The news is dominated by "the whistleblower," the CIA officer who reported to the CIA Inspector General (IG) that President Donald Trump may have committed a crime during a conversation with the president of Ukraine. I've been fascinated by the story for a couple of reasons. 

First, as a whistleblower and a former CIA officer, I know what must have been going through the guy's mind as he was coming to the decision to make a report on the president of the United States. That is, if he is a real whistleblower. 

If he's a whistleblower, and not a CIA plant whose task it is to take down the president, then his career is probably over. Intelligence agencies only pay lip service to whistleblowing. A potential whistleblower is supposed to go through the chain of command as the current whistleblower did. If an employee has evidence of waste, fraud, abuse, illegality, or threats to the public health or public safety, he is supposed to go to the Inspector General. The IG, then is supposed to go to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). And when the DNI investigates and finds the complaint credible, he then takes it to the House and Senate Intelligence Committees. That sounds straightforward, but it's not.

The Case of Thomas Drake

Look at the cautionary case of Thomas Drake, a senior NSA officer who blew the whistle on warrantless wiretapping of American citizens in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. Drake went to the NSA inspector general, where he got no satisfaction. He then went to the NSA general counsel and then to the Defense Department inspector general. The DOD IG actually destroyed the evidence that Tom had brought to them. So, when nothing happened there, he went to the House Intelligence Committee. All of this was done through the proper channels. 

For his trouble, Drake was rewarded with 10 felony indictments, including five counts of espionage. Of course, he hadn't committed espionage, and the case eventually fell apart, but not until his life was ruined — personally, professionally and financially.

So even if he is a legitimate whistleblower, the CIA officer who contacted the IG on Trump will never be trusted internally again. The view in Langley will be, "If he's willing to rat out the president of the United States, he'd be willing to rat out all of us."

 (In my own case, where I blew the whistle on the CIA's torture program, I didn't — and couldn't — go through the chain of command because my chain of command had created the torture program. I couldn't go to Congress because Congress was in on the program. They had approved it and financed it. My only alternative was to go to the media.)