Melvin Goodman rightly takes on Jill Lepore on Whistleblowing

September 24, 2019 COUNTERPUNCH

The Central Role of the Whistleblower

by Melvin Goodman

What I remember with most dismay from Jill Lepore’s NEW YORKER article is her aloof reference to “breezy” whistleblowers.  

Goodman:

Lepore’s review of Snowden’s book in the current issue of the New Yorker is a typical example of the lack of support given to whistleblowers from the press and the public.  In raising the false dichotomy of Snowden as either a “patriot” or a “traitor,” Lepore could have noted that, after leaving the Department of Justice, former attorney general Eric Holder referred to Snowden as a “public servant.” And in discussing Snowden’s decision to leave the country and to avoid “other avenues available for somebody whose conscience was stirred,” it should be noted that a prior whistleblower from the National Security Agency, Thomas Drake, did exactly that and the Obama administration outrageously used the Espionage Act against him.  Lepore concludes that an “age of whistle-blowing…isn’t a sign of a thriving democracy,” but we will not have a thriving democracy without protection for whistleblowers.