What is the difference between a whistle blower and a criminal? What does the 40hr work week have to do with being a recently released inmate? How do you survive in prison when you’ve been declared a national security threat for revealing information about government interrogation techniques? You can ponder all this (and more) while watching the following Vice News story:
Ex-CIA Officer John Kiriakou: “The Government Turned Me Into a Dissident” – YouTube.
In 2007, John Kiriakou became the first Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) official to publicly confirm that agency interrogators waterboarded a high-value detainee, terrorism suspect Abu Zubaydah — a revelation that had previously been a closely guarded secret. Five years after this unauthorized disclosure to ABC News, the veteran CIA officer pleaded guilty to leaking to journalists the identity of certain individuals who were involved with the CIA’s rendition, detention, and interrogation program. He was sentenced to two and a half years in federal prison. VICE News caught up with Kiriakou for a wide-ranging interview just a few days after he was released from prison. He detailed how his CIA training became a technique for survival behind bars, and how the government turned him into a “dissident.”Vice News
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