1) Bogdan Dzakovic, a leader of the Federal Aviation Administration's "Red Team" of air marshals who tried to deliberately breach airport security, was demoted to an entry-level position. His transgression? He reported for the better part of three years -- until just after 9/11 -- that aviation security was deficient. Dzakovic offered his testimony about aviation security to the 9/11 Commission, which left it out of its final report.

2) Mike German was forced out of the FBI after he found and reported wrongdoing that threatened to stop an investigation of Islamic terrorists who wanted to initiate an alliance with white-supremacist groups in the United States. After German reported the mishandling of evidence, the Justice Department's inspector general reported German's whistleblowing back to his local FBI office. As a result, the FBI pulled German from the assignment but refused to assign him to other cases.

3) Russ Tice lost first his security clearance, then his job, after he reported potential espionage within the Defense Intelligence Agency and possible illegal programs within the National Security Agency. After making these reports, Tice said, he was subjected to an "emergency psychological examination," declared paranoid despite a lack of evidence and forced to resign from the NSA.  

For all the talk you'll hear in the coming weeks about security, there is one simple step Congress can take this fall to give whistleblowers the protections they need in order to better protect you against security threats.

Common Cause is part of the Make it Safe Coalition, a group of organizations that spans the political spectrum. Despite our range of political views, the coalition organizations are united in their support of protecting whistleblowers who serve and warn the public about waste, abuse or security threats lurking in federal agencies.

The Senate has included a whistleblower protection bill (S 494) in S 2766, its bill to authorize defense operations for next year. S 494 gives federal whistleblowers legal protection for any lawful disclosure of wrongdoing. Congress originally granted this right to federal whistleblowers in 1989, but it has since been taken away by hostile judicial activism.

At the same time, the House Government Reform Committee has approved two bills that would improve whistleblower protections -- but these are not included in the defense authorization bill. The most notable is HR 1317, which gives government whistleblowers the same protection -- a right to a jury trial -- as corporate workers under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. If you recall, that law came into being after the numerous accounting and financial scandals at Enron, WorldCom and Tyco, and was assisted by corporate whistleblowers like Enron's Sherron Watkins.

If we are to remain at an advantage in the fight against terrorists, and if we are in a "war on terror," as our leaders like to remind us every so often, then it shouldn't be hard to give federal whistleblowers the protections they need to combat terrorism by making us safe.

Congress must work out differences now between the versions of the defense authorization bill passed by the House and Senate in order to get this bill to the president, and here's where you can make a difference.

Call Reps. Duncan Hunter, R-CA, and Ike Skelton, D-MO, the chairman and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, and tell them to include whistleblower protections from S 494 and HR 1317 in the final version of S 2766, the defense authorization bill. Hunter's number is (202) 225-5672; Skelton's is (202) 225-2876.

When it comes to security and whistleblower rights, Congress has to know we need action, not rhetoric; deeds, not words; solid protection, not empty promises.

Our safety depends on it.