The Two Bradleys

Dear Mr. President,

There’s always 2% who never get the word or can’t seem to get with the program. In your administration it appears to be the IRS. Your Injustice Department prosecutes a guy, Bradley Birkenfeld, for conspiring with wealthy investors to evade U.S. income taxes, he spends 2½ years in the clink and what does the IRS do? It gives him a $104 million whistle blower award for helping recover more than $5 billion in unpaid taxes by rich Americans who hid their money in illegal offshore blind trusts and other dodgy tax schemes that cheat the government out of an estimated $100 billion a year. (Is this why Mitt won’t show his tax returns? “Show us your tax returns!” could be a campaign theme, Mr. President. Think about it.) Yesterday I watched Amy Goodman (Democracy Now) interview one of Birkenfeld’s lawyers (Birkenfeld is prohibited by the government from giving interviews). I couldn’t believe the Kafkaesque nature of the case. I went back through last week’s New York Times and found an article about Birkenfeld and as I read it, the similarity to the way the government has treated another whistle-blower named Bradley, struck me. Although one reported a war crime and the other a financial crime, both went through a similar experience. Both reported crimes through proper channels, warning higher ups of illegal activity. Both were rebuffed and ignored and both, out of frustration, turned whistle-blower, answering to their conscience and instinctive sense of right and wrong. Both suffered for it with the Injustice Department persecuted and prosecuted Birkenfeld and the Defense Department Manning. Manning has been incarcerated in military prisons for more than 2 years, one of those years in solitary under conditions of torture and won’t go to trial until February 4, 2013. Birkenfeld served 2½ years and was released on August 1. But Birkenfeld will get $104 million, while Manning will get life. Bradley Birkenfeld helped—knowingly or inadvertently—members of the 1% cheat on taxes, robbing us individually and collectively of government services and assistance. Bradley Manning did his job too, analyzing information and helping target and kill “bad guys” until one day he discovered a helicopter gunship video of a war crime and could no longer do his job. This should be your moral conundrum, Mr. President, how to dispense justice fairly and honorably. It is not a moral conundrum to choose suspected insurgents for your kill list this week. Think about it.