleblower organizations, provides a personal and legal support network for each other and for government insiders considering becoming truth-tellers. Current coalition members include Sibel Edmonds, Daniel Ellsberg, Frank Grevil, Katharine Gun, Ray McGovern, Coleen Rowley, the Project on Government Oversight, and the ACLU. (Bios and info on members will be available on the Truth-Telling Coalition Website, currently under construction. )
The Coalition stemmed from a symposium entitled "When Silence Is Complicity: What Should Officials Do? Whistleblowers Speak Out," held at American University on September 8, 2004, co-organized by Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence, the Truth-Telling Project, and the Department of History at American University. At the symposium, the first-ever gathering of high-level national security whistleblowers, many of the participants discussed the isolation they felt after breaking ranks with their colleagues and making the step to come forward as truth-tellers. In the discussions following the symposium, some of the participants discussed the value of forming a support-network for current and potential whistleblowers, and the Truth-Telling Coalition was launched.
Person-to-Person Outreach
The Project is currently working with national security truth-tellers Sibel Edmonds, Katharine Gun, and Frank Grevil to assist them in their truth-telling activities. On September 22, 2004, the Project helped organize an Open Letter to the Danish Government and People, signed by 8 former and current US and UK government employees, in support of Danish truth-teller Frank Grevil.

Media Outreach
Daniel Ellsberg continues to write a number of articles, and give radio and television interviews on the issues addressed by the Project. These include recent appearances NPR's Morning Edition and on MSNBC, as well as op-eds on whistleblowing in the UK Guardian, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, the Harvard International Review, and Harpers magazine. These articles aim to reach current insiders, with the goal of encouraging them to consider becoming whistleblowers. To see Daniel Ellsberg's writing, interviews and lectures on the subject of whistleblowing, go to the Writing & Interviews page.
Legal Counsel

The Truth-Telling Project is working with the Center for National Security Studies, the Project on Governmental Oversight and the ACLU to locate first-rate lawyers who will announce publicly their readiness to provide pro-bono legal counsel for government insiders contemplating truth-telling. At the request of the Truth-Telling Project, the ACLU has announced that is will provide free legal advice to government insiders considering becoming whistleblowers. For press coverage of this announcement, see the Press Coverage page.
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Senator Files Supreme Court Brief on Behalf of Whistleblowers

On January 19, Senator Charles Grassley filed an Amicus Curiae ("friend of the court") brief in the U.S. Supreme Court case of Allison Engine Co., Inc. v. United States ex rel. Sanders. The Sanders case will have far-reaching impact on the viability of America's most important whistleblower protection law: The False Claims Act.

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Or this is the address if the link does not work:
http://www.whistleblowersblog.org/2008/01/articles/false-claims/senator-grassley-others-file-briefs-in-supreme-court-whistleblower-case/

In the Sanders case, General Motors and one of its main contractors is seeking to escape liability for defrauding the government based on a technicality. In addition to Senator Grassley, the Sanders whistleblowers, the Solicitor general of the United States and other public interest groups have filed briefs supporting the whistleblowers claims.
Stephen Kohn, President of the National Whistleblower Center, issued the following statement:
"If the Supreme Court were to find against the whistleblowers in this case, it will open a loophole by which fraudulent companies will launder their dirty contracts through subcontractors, thereby defeating the presentment requirement."
"Since 1986 The False Claims Act has recovered over 20 billion dollars in taxpayer money. It is the best tool this country has with which to fight fraud, and by making a common sense decision, the court can see to it that it remains that way," Kohn added.
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Since 1988 the NWC has championed whistleblower protection. The NWC is currently supporting FBI Whistleblower Bassem Youssef, who has reported serious misconduct in the War on Terror, and the NWC is currently assisting Bunnatine Greenhouse (the former Army Corps of Engineers top contracting officer who opposed the no-bid multi billion dollar contracts awarded to Halliburton for the reconstruction of Iraq)
For more information, please visit www.whistleblowers.org and www.whistleblowersblog.org

Report: US Fails at Enforcing Prosecution of Contractors
By Elana Schor
The Guardian Unlimited UK
Wednesday 16 January 2008
The US government has the legal authority to prosecute private contractors for crimes they commit in Iraq but often declines to use it, according to a report released today by a leading human rights group. The findings by Human Rights First come amid renewed uncertainty about whether employees of the US security company Blackwater can be prosecuted for a September shooting in Baghdad that left 17 Iraqis dead.
The Bush administration has warned that inconsistency in federal law may allow the contractors to evade charges, the New York Times reported today.
"The main obstacle to ending the culture of impunity among private security contractors is not shortcomings in the law but rather the lack of will to enforce the law," today's report states.
A seven-year-old law called the Military extraterrestrial jurisdiction act, or MEJA, provides the main mechanism to prosecute contractors for crimes committed outside the US.
But many in the capital have questioned whether MEJA's specific application to Pentagon employees would exempt Blackwater, which was operating under a US state department contract when the September shooting occurred.
The human rights report rejects that argument, citing a congressional expansion of MEJA passed after the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal in 2004. That measure allows for prosecution of non-Pentagon employees who were "supporting the mission of the department of defence".
The behaviour of contractors for Blackwater and other security firms has sparked resentment among Iraqi officials as well as civilians, many of whom consider the private guards unnecessarily violent.
"These violent attacks have created a culture of impunity that angers the local population, undermines the military mission, and promotes more abuse by contractors over time," the report states.
The report found that since the war in Iraq began, only one US contractor has been charged with a violent crime under MEJA: an employee of KBR, formerly owned by Halliburton, who was accused of stabbing an Indian female colleague.
The House of Representatives already has approved a measure that would directly apply MEJA to Blackwater and its fellow contractors. Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama has introduced an expansion of MEJA in the Senate, but the bill has yet to see action.
Fallout from Blackwater's legal and public relations troubles has hit British security companies in recent months.
The chief executive of ArmorGroup, the largest UK security firm operating in Iraq, left his post after reports of the September violence chilled the company's profits and new contracts.
The human rights report singles out ArmorGroup and Aegis Defence Services, another UK-based contractor, for tracking incidents involving firearms use by their employees, in contrast with US companies that do not routinely keep such records.
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O.K., so where is that Whistleblower Protection Law? -GFS
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Could Congress Be Waking Up?
By Thomas E. Mann, Molly Reynolds and Nigel Holmes
The New York Times
Saturday 19 January 2008

(Graphic: Nigel Holmes / The New York Times)

Amid the clamor of the presidential campaign, it's sometimes easy to forget that all 435 House seats and 35 of the Senate's seats are up for election this year, too. So how should Congress under its new Democratic leadership be judged?
The public has reached a decidedly negative conclusion, based on Congress's inability to force a change in policy on the Iraq war and the pitched partisan battles that characterized much of the year in Washington.
But expectations for seismic change in policymaking after the 2006 midterm elections were almost certainly too high, given the deep ideological differences between the parties, the Democrats' narrow majorities, the now-routine Senate filibusters and a Republican president determined to go his own way on Iraq, the budget and domestic policy.
Based on our research, the 110th Congress does deserve some praise. In 2007, the level of energy and activity on Capitol Hill picked up markedly. This is not surprising - when the Newt Gingrich Congress, its closest analogue, took over in 1995, the pace of legislative life sped up, too.
In terms of both the number and significance of new public laws, however, last year's Democratic majority significantly outperformed that Republican Congress. Only one item described in the Republican Contract With America was signed into law at the end of 1995, while most of the proposals the Democrats announced as their agenda were enacted.
Democrats, to be sure, aimed lower in their specific legislative promises, but they managed to overcome the many obstacles in their way. Republicans in 1995 shot for the moon and ended up frustrated by Senate inaction, presidential vetoes and a government shutdown that proved politically damaging.
The new Democratic Congress delivered on the promise of ethics and lobbying reform, and made considerable progress in reining in earmarks, which had exploded under the previous 12 years of mostly Republican rule. In fact, between the 2006 and 2008 fiscal years, the cost of appropriations earmarks appears to have dropped from $29 billion to $14.1 billion. Perhaps most important, Congress reasserted itself as a rightful check on the executive branch, significantly stepping up its oversight on a wide range of important subjects.
But a less partisan, more deliberative and productive legislative process will have to await a clearer signal from voters in the 2008 elections.
The chart above shows how the 110th Congress spent its time, and what it accomplished, in its first year under Democratic control, compared with its immediate predecessor and with the Republican Congress that took office in 1995.

Thomas E. Mann is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and co-author of "The Broken Branch." Molly Reynolds is a senior research assistant at Brookings. Nigel Holmes is a graphic designer.
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Daniel Ellsberg writes of “The American Media’s Complicit Failure to Investigate and Report on the Sibel Edmonds Case.” He points out how ridiculous it is that the London Times writes cautiously, but at least reports on things of critical importance to the citizens of the United States, when the U.S. Press and media organizations refuse to cover the stories. Please find several previous articles on this blog regarding the Sibel Edmonds story, and another reporter's thoughts, Alexandrovna. To read Ellsberg’s article in total, please go to the Brad Blog at this address:

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5583