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Show A6 Wednesday, March 26, 2008 Vernal Express . pinion "He's been releasing tapes long enough. Shouldn't he have a greatest hits anthology by now?" WHISTLEBLOWERS NEED BETTER PROTECTION By Tom Devm Minuteman Media The current dark age of government secrecy is emphasized by the Bush administration's ongoing insistence that giant telecommunication companies be shielded from any liability for their illegal actions. The goal, of course, is to keep Americans from discovering the full scope of privacy abuses undertaken by the government. During this period of darkness, however, how-ever, hundreds of human points of light keep proving the amazing power of freedom of speech. We call them whistleblowers - employees who use truth to challenge abuses of power that betray the public's wellbeing. Once vilified as traitors, their revelations and societal impact have slowly but surely raised public perception to match their true value. Unfortunately, whistleblowers' legal rights are a house of mirrors, ranging from nonexistent to traps that rubberstamp retaliation. The next few months will be a test as to whether Congress is ready to put genuine rights behind the rhetoric. The ultimate winners, or losers, will be the public. Whistleblowers exercise freedom of speech when it counts. Through the freedom to protest, they are the agents of accountability for abuses of power sustained by secrecy. Through the freedom to warn, they can prevent pre-vent avoidable crimes or disasters - if we listen to messengers instead of silencing them. Enron's convicted leadership was a direct result of taking the latter approach with whistleblower Sharon Watkins. World Bank whistleblowers whistleblow-ers sparked the downfall of its president, Iraq war planner Paul Wolfowitz, by exposing that his personal corruption surpassed that of the Third World countries he was crusading to clean up. The Whistleblower Protection Act (WPA) of 1989 gave government workers history's strongest free speech rights, but only on paper. The law has been gouged by judicially creajed loopholes from an appeals court with a track record of protecting dissent comparable to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act's (FISA's) court. The appeals court's 13-year record of protecting pro-tecting civil liberties: 2 to 183 against whistleblowers. Corporate whistleblower laws are even more surreal, a hit or miss crazy quilt of patchwork protection, with far more misses than hits. To illustrate, il-lustrate, a poultry plant worker has rights challenging toxic dumping in a river, but not fecal-contaminated chickens. A Mattel employee has rights to blow the whistle on "cooked books," but not to challenge safety threats to the-children the-children who play with its toys. y(fiT""r) r - -- Like the public perception of whistleblowers, though, the winds seem to be changing to help protect all employees. The House and Senate are reconciling separate overhauls of the discredited WPA. Corporate employee rights, while still piecemeal, are being created and modernized. Last year, Congress passed "best practices" laws with access to jury trials for ground transportation workers and defense contractors. con-tractors. Which brings us to the battle-de-jour. In January, the Senate voted to protect retail and manufacturing employees as an enforcement cornerstone corner-stone of consumer product safety legislation. The Senate's bill would safeguard safe-guard corporate employees from retaliation for reporting abuses of safety standards by a retailer, manufacturer or distributor of a product in commerce. In the wake of recent product scandals, this protection's necessity becomes clear - Americans deserve to know that toys they buy for their children are safe. If a worker knows that lead content is too high in toys being imported, he should have the legal right to speak out. Without these protections, whistleblowers who wish to report serious safety concerns about products will be deterred heavily from doing so. Critics of the whistleblower provision state that free speech rights are unnecessary because no corporation has ever harassed workers for challenging illegal cover-ups of unsafe products - but case study after case study show this assertion to be blatantly false. Critics also claim that trial lawyers would benefit if cover-ups are frustrated - effectively arguing to keep truth from the public. Of course, one leading critic of reform, Consumer Product Prod-uct Safety Commission Chairwoman Nancy A. Nord, was caught last year having taken multiple trips paid for by the very industries she was regulating - including a trip to a South Carolina golf course. Right now, the Senate-passed consumer product whistleblower rights bill must be reconciled with a House bill containing none. Contrary to the industry's objections, this anti-secrecy reform is certain to be good for the economy. It doesn't cost a thing to listen to whistleblowers - and consumer confidence in the products we buy will only be strengthened by ensuring that they're safe to use. Tom Devine is Legal Director and Adam Miles is Legislative Representative Rep-resentative for the Government Accountability Project, the nation's leading whistleblower protection and advocacy organization, www.whistleblower.org. n V 1 J VlHKT toES wmm. Web opinion poll Each week the Vernal Express offers an online poll to its readers. To participate in the poll, visit www.vernal.com and click on the opinion link. Polls are not scientific and represent the opinions of voluntary Internet users. New polls are posted weekly and printed results represent voting as of Tuesday morning. If you have an Idea for an opinion poll, e-mail it to editorvernal.com. Question for this week Do you think the Dinosaur Roundup Rodeo is an asset to our community? commu-nity? a) Yos. b) No. Note: The web poll was not updated this week and last week's question will be posted for this week. BERTHA BUTTERBEAN Texas tea party By Dana Colovich Guest Writer A few of the Butter-beans Butter-beans took a road trip this past weekend. week-end. We put gas in our car and headed south for a few days. South has a lot to recommend recom-mend it, most notably its temperature. But right now gasoline has only one thing to recommend it. It makes your car run. On road trips - well all of the time - Father Butterbean is preoccupied with the price of gasoline. I don't think he notices the scenery or the wildlife or the stores or the speed limit signs, but he focuses on all of the station marquees and compares their advertised prices. "That station back there a ways had gas for $3.19. This one has it for $3.29. It jumped 10 cents in just a couple of blocks. And back there in the last town, I saw it for $3.05. Remember that. We'll stop there on the way home and fill up." "I can't remember the price at the one we just passed, let alone the one in the last town," I complain. "And quit driving all over this town looking for the cheapest gas. It's okay if we have to pay three cents a gallon more." "No, it's not. It's the principle prin-ciple of the thing. If I go to the most expensive station, they will think they can get away with those prices all the time." Mr. B. judges stations by their gas prices - not by anything else. Don't ever tell him, but I occasionally go to the station that is the closest, whether its price is less or not. Of course, sometimes I am in danger of running out of gas if I go to the station across town. At times like that, I will pay 70 cents extra for my tank of gas if it will save me a walk in the cold. In fact I would be willing to pay a lot more than that. This conversation took place during our road trip: "Dad, will you pull over at a station? I need to use the bathroom." Now you know how kids are, even big ones, they will need to go to the bathroom within half an hour of the last fill up, which was the case this time. "Dad, don't forget I need a bathroom. There's a station just ahead." "We can't go to that station; sta-tion; their gas costs $3.27. "We can't use their bathroom bath-room because their gas costs $3.27? It's okay Dad. They don't charge for their toilet paper." What really aggravates him is triumphantly saving five cents on gasoline and then going inside to find he has to pay more for his potato chips and drinks. "These chips cost $3.19. That's a gallon of gas. What good does it do to save on gas if I have to spend it all on treats?" ' "Dad, this is a convenience store." "Those chips are $1.29 at the grocery store. Let's go over there." Notice that you didn't hear him say that he didn't need any chips then. "Dad, it's three miles away. That would make it an inconvenience store. Besides it will cost that much in gas to get there." "Here, Dad. Here's some milk to go with your cookies." cook-ies." "I don't want to buy a small one. It costs $1.69. You can get a whole gallon for less than twice that. "Dad, do you want to drink out of a gallon jug while you're driving?" Mr. B. not only worries about the price at the pump, but like most men, he frets over his gas mileage as well. He has been calling out the mpg score every 10 miles, as well as when we go up hills and down, in the city and in the country. "I could get better gas mileage," he remarks while eying the CD case I brought, "if we didn't have to carry all of those CD's around." Looks like in the interest of hauling less weight in the future, I am going to have to choose between my music and my potato chips. THE GOOD NEWS IS TVE THE BAD ITOlS IS XlE KTJt HUEP THE TANK... JTZTX tm m NTO' CCUESE jmj Public Forum - Letters to the Editor What is your opinion? The Vernal Express welcomes letters from its readers concerning any subject pertinent to the Uintah Basin. There are no restrictions on contents, if in good taste and not libelous or vindictive. Letters may be edited for grammar and style, length and content. All letters must be submitted exclusively to the Vernal Express and bear the full name, signature, phone number and address of the writer or writers. Letters for the sole purpose of expressing thanks to individuals or groups will not be printed in this forum. Submissions may be mailed to 54 N. Vernal Ave., Vernal, UT 84078; faxed to 435-789-8690 or sent by e-mail to editorvemal.com The name or names of the persons submitting letters must appear on all published letters. Letters express the opinion of the writer or writers and are not necessarily the opinion of the Vernal Express. USA sovereignty being destroyed Dear editor, The United States was created by the 13 individual states that existed in 1789. They established a federal government with limited powers and very few duties. Each state was to remain independent in most areas. The people could control federal spending because they elected the members of the U.S. House of Representatives Represen-tatives where all money bills must originate. The state legislatures could control federal interference because they elected the members of the U.S. Senate. In 1913, 36 states passed the 17th Amendment to allow voters to directly elect their U.S. Senators. Since then, the federal government has usurped many powers of the states. We are rapidly becoming a police state. The president is now allowing warrantless seizes and searches, torture, and many other unconstitutional activities. He also is suspending suspend-ing habeas corpus, our right to face criminal accusations in a court of law. The feds also plan to merge the United States with Mexico and Canada into a sovereignty-destroying regional government with open borders called the North American Union (NAU) by 2010. Go to www. thenewamerican.com for NAU details. Americans need to demand that the feds obey our Constitution now, or we soon will be governed by officials of-ficials we did not elect, just like the European Union is today. Richard & Gloria Hampton Sylmar, CA Request for information To the editor, My name is Sweena Hall. In my fifth grade class we are doing a state research project, and I will be doing my project on Utah. The project is due at the end of May, and it will cover such topics as famous people from Vernal and Utah, your special state traditions and the history of Vernal and Utah. The reason I am writing to your paper is to ask if you could publish my letter. I am hoping that some of the people peo-ple in your community would write to me and tell me about their traditions and experiences experi-ences in Vernal. I would enjoy receiving favorite recipes too. I live in Souther California and am sure many things about Vernal are very different differ-ent from where I live. Also if any of the citizens find time to reply it would be great if they could enclose a copy of my "published" letter. Thank you so much for taking the time to read my letter. I would really appreciate appreci-ate any information. Sweena Hall La Madera Elementary 25350 Serrano Road Lake Forest CA 92630 Frog and scorpion commentary Dear editor, The Federal Reserve was planning to cross a wide stream. It had crossed many such streams and was skilled in crossing them well. But just as it stepped into the water, investment banks asked to ride along. They didn't have the assets to cross the stream but knew the Fed did. The Fed looked at the investment banks and said, "I can't let you ride on my back. You want me to take your bad debt in exchange for my instruments which have the full faith and credit of the United States," it said. "You'll stingme." The investment invest-ment banks said, "If we're not able to get to the other side, everybody who is waiting for us will panic and that will be terrible." "Besides," they said, "If we sting you, we'll all drown." The Fed thought, and said, "OK, I guess that makes sense. I'll help you get to the other side, but you can't behave as you have before, OK?" "OK" replied the' investment invest-ment banks. Halfwayacrossthestream, the investment banks stung the Fed. The Fed looked back wide-eyed and asked, "With all that was at stake, why did you sting me? Now, we're both going to drown." As the water rose around them all, the investment banks replied, "We're sorry. It's just what we do." Apologies to Aesop. Don Merrill Salt Lake City Tribe's investments safe despite buyout Dear Editor, With spring coming up soon, there is other interesting interest-ing news - there is notice of intent to recall me and JP Morgan has bought out Bear Stearns. The notice to recall will be posted for 20 days, after which a petition for recall will be circulated. If the petition for recall is valid, a recall election will take place. I have been accused ac-cused of gross misconduct and abusing the oath of office, the details of which aren't discussed. Bear Stearns has been making the news lately and the buyout by JP Morgan has occurred. I have been informed that the tribe's funds continue to be safe. Four members of the tribal council visited the offices of Bear Stearns two weeks ago. We visited with the CEO of the Bear Stearns Securities Corp. He informed us that our money was safe and protected by an insurance company. But, we will still watch to make sure that the tribe's money continues to be safe. We explained the structure of Bear Stearns at the tribe's informative quarterly meeting meet-ing that was held last week. We intend to keep holdingthe quarterly meetings to keep our membership informed of our activities. I'd like to thank the tribal members who are supportive of what we are doing and wantthem to know that we ' havfe the tribe's best interest always at heart. Curtis R. Cesspooch Chairman, Ute Tribe Business Busi-ness Committee Hats in school Dear editor, We as students of Davis Elementary want hats in school. Hats don't hurt anyone any-one or anything, because hats are made out of material and cardboard. We already have those things at school. We would make a deal with the teachers to not play with our hats. The teachers can still see us while we are working. Hats will keep the sun's glare out of our eyes. We could be ready for school faster. If we sleep in we could slip a hat on, and be to school on time. We would not have to comb our hair if we were allowed to wear hats. It would be cool to wear hats in school. Melisha, Caden, Corbyn, Shayla, Raige and Jacob, Sstudents in Tamara Chew's class at Discovery Elementary |