WHO WILL BLOW A WHISTLE IN BEHALF OF A WHISTLE-BLOWER?

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000504160001-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 21, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: February 20, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

i Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000504160001-8
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR
20 February 1985
Who willblow a whistle in behalf
of a whistle- blower? MELVINMADDOCKS
T F you want to tell the Internal Revenue Service that
your neighbor is cheating on his income tax, the
A. government will treat you as a public-spirited
citizen, rewarding you with 10 percent of whatever it
collects from the rascal's audit.
If, on the other hand, you want to tell the Proper
Authorities about a violation of the regulations for nu-
clear safety perhaps, or toxic waste disposal maybe,
watch out! An employee who, as they say, blows the
whistle on an employer in the interests of preventing
another Three-Mile Island or Bhopal may, as they also
say, get canned - and with no assurance at the mo-
ment that he or she will be reinstated.. .
The cautionary example for all those about to purse
their lips and give a little tootle is a safety inspector
dismissed from his job after informing his employer of
what he judged to be flawed welding at the Comanche
Peak nuclear plant, under construction near Glen
Rose, Texas. After hearing the case, the Labor Depart-
ment awarded the inspector reinstatement, back pay,
and legal fees. But a United States Court of Appeals
has overturned the decision, ruling that the inspector
was eligible for protection only if he reported the al-
leged violations to the government.
In fact, the rules of the NuclearRegulatory Com-
mission instruct safety inspectors to report hazards to
their employers first, and then to the government only
if the employer takes no action. But since the Labor
Department, as of this writing, has not appealed the
case, the safety inspector from Comanche Peak is now
dangling, like the whistle he may wish.he.had never
blown.
Better he had charged somebody - anybody -
with tax evasion.
Who will blow the whistle in behalf of a whistle
blower?
Our very unsafe safety inspector is the victim of the
law of thermopolitical dynamics, which goes like this:
If a less powerful person or group makes things hot for
a more powerful person or group, that person or group
is likely to make things an awful lot hotter for junior.
The whistle-blower also runs a subtler risk of ostra- I
cism. Life is made not only infernally hot, but just a lit-
tle shameful. From school days on, the alternative -
terms for whistle-blowing are pronounced mostly with
a curled lip of disdain. One tattles. One snitches. One
sings. One squeals. One informs.
The dreadful image of Benedict Arnold hangs like a
dark hint in the air.
. Loyalty - the virtue of men-in-groups - is silently
invoked. Even if a whistle-blower proves correct, he is
seen as a troublemaker, a rocker-of-boats - definitely
not a team-player.
Ask the lonely heroes in the General Accounting Of-
fice who've been blowing whistles on government
waste all these years.
But at the very time that whistle-blowing is being
made difficult for the Little Guy, the Big Guy seems to
be blowing his whistle all over.
The C'IA for the first tie is being allowed to con.
duct'"covert activities" within the United States.
The FBI as n given extra athtu a or practicing
surveillance, according to new "domestic security"
guidelines... - _ . _ - - _ - - -
The National Crime Information Center has set up
a computer file to maintain watch on citizens loosely
described as "anti-authority or anti-law enforcement."
The use of the lie detector as a personnel-screening
device is increasing. = - , What else are these acts of vigilance but a kind of
reverse whistle-blowing by the state, playing safety in-
spector in matters far less definable than the manufac-
ture of nuclear energy or the disposal of toxic waste?
It is one thing to blow the whistle on a flaw in the
welding. It is another thing to blow the whistle on an
"anti-authority" idea or an "anti-law" attitude of the
heart. How the whistles would shrill for Henry
Thoreau! - -
Nobody is against vigilance, but a balance of whis-
tle-blowing power ought to be zealously maintained. If
a state dispenses less and less information about its
own operations while demanding more and more infor-
mation about its citizens, sooner or later democracy
will be in trouble, as Thoreau would be the first to
point out.
Whistle-blowers should not be exempt from whis-
tles being blown on them. But they must be respected
precisely because they are inconvenient. Socrates, also
known as a gadfly, and Jeremiah, also known as a
prophet, were whistle-blowers. _
The whistle-blower is the person we appoint in our
best moments to keep us honest at our worst moments,
and in the moments in between, we must do our best to
remember that.
r.. ?AWednesday and Friday_ealamn?
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/21 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000504160001-8