Mark Udall's Loss Is a Blow for Privacy, But He Can Go Out with a Bang: 'Leak' the CIA Torture Repor

[KoKo]

The outgoing Senator and champion of civil liberties has one last chance to read the truth about American atrocities out loud, for the world to see – before it’s too late
by
Trevor Timm

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/nov/05/mark-udall-loss-privacy-cia-torture-report

America’s rising civil liberties movement lost one of its strongest advocates in the US Congress on Tuesday night, as Colorado’s Mark Udall lost his Senate seat to Republican Cory Gardner. While the election was not a referendum on Udall’s support for civil liberties (Gardner expressed support for surveillance reform, and Udall spent most of his campaign almost solely concentrating on reproductive issues), the loss is undoubtedly a blow for privacy and transparency advocates, as Udall was one of the NSA and CIA’s most outspoken and consistent critics. Most importantly, he sat on the intelligence committee, the Senate’s sole oversight board of the clandestine agencies, where he was one of just a few dissenting members.

But Udall’s loss doesn’t have to be all bad. The lame-duck transparency advocate now has a rare opportunity to truly show his principles in the final two months of his Senate career and finally expose, in great detail, the secret government wrongdoing he’s been criticizing for years. On his way out the door, Udall can use congressional immunity provided to him by the Constitution’s Speech and Debate clause to read the Senate’s still-classified 6,000-page CIA torture report into the Congressional record – on the floor, on TV, for the world to see.

There’s ample precedent for this. In 1971, former Senator Mike Gravel famously read the top-secret classified Pentagon Papers for three hours before almost collapsing and then entering thousands of pages more into the record after he couldn’t speak for any longer from exhaustion.

In fact, Udall and his nearly lone partner in transparency, Senator Ron Wyden, have received criticism for not using this floor privilege before, including very recently when director Laura Poitras, on tour for her new documentary about Edward Snowden, said Wyden and others “failed the public” by not coming out and openly saying in 2011 that the NSA had secretly re-interpreted the Patriot Act to collect every American’s phone records. In many ways, Snowden let them off the hook.

Read the full article at the Guardian.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/nov/05/mark-udall-loss-privacy-cia-torture-report

[JI7]

1. Udall is a third wayer

[KoKo]

2. Do you have a Link to this...that he is a "Third Wayer?"

Makes no sense since he jeopardized his his Candidacy by saying he KNEW MORE about the TORTURE REPORT ....and he was willing to REVEAL IT ALL.

And after he lost...PROGRESSIVE LEFT went AFTER HIM to "TELL IT ALL!:


How could Udall be a "Third Wayer" when he DECLARED his INTENTION? Which was PROGRESSIVE...to LET THE TRUTH OUT?

[JI7]

3. so why didn't all the liberals who don't vote because lack of liberal candidates come out to vote

for him ?

[KoKo]

5. I heard he ran a lackluster Campaign....and maybe he was just

SICK of the Political Games?

I have no idea what has happened to Dem Candidates...except the "Shadow Govt. Money" and that they are either threatened or sold their souls. It's hard to think of Udall doing that ....but, maybe it was Gerrymandering or our Dem Party OP'S didn't support him?

[liberal_at_heart]

4. He was good at exposing government agency abuse. I would love to see him

leak the CIA report before he leaves office.