Thread by @TheRealHoarse

About five or six years ago or so, I was working with a small firm as partners on a long-term client project.

I discovered that the two senior guys from the partner firm were cheating our client.

Basically skimming money by getting a backend cut of inflated vendor bills.

1/

I had helped write our agreement with the client. I considered myself a point of trust. The partners were defrauding the client - and me knowing meant I could be either a tacit accomplice or a whistleblower.

I ain’t no fucking accomplice, so I consulted an attorney...

2/

The partnership and client relationship were important to me.

They were 90% of my income.

I figured I could blow the whistle on the partner firm and the client would likely fire them and possibly hire me back directly.

3/

The attorney walked me through what I’d have to do to blow the whistle and insulate myself from potential liability:

- abandon the partnership
- walk away from all business with the client then and in the future

So, basically, lose the income I needed to pay my mortgage...
4/

...and walk away from a relationship that was contracted to provide that income for years to come.

The attorney’s point was:

If you want to be a clean whistleblower, there can be nothing in it for you. Nothing. Not then. Not in the future. Never.

Total walk away.

5/

So, I did that.

Called the client. Dropped the dime on the frauds in carefully prepared language.

Hung up the phone on basically creating a major life problem for myself.

The income loss messed up my life badly with long effects but I slept like a lamb.

6/

I say all this because Miles Taylor just outed himself as Anonymous today.

People will debate how much of a saint or sinner he may be and whether he can or can’t be trusted.

And I’m hesitant to take shots at someone whose actions may help in some way...

7/

But I’ll say this from having faced a “Do I blow the whistle at high personal cost?” crossroads:

1) It wasn’t a difficult decision.

The consequences were hard. The decision was not.

We allow members of the Trump World to act like having character is heroic.

8/

Remember the Gold Star father, Khizr Khan?

When asked why he spoke out against Trump, he said “Because it is my duty.”

I. Get. That.

Life chooses us sometimes. It puts us in moments where there is right and wrong and no gray in between save for your personal convenience.

9/

Miles Taylor may be a good guy. He might be a great guy. He may be a saint.

But what I can’t reconcile is that when faced with a call to duty, he chose a path where there *was* something in it for him.

10/

He insulated himself in his own mind from the bad actors he worked alongside every day.

He gathered anonymous praise from the public.

He wrote a book.

He benefitted.

11/

And while I didn’t like the advice that attorney gave me, he was right and I knew it.

You do it the right way - the cleanest way - so there can be no question of motive.

And if your driver is really doing the right thing, that’s what you care about. The right thing.

12/

I happen to be proud of having had one of those moral gut-checks and having had the right choice be the only choice.

I happen to feel good about that.

And it rubs me wrong that Miles Taylor is holding out a basket and collecting things here. Praise, book sales, etc.

13/

The irony is that something about him chafed me even before today’s revelation.

He was a little too eager to be seen as “good” for having been in opposition to “bad”.

14/

I didn’t consider myself “good” for blowing the whistle on my former partners.

I considered it my duty.

That’s it.

You do your duty. That’s it.

15/

You won’t see any cheering for Miles Taylor from me.

Being in the room where the bad things happened; belatedly blowing the whistle; deriving benefits; and then singing your own praises... yeah, that’s nothing I see as honorable.

Sorry. It’s just doesn’t impress me. At all.

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