WHISTLEBLOWERS

NOTE: An eagle-eyed passing reader might notice subtle adjustments in the blog description, and in the "about me" section in the sidebar - as well as the change of header illustration. I haven't lost interest in astrology, but feel that I've covered most of what I set out to cover, on astrology, since August 2006. Posts from my archives or linkage to something there, whenever appropriate to a new issue, will keep the background astro-flavour going, and I'll definitely continue to post on astrology when situation demands or if something alerts me to an interesting new angle I can present. Links to other astrology sites, remain in the sidebar of course, as well as access to my archives either by date or Label Cloud.

WHISTLEBLOWERS

I wonder which movie producer is already planning the Julian Assange biopic ? Who'd be in the shortlist of actors to play the guy who is currently holed up in the London embassy of Ecuador, resisting return to Sweden to face some rather mild questions on his sexual demands of a couple of Swedish women? I doubt that Assange is afraid of Swedish questioning techniques, though he could well wish to avoid the risk of Sweden, when done with him, sending him to the USA to answer charges of leaking information via his organisation, Wikileaks - whistleblowing to put it another way.

Link to my post from December 2010 touching on Julian Assange and related astrology.

I can visualise the movie: fictionalised in places - lots of poetic licence, a few sweaty sex scenes, some nice shots of Swedish landscapes, a dramatic stand-off.... It would join others of the same ilk:

Daniel Ellsberg/The Pentagon Papers. In 1971, he was the State Department officer who gave the "Pentagon Papers" (history of the United States’ political-military involvement in Vietnam 1945-1967) to the New York Times.

Karen Silkwood/Silkwood – in 1974, she was a blue-collar worker who raised concerns about plutonium plant safety. Unfortunately she died under mysterious circumstances after she started investigating claims of irregularities and wrongdoing at the Kerr-McGee plant. The 1983 film Silkwood is an account of Silkwood's life and the story.

Other famous whistleblowers, not necessarily subjects of movies listed HERE.

We very recently watched the DVD of a 2011 movie called simply The Whistleblower. I bought it as David Strathairn, whose films I'm collecting, plays a fairly minor but pivotal part. It's the story of Kathryn Bolkovac, a former US police investigator from Nebraska. She worked as a U.N. International Police Force monitor. Originally hired by the US company DynCorp in the framework of a U.N.-related contract, she filed a lawsuit in the UK against DynCorp for unfair dismissal due to a protected disclosure (whistleblowing), and on 2 August 2002 the tribunal unanimously found in her favor. DynCorp had a $15 million contract to hire and train police officers for duty in Bosnia at the time she reported such officers were paying for prostitutes and participating in sex-trafficking - of children as well as adults. Many of these were forced to resign under suspicion of illegal activity, but none have been prosecuted, as they also enjoy immunity from prosecution in Bosnia.

I'll wait patiently for the Assange movie then. There'll be a few more twists in the plot though, before the cameras start to roll - we can count on that!