{"id":48874,"date":"2019-10-07T18:31:01","date_gmt":"2019-10-07T23:31:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=48874"},"modified":"2019-10-07T18:31:05","modified_gmt":"2019-10-07T23:31:05","slug":"the-whistleblower-probably-isnt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=48874","title":{"rendered":"The \u2018Whistleblower\u2019 Probably Isn\u2019t"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The \u2018Whistleblower\u2019 Probably Isn\u2019t <\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s an insult to real whistleblowers to use the term with the Ukrainegate protagonist<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Real<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Start with the initial headline, in the story<\/a> the Washington Post <\/em>\u201cbroke\u201d on September 18th:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

TRUMP\u2019S COMMUNICATIONS WITH FOREIGN LEADER ARE PART OF WHISTLEBLOWER COMPLAINT THAT SPURRED STANDOFF BETWEEN SPY CHIEF AND CONGRESS, FORMER OFFICIALS SAY<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The unnamed person at the center of this story sure didn\u2019t sound like a whistleblower. Our intelligence community wouldn\u2019t wipe its ass with a real whistleblower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Americans who\u2019ve blown the whistle over serious offenses by the federal government either spend the\u00a0rest of their lives overseas,<\/a>\u00a0like Edward Snowden, end up in jail,\u00a0like Chelsea Manning<\/a>, get arrested and ruined financially, like\u00a0former NSA official Thomas Drake<\/a>, have their homes raided by FBI like\u00a0disabled NSA vet William Binney<\/a>, or get charged with espionage like ex-CIA\u00a0exposer-of-torture John Kiriakou<\/a>. It\u2019s an insult to all of these people, and the suffering they\u2019ve weathered, to frame the ballcarrier in the Beltway\u2019s latest partisan power contest as a whistleblower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With that in mind, let\u2019s look at what we know about the first \u201cwhistleblower\u201d in Ukrainegate:<\/p>\n\n\n\n