""PEN American Center has named Sibel Edmonds, a translator who was fired from her job at the FBI after complaining of intelligence failures and poor performance in her unit, as the recipient of this year’s prestigious PEN/Newman’s Own First Amendment Award. Ms. Edmonds will receive the $20,000 prize at PEN’s annual Gala on April 18, 2006 at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. " (link)that's today.
(sibel was kind enough to leave a message in reply)
congratulations again sibel!
3 comments:
More fun from Daniel Hopsicker reporting on CIA drug flights:
A plane was recently detained in Mexico carrying 5.5 tons of cocaine. Brent C Kovac is one of the two owners. And he just happens to have been appointed by Tom Delay in 1993 to the Business Advisory Council of the National Republican Congressional Committee.
The plane's registered owner, a Florida air charter company called Royal Sons, was run from a hanger at the Venice Fl. Airport owned by flight school Huffman Aviation of 9/11 fame. The plane carried an official looking US govt insignia. According to Hopsicker, Royal Sons is part of a cluster of related air charter firms that are dummy CIA companies. When Mexican authorities surrounded the plane the pilot "escaped".
Hopsicker recalls: "...Huffman Aviation's owner Wally Hilliard had his own Lear jet busted by DEA agents, during the same month Mohamed Atta arrived at his flight school, unhappy to discover 43 pounds of heroin aboard."
He concludes: "...the sleepy retirement community of blue-haired widows [Venice Fl] is about to replace Palermo or Caracas as the place to see and be seen in the international narcotics trade."
I just love it when you get Tom Delay, CIA drug flights and 9/11 in the one hit.
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That was my post actually.
My congrats to Sibel as well! You also deserved the JFK Profiles in Courage Award too, but this one at least helps bring you the honor you and other whistleblowers deserve for stepping forward. Really liked your comments that your award will help others see you and other whistleblowers as "freedom fighters" and not just "disgruntled employees" as this article notes today!
Edmonds won the $20,000 PEN/Newman's Own First Amendment Award. She said before the dinner that she thought her receipt of the award would help others see whistle-blowers as "freedom fighters" rather than "disgruntled employees."
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