The News Democrat, newspaper of Brown County, Ohio, has gotten the scoop on the August 8 deposition testimony of Sibel Edmonds, renowned FBI whistleblower. Both the transcript and video of the deposition are now available at the News Democrat website here:
http://newsdemocrat.com/...
Edmonds has been operating under a DOJ "state secrets" gag order, severely limiting release of information gleaned from her years as a Turkish and Farsi interpreter and expert for the FBI. Answering a supboena issued by the Ohio Elections Commission in the Schmidt v. Krikorian genocide denial case, Edmonds has now implicated numerous members of Congress in illicit influence-peddling schemes backed by the Turkish government.
The posting by the News Democrat brought an immediate response on the website from Ergun Kirlikovali, who fails to identify himself as president-elect of the Assembly of Turkish American Associations [ATAA], one of the lobbying groups implicated by Edmonds.
More below the fold.
See background on the Schmidt v. Krikorian case before the Ohio Elections Commission here: http://www.dailykos.com/...
See background on Sibel Edmonds's earth-shaking testimony in the case here: http://www.dailykos.com/...
See more on David Krikorian's campaign to unseat Jean Schmidt here:http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/7/13/752866/-OH-02:-Schmidt-Happened:-Challenger-Will-Clean-
Mean-Jeans-Clock
For coverage by the Dayton Daily News, "Political Flyer Headed to Court," see http://www.daytondailynews.com/...
I am still poring over the transcript and will be posting future diaries on the content. For now, I want to focus on the impact of this release on the effort to unseat Jean Schmidt in OH-02.
The decision by David Krikorian, the likely Democratic nominee to challenge Schmidt in 2010, to first release the deposition transcripts and video to newspapers in the district is a brilliant one. Additional district newspapers are expected to carry the material in coming days. It helps the ailing newspapers, it guarantees Krikorian front-page coverage, and it creates a huge local embarrassment for Schmidt, exposed as a shill for Turkish interests in a district that has practically no Turkish residents.
Voters in OH-02 will certainly wonder why their congressional representative is co-chair of the Congressional Turkish Caucus, why she led US representatives in contributions from Turkish interest groups in 2008, and why she now chooses to devote her energies to challenging true allegations made by Krikorian in the 2008 campaign.
The sensitivity and international importance of the Edmonds revelations is indicated by the two first comments posted on the News Democrat website. Here is the first response by Turkish apologist and Schmidt-supporter Ergun Kirlikovali, taking potshots at both Edmonds and Krikorian:
First the "octo-mom", now this weird "sibellydancer"... Sheesh! Give me a break! If you believe this shady woman, who is discredited and fired by FBI 7+ years ago and who is trying to get back to FBI payrolls since, then you can believe the world is flat.
Nothing she said is new and all tall tales. The real question is why "sibellydancer" now?
It is now because Krikorian, in a desperate attempt to disprove charges of libel he shamelessly leveled against an honorable Congresswoman Schmidt, is using anything that he thinks might help him and his sick cause of peddling a bogus genocide. But it is too little, too late. Krikorian made his bed, now he will have to lie in it. He will find out, the hard way, that the U.S. is a country of laws, not slanderous claims.
Armenians poisoned for decades the columns and screens in this country with their brand of racist and dishonest history. Now they are trying to close the door on fair-minded readers from finding out the deception behind the Armenian claims by pressuring search engines to censor Turkish views.
Myth substitutes facts. Politics voids scholarship. Perception replaces precision. Votes beat knowledge. Ill-informed editors regurgitate propaganda for quick pats on the shoulder. And a bogus genocide is marketed as the whole truth. A sad day for freedom of speech when the truth cannot be spoken for fear of being branded a genocide denier by outspoken genocide falsifiers, Krikorian being one of them.
Now here's an enlightening response to that letter posted by "JDA" (identity unknown to me):
Mr. Kirlikovali's childish and ineffective ridicule of the patriot Sibel Edmonds is bad enough that he is the incoming President Elect of the Assembly of Turkish American Associations [ATAA]is worse.
Worse still is that he has deposited unbelievably racist comments about Armenians and others throughout the internet under his own name, and the recent pen name "Norman Israel."
Nowhere in his sexist screed does Mr. Kirlikovali cite a single fact.
When you read his desperate name-calling, you are reading the official hate campaign by the Turkish American establishment in reaction to the sunlight brought by Sibel Edmonds to pervert our Republic.
As you might surmise, this isn't usual fare for the Brown County newspaper, where the typical scope of "world events" extends no farther than the boyhood home of Ulysses S. Grant. Realizing her error, Schmidt withrew four of nine counts of alleged "false statements" at a hearing before the Elections Commission earlier this month. Since the hearing, Schmidt's attorneys have attempted to withdraw additional counts, but Krikorian isn't letting her off the hook so easily. Schmidt will have to defend her allegations at a full hearing of the Commission in September.
As the campaign progresses, it's going to shake up the district more and more. My assessment is that Jean Schmidt's reign of error is just about done.
In lieu of condolences to those of us in OH-02, please support the Krikorian campaign through ActBlue at http://www.actblue.com/...