a news powerhouse
The NSA is bracing for a major threat as Glenn Greenwald and his team of hard-hitting journalists prepare to unleash a frontal attack on the system and its corrupt ways with a news site financed by a billionaire advocate of government accountability.
Pierre M. Omidyar
Pierre Omidyar, founder of eBay, is reported to have put up $250 million to get the as-yet-unnamed news organization
off the ground. The French-born Iranian-American established the Democracy Fund, which finances "social entrepreneurs working to ensure that the political system is responsive to the public."
Glenn Greenwald
Glenn Greenwald used his Guardian position to awaken America and the world to the disturbing content of secret materials spirited out of the NSA by whistleblower Edward Snowden. Previously, Greenwald wrote for Salon. The award-winning journalist is a trained constitutional lawyer.
Greenwald background
http://www.omidyargroup.com/pov/author/ggreenwald
Omidyar, whose Twitter messages display great concern about NSA surveillance, is estimated to have a financial worth of $8.5 billion. At present six corporations control more than 90 percent of U.S. media. Omidyar's presence brings another major voice to the U.S. media market, making it more difficult for these corporations to cooperate to play down or spike unwelcome stories.
The Guardian's U.S. edition, with Greenwald reporting on Edward Snowden's leaks, had already undermined the somewhat strained gentlemen's agreement between U.S. intelligence agencies and domestic media to ignore various stories.
Omidyar's organization will doubtless come under fire as a hotbed of leftism. Yet many of the issues raised by these reporters should be of concern to all Americans. It is certainly true that many libertarians have found common cause with liberals and leftists on the issue of transforming America into a national security surveillance state.
The Obama administration seems to have been lulled into a false sense of security with respect to the press, evidently believing that being on acceptable terms with the media cartel's owners made it immune to real scrutiny. But news crusading is a time-honored American tradition, intelligence system oppression or no.
Others on the Omidyar news team:
Laura Poitras
Laura Poitras says she was placed on Homeland Security's watchlist, with a maximum "threat rating," and harassed by U.S. operatives after
her award-winning documentary "My Country, My Country" aired.
The film portrays life in Iraq for average Iraqis under U.S. occupation.
Poitras has been working with Der Spiegel in Germany and other publications on the Snowden leaks, she says.
She and Greenwald are the only journalists to have the entire trove of NSA files, Poitras says.
N.Y. Times article on Poitras
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/18/magazine/laura-poitras-snowden.html
Poitras background
http://www.omidyargroup.com/pov/author/lpoitras
Dan Froomkin
Dan Froomkin is contributing editor of Nieman Reports, and the former senior Washington correspondent for the Huffington Post. He wrote the White House Watch column for the Washington Post website from 2004 to 2009, and was editor of the site from 2000 to 2003.
Froomkin urges press to fight secrecy
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-froomkin/its-time-for-the-press-to_b_3455229.html
Froomkin background
http://www.omidyargroup.com/pov/author/dfroomkin
Jeremy Scahill
Jeremy Scahill reported on national security for the Nation magazine. His book "Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army" won the George Polk Book Award. His newest book is "Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield" was published by Nation Books in April.
Scahill background
http://www.omidyargroup.com/pov/author/jscahill
Liliana Segura
Liliana Segura, another veteran of the Nation, where she had been an associate editor, has written a number of reports on domestic injustices, including one on the prison business. She has also written for AlterNet and ColorLines.
On prison profiteers
http://www.thenation.com/prison-profiteers
Segura background
http://www.omidyargroup.com/pov/author/lsegura/
Jefferson Airplane performs 'Revolution'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_0sg0XDfmg
Pressure builds in Germany to help Snowden
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/03/germany-edward-snowden-asylum
but Chancellor Angela Merkel's problem is that her own intelligence service is opposed to such a move and she is under heavy pressure from President Obama to treat Snowden as a criminal. One wouldn't expect Washington officials to admit to the criminal nature of their stealth attack on the Constitution. They aren't criminals, they claim, because judges and lawyers secretly said the ripoff was OK.
Greenwald's temporary blog link unresponsive
Greenwald's temporary Google Blogger blog "has been removed," according to Google. Greenwald had said he planned to keep that blog in being. Understandably, the blog may conflict with his new editorial position. However, it might be helpful if the content of that blog were reposted elsewhere, presumably at his new employer's site.
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