Sunday, 17 May 2015, ALEXANDRIA, VA - The blatant hypocrisy of President Obama in his selective prosecution of those who dare "leak" to the press what apparently does not suit Mr. Obama's political nor "legacy" agenda played itself out once more as expected this past week as anticipated in earlier posts here in the sentencing of former CIA officer attorney Jeffrey A. Sterling who "stiffly" consoled his grief-stricken sobbing wife after Federal Judge Leonie Brinkem (doubtless pursuant to marching orders spoken or unspoken) meted out a three-and-one-half year prison sentence to Mr. Sterling that he now will serve at a federal penitentiary in Missouri while the Court at the same time consoled him that "[y]ou have a lot of talent -- and an ability to live a law-abiding life" (which presumably once out of prison can be spent working at a car wash unless Mr. Sterling is appointed to the federal judiciary or elected to political office).
Mr. Sterling last January was convicted of "espionage" allegedly for providing
New York Times reporter James A. Risen with "confidential information" that Mr. Risen used in his book "State of War" which at the time according to Obama stooge then-Attorney General Eric Holder allegedly "put people's lives at risk" and "endangered" national security by disclosing information about yet one more failed CIA plot in this instance attempting to dupe Iranian nuclear engineers by using an apparent CIA "asset" playing the role of a phony "turned" Russian scientist who would provide the Iranians with fake plans to construct non-functional components disrupting alleged Iranian nuclear weapons development. (Not yet made into a major motion picture.)
No evidence is known by the
Ninth Amendment (whose reporter got lost in Old Town) to have been introduced at Mr. Sterling's trial which confirmed that anyone allegedly put "at risk" actually had been harmed in any way nor that the failure of the CIA's plot to disrupt any Iranian nuclear weapons development had anything to do with Mr. Sterling's "leaks" to the
New York Times. Mr. Risen also had been harassed with threats of federal prosecution himself although the federal government disabused itself of that notion and the threat was dropped as Mr. Risen made it clear that he would spend as long as necessary in no doubt well-publicized (at the least by his employer) imprisonment for "contempt of court" for refusing to reveal his source(s).
In any case the federal government thoughtfully continued Mr. Sterling's sentencing to this past week given the inconvenient fact that it happened originally to fall on the exact same date as and therefore so as to serve even further to highlight and give even more the blatant "appearance" of impropriety as if that were possible that the Obama administration faced with the grossly obvious disparity of the incidentally African-American Mr. Sterling's "expected" stiff sentencing with that of Caucasian former CIA "Love Note" Director former Four Star General David A. Petraeus who originally was to be handed a mutually agreed-upon sentence on the same day as Mr. Sterling under which for Mr. Petraeus' "exceptionally grave national security" disclosures (as previously described by then-Attorney General Eric Holder's D.O.J.) including providing not only an oral (as it were) overview of notebooks of his personal notations taken during National Security Council meetings which he attended but further physically (as it were) providing them to his biographer cum lover Patricia Broadwell which notebooks the F.B.I. after Mr. Petraeus lied to them at a later point in a search of his house also found along with other critical national security information unsecured in Mr. Petraeus' home study unlocked desk drawer under which Mr. Petraeus would walk out free under a plea agreement of two years "probation" and a $40,000 fine.
Federal Magistrate Judge David Keesler who presided over Mr. Petraeus' hearing as previously reported here felt the agreed "sentence" could not even pass the "credibility" much less "laugh" test and therefore obligingly raised to $100,000 the fine most likely so as to make some weak effort to protect and not expose the whole sham prosecution of Mr. Petraeus as a total fiasco no doubt raising even further loud objections of other attorneys for defendants such as Mr. Sterling and others prosecuted by Mr. Obama for "leaks" to the press most notably the as yet to be "brought before justice" Mr. Edward J. Snowden (his attorney already screaming "dual system of justice") with Snowden increasingly seen throughout the world as a "hero" unlike his former putative boss Obama.
Clearly there are wrongful uncertain and uneven risks under the Obama administration faced by those former or present government officials and others who serve the vital role of providing legitimate information to the press and People which as Mr. Obama knows being a constitutional scholar is essential to the preservation of the People's liberties and protections from State abuse as made abundantly apparent by the fact that freedom of the press is one of the core rights included in the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in the Bill of Rights.
President Obama now far has outdone all his predecessors in office who prosecuted a combined total of three persons for "leaks" to the press with Mr. Obama himself alone now having overseen the prosecution of at least eight persons for "leaks" to the press including to some of the most essential "newspapers of record" in the United States as well as Mr. Obama overseeing or allowing as well an apparent witch-hunt for Edward J. Snowden who as it turns out as of this time rightly has revealed illegal secret U.S. government mass surveillance and metadata storage practices of momentous scope in the unprecedented enormous illegal invasion of Americans' privacy and other rights now determined to have been continuing by a secretly invasive government without any
bona fide legal basis for nearly fifteen years.
Mr. Obama in his election efforts and purportedly in his time in office has cast himself as a virtual champion of White House "transparency" on a scale never before enjoyed by the American people which Mr. Obama presumably expects and hopes to largely define the overall contours of his presidency. Unfortunately events and reports of events concerning what Mr. Obama and his White House know and what they disclose to the People appear rapidly to be becoming more and more divergent. At this rate Mr. Obama may well be remembered for his "transparency" but not necessarily at all in the way he would wish because the "transparency" of a false transparency would seem to be the worst transparency of all.
Readers interested in more information on the above can go to the link below as well as recent posts here in the
Ninth Amendment providing more background and source material links on the above.
http://www.bbc.com/news/32456102
Copyright 2015 Martin P. All World Rights Expressly Reserved
