Food Safety News: Consumer Groups Criticize Poultry Inspection Proposal

Summary: More consumer groups have publicly critiqued USDA's plan to shift poultry inspection duties to companies (expanding aprogram known as HIMP) in comments filed this week. Concerns included a lack of specific requirements for microbiological testing, or training for company employees taking over federal inspectors' roles. 

Key Quote: The Center for Science in the Public Interest, Consumer Federation of America, and Consumers Union each sharply criticized the proposal in their comments filed before the Tuesday deadline, which had been pushed back a month in response to sharp criticism raised by the Government Accountability Project, Food & Water Watch, and poultry inspectors.

Tri-City Herald (WA): DOE Dismissed from Hanford Whistleblower Lawsuit

Summary: A federal judge has dismissed the US Department of Energy from the lawsuit brought by Hanford nuclear site whistleblower Walt Tamosaitis, which had alleged that the department played a role in his retaliation. His main suit against contractor URS, however, is set to move forward.

HFCS Whistleblower Applauds FDA Rejection of "Corn Sugar" Label

Summary: This week, the FDA rejected a petition submitted in 2010 by the Corn Refiners Association to identify high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) as "corn sugar." GAP client and whistleblower Renee Dufault, who has helped expose a number of problems associated with HFCS, says FDA made the right call.

Wall Street Journal: Most Whistleblowers Report Internally, Study Finda

Summary: A study released yesterday shows that most corporate whistleblowers choose to only report problems internally. According to the report by the nonprofit Ethics Resource Center, only "18 percent" [of corporate whistleblowers] ever chooses to report externally. Of those who do go outside their company at some point, 84 percent do so only after trying to report internally first."

Furthermore, only two percent of those surveyed went solely outside of the company to report wrongdoing. Since the SEC enacted its whistleblower reward program, many businesses have complained that monetary incentives would discourage internal reporting. These new results counter that argument.

Radack, Drake Win Hugh Hefner First Amendment Award

Summary: The winners for this year's Hugh M. Hefner Foundation First Amendment Awards were announced yesterday, and GAP’s own National Security & Human Rights Director Jesselyn Radack has been honored. Radack is co-winner in the government category with Thomas Drake, National Security Agency whistleblower and GAP client. Radack and Drake are being acknowledged for their critical work exposing national security hypocrisy and abuses.

Courtesy of Flickr user imjoshdotcomThe winners for this year's Hugh M. Hefner Foundation First Amendment Awards were announced today and – lo and behold – GAP’s own National Security & Human Rights Director Jesselyn Radack has been honored! Radack is co-winner in the government category with Thomas Drake, National Security Agency (NSA) whistleblower and GAP client. Radack and Drake are being acknowledged for their critical work exposing national security hypocrisy and abuses.

The Foundation has been giving out the First Amendment Awards since 1980, honoring those who have made contributions to the protections afforded under the First Amendment. Radack and Drake join an impressive rank of winners, including the likes of Walter Karp, Studs Terkel, Cecile Richards, Michael Moore, John Seigenthaler, Bill Maher, and Molly Ivins.

Drake, of course, blew the whistle on fraud, waste, and abuse within the NSA and was rewarded by being prosecuted under the Espionage Act, a tactic the Obama administration has now used six times against intelligence whistleblowers – more than all previous administrations combined. Radack, herself a Department of Justice whistleblower, represented Drake on whistleblower issues and played a vital role in winning his case in the court of public opinion.

This isn’t the first time Drake and Radack have been recognized for their work. They won the Sam Adams Award, presented by the Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence late last year. Drake was also the winner of the 2011 Ridenhour Prize for Truth-Telling, largely considered the most prestigious award for whistleblowers.

I thought we were done with "death panels" after the health care debate, but as the New York Times reported yesterday, Obama has his own 100-person "death panel" made up of members of the ever-expanding national security state.

It is the strangest of bureaucratic rituals: Every week or so, more than 100 members of the government’s sprawling national security apparatus gather, by secure video teleconference, to pore over terrorist suspects’ biographies and recommend to the president who should be the next to die.

While the Times calls it a "bureaucratic ritual," a panel of suits deciding who to kill next sounds more like an organized crime ring, with Obama as the mob boss insisting on signing off on every death. John O. Brennan is like the consigliere. The Times' sources – "three dozen of [Obama's] current and former advisers" – imply that Obama's tight hold on decisions about who the U.S. should kill without charge or trial makes Obama morally responsible:

A student of writings on war by Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, he believes that he should take moral responsibility for such actions.

It could also make him a psychopathic dictator whose favorite part of being president is heading up the "death panel," but we'll never know, considering that the Obama administration continues to claim in court that it "can neither confirm or deny" the existence of the drone program. BEFORE the commenters jump down my throat about calling Obama a "psychopathic dictator," please read what I wrote - I am not saying Obama is a "dictator" - the point is we don't know the official policies, reasoning behind, or criteria of the death panels - because this is all occurring in secret. Americans cannot go to the U.S. Code or case law and learn the criteria for summary execution. The officials on these death panels are

Los Angeles Times: Julian Assange Loses Appeal Against Extradition

Summary: WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has lost his UK Supreme Court appeal fighting his extradition to Sweden where he faces on questions related to a sexual assault charge. Assange is currently under house arrest in England and has been fighting the extradition to Sweden for fear that he could then be extradited to the US and charged for leaking State Department documents.

Related Article: Associated Press

Viewpoint with Eliot Spitzer: Extra – State Dept. Whistleblower Peter Van Buren Asks Hillary Clinton, ‘Madam, Have You No Shame?’

Summary: State Department whistleblower and GAP client Peter Van Buren appeared on Viewpoint with Eliot Spitzer last night to talk about his disclosures on problems with reconstruction efforts in Iraq. The ACLU recently sent a letter to the agency, telling them that firing Van Buren would violate his constitutional rights.

Food Safety News: Controversy Continues As Comment Period Closes for HIMP

Summary: Chicken and turkey industry groups filed comments in favor of USDA's deregulated poultry inspection plan before the comment period closed yesterday. Their support of the plan, known as HIMP, contrasts with USDA whistleblowers who revealed to GAP serious criticisms of conditions at current HIMP poultry plants. Yesterday, GAP's Food Integrity Campaign submitted its comments and petition to the USDA, along with several affidavits from federal inspectors.

The UK's Daily Mail reports:

The Department of Homeland Security [DHS] has been forced to release a list of keywords and phrases it uses to monitor social networking sites and online media for signs of terrorist or other threats against the U.S.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) obtained the list of mostly-innocuous words DHS finds important enough to include in a guide for analysts whose goal is to

[identify] media reports that reflect adversely on DHS and response activities.

The list includes completely innocent words anyone would use in social networking, such as

flu
leak
incident
response
cops
exercise
sick
pork
electric
cancelled
smart
power
delays
cloud
vaccine
interstate
closure
emergency
hurricane
organization
metro
storm
virus
help

Daily Times (MD): Proposed Poultry Inspection Rules Stirs Controversy

Summary: Today is the final day of the comment period for the USDA’s proposed poultry inspection plan, HIMP, which would shift many of the oversight duties from the federal government to private corporations. The proposed changes have been decried by whistleblower inspectors, as well as many food safety groups. 

GAP’s Food Integrity Campaign released new affidavits today from USDA inspectors in HIMP plants who share concerns about the ability to maintain poultry safety with these new changes. These affidavits can be read here.

Key Quote: Federal inspectors who worked at plants participating in the pilot projects provided affidavits in April to the Government Accountability Project, a whistle-blower protection and advocacy organization. The inspectors said the new inspection system harmed their ability to ensure food safety.

"I've seen sorters attempt to slow down or stop the line to move birds to the reprocessing line, only to be rebuked by their supervisors," one whistle-blower wrote. "In my plant, some of the sorters really try to look at all of the birds. Others, though, seem not to care or have given up on doing their job."

RT: VatiLeaks – Pope’s Butler Arrested for Stealing Confidential Correspondence

Summary: The butler of Pope Benedict XVI has been arrested as the “leaker” of a number of secret Vatican documents that have been released in recent months, revealing corruption and power struggles among the Vatican’s leaders.