John Kiriakou discusses the case of hero whistleblower Daniel Hale, who helped expose the White House’s secret drone assassination program during the Obama administration. Hale has pled guilty to one charge under the espionage act, in an effort to win the mercy of the court, but he still faces four other charges, which at the moment the Justice Department is refusing to back down from. Hale is now facing at least some time in prison, but could be given a much longer sentence, depending on how things go in the coming months. Scott and Kiriakou remind us that, of course, Hale shouldn’t be facing any charges at all: the secret activities he exposed—namely the killing of civilians—are criminal, and therefore can’t be classified in the first place under U.S. law.

Discussed on the show:

• “JOHN KIRIAKOU: Duping a Whistleblower” (Consortium News)
• Stand with Daniel Hale
• “The Drone Papers: Secret documents detail the U.S. assassination program.” (The Intercept)
• The Assassination Complex: Inside the Government’s Secret Drone Warfare Program
  
• “National Bird (2016)” (IMDb)
• The Encyclopedia of Serial Killers (Facts on File Crime Library)
  
• The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner
  
• “Russia Secretly Offered Afghan Militants Bounties to Kill U.S. Troops, Intelligence Says” (The New York Times)
• “Podesta Email Leak” (WikiLeaks)
• “State Department Cables” (WikiLeaks)

John Kiriakou is a former CIA officer and author of The Convenient Terrorist: Two Whistleblowers’ Stories of Torture, Terror, Secret Wars, and CIA Lies and Doing Time Like A Spy. He is the host of Loud and Clear on Sputnik Radio. Follow him on Twitter @JohnKiriakou.

This episode of the Scott Horton Show is sponsored by: The War State, by Mike Swanson; Tom Woods’ Liberty Classroom; ExpandDesigns.com/Scott; Photo IQ; Green Mill Supercritical; Zippix Toothpicks; and Listen and Think Audio.

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