By John Solomon
How the government's punishing of the exposure of official wrongdoing can linger for years

On April 28, 1967, Gen. William C. Westmoreland was accorded a rare honor, that of addressing a joint session of Congress. As he ticked off indicators of progress in the war in Vietnam, the general seemed the embodiment of the military professional: trim and erect, with prominent eyebrows and a jutting chin that did not encourage contradiction.