Whistleblowing Quotes

If I'd written all the truth I knew for the past ten years, about 600 people - including me - would be rotting in prison cells from Rio to Seattle today. Absolute truth is a very rare and dangerous commodity in the context of professional journalism.

I think America is less safe on a lot fronts, and I disagree with the release of the information from Dianne Feinstein. I think she's as much a traitor to this country at this point as I thought about Edward Snowden and his release of information about other investigations and abilities from an intelligence standpoint.

WikiLeaks, God bless them, will save lives as a result of their actions.

Corruption undermines public confidence in our country and institutions. It is a huge cost to the economy. Combating it will take courage, determination and perseverance. The most effective means of doing it is by creating a climate not receptive to corruption.

Truth is a very powerful political weapon against those who are trying to conceal it.

The purpose of whistleblowing is to expose secret and wrongful acts by those in power in order to enable reform.

Someone needs to tell the truth, but it shouldn't be my job.

The first time I raised the issue [of rigged weapons tests], my job was eliminated.

I'm focused on leaks that hurt the institution of the president and the president himself. I understand we have to leak things to reporters to help shape policy or try to balloon things or do tests on ideas or people for different jobs. I'm talking about nefarious, unnecessary, backstabbing, palace intrigue-like leaks.

Most of what is done I think is to kept secret so the public won't know. The same is true of what Wikileaks exposed.

[Chelsea] Manning leaked more than 700,000 classified files and videos to WikiLeaks about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and U.S. foreign policy.

Some people blame him [General Thomas Conway] for calling some of OUR GENERALS cowards & drunkards in public company. But these things are proof of his integrity, and should raise him in the opinion of every friend of America.

What was my great sin? To have revealed the private property of the bank - well if this is being a criminal, then maybe I'm a great criminal.

The fact is that when it comes to judgment as to what should be secret and what should not be secret, Julian Assange's judgment has been pretty good so far.

WikiLeaks exposed corruption, war crimes, torture and cover-ups. It showed that we were lied to about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; that the U.S. military had deliberately hidden information about systematic torture and civilian casualties, which were much higher than reported.

Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, has on several occasions talked about transparency as an absolute principle. I don't personally believe that.

Walt Shaub is a true ethics hero for speaking out.

Go ahead and investigate the bastards.

I hope the true public servants learn from this that they should not be afraid and they will get incredible grass-roots support if they call out corruption.

I worked with people like Edward Snowden. Well, not people who took stuff home.

You can't come forward against the world's most powerful intelligence agencies and be completely free from risk.

Amazon webhosting dropped Wikileaks as a customer after receiving a complaint from U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman, despite the fact that Wikileaks had not been charged, let alone convicted, of any crime.

Part of the satisfaction of tattling surely comes from showing oneself to adults as a good moral agent, a responsible being who is sensitive to right and wrong. But I would bet that children would tattle even if they could do so only anonymously. They would do it just to have justice done.

Look at Snowden or Julian Assange. In their own way, they are free without restrictions. They are dropped in a place because of political reasons.

The media helps keep government honest.