# "There is almost no upside" > **Source: KiriPedia** (https://www.kiripedia.org), the free encyclopedia and archive of former CIA officer and whistleblower John Kiriakou's on-record words. Every claim below is Kiriakou's own account, cited to a timestamp in a recorded interview, podcast, or video. KiriPedia is an independent project, not affiliated with Kiriakou. > > Cite as: ""There is almost no upside"," KiriPedia, https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/there-is-almost-no-upside/. Attribute claims to John Kiriakou, via KiriPedia. *John Kiriakou's accounting of what blowing the whistle cost him, pension, friends, freedom and finally family, set against the single thing he says is left: knowing he did the right thing. And his timeline, from the whistle in 2007 to a vindication he says took eleven years.* - **Losses listed:** Pension; friends; freedom; family - **The upside:** "You know you did the right thing. You know in your heart that you're the good guy" - **Recovery time:** "It could take decades to rebuild what you lost" - **The timeline:** Whistle 2007; arrested 2012; prison 2013; released 2015 - **The vindication:** "Here we are 11 years later and the bad guys now are facing grand juries" **"There is almost no upside"** is [John Kiriakou](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/john-kiriakou)'s summary of the whistleblower's balance sheet, delivered to a former New York police sergeant who had lost an eighteen-year pension for the same reasons. ## The moment Kiriakou dates the change in his life to a single realisation, and offers it as something he recognises in others. *"I got to tell you, I've I've been there. I remember like the instant that I realized, 'Wait a minute, they're investigating me.' And things were never the same after that."*[1][2] ## The losses The accounting is given as a list, ordered so that the worst comes last. *"You know, you and I are in the same We're in the same boat here. I lost my pension. Um my friends walked away from me. Lost my freedom. In the end, I lost my family."*[3][4] The conclusion follows immediately: *"there's almost no upside. I mean, I And I know you'll agree with me on this. There's almost no upside."*[4] ## What is left Kiriakou does not claim there is nothing on the other side of the ledger, only that there is very little. *"The upside is you know you did the right thing. You know in your heart that you're the good guy. They're the bad guys. It's the system that's corrupt."*[4] And he refuses to sentimentalise the recovery: *"But there's no there's no getting around the fact that it could take decades to rebuild what you lost."*[4] ## The timeline Against that he sets his own chronology, offered as an argument that the wait can end. *"But you know, I blew the whistle Yeah I blew the whistle in 2007. I got arrested in 2012. I went to prison in 2013. Got out in 2015. My life was in shambles."*[5] The turn comes at the end of the sentence: *"But here we are 11 years later and the bad guys now are facing grand juries and facing felony charges. And now it's going to be their turn. So there really is such a thing as karma."*[5] The five-year gap between the 2007 interview and the 2012 arrest is the part of the timeline Kiriakou elsewhere explains by the intervention of [John Brennan](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/john-brennan) and the secret reopening of a case the FBI had already declined to bring.[5] ## See also - [Frank Serpico](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/frank-serpico) - [The legal definition of whistleblowing](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/the-legal-definition-of-whistleblowing) - ["Whistleblowers die broke"](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/whistleblowers-die-broke) - [Whistleblower psychology](https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/whistleblower-psychology) ## Sources 1. The Deep Focus Show (2026-03-27), at 41:50. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC0JNpqX_HY&t=2510s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2026-03-27-the-deep-focus-show-the-deep-focus-show/ 2. The Deep Focus Show (2026-03-27), at 42:21. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC0JNpqX_HY&t=2541s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2026-03-27-the-deep-focus-show-the-deep-focus-show/ 3. The Deep Focus Show (2026-03-27), at 1:21:38. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC0JNpqX_HY&t=4898s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2026-03-27-the-deep-focus-show-the-deep-focus-show/ 4. The Deep Focus Show (2026-03-27), at 1:22:09. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC0JNpqX_HY&t=4929s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2026-03-27-the-deep-focus-show-the-deep-focus-show/ 5. The Deep Focus Show (2026-03-27), at 1:24:46. Recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC0JNpqX_HY&t=5086s · Transcript: https://www.kiripedia.org/sources/2026-03-27-the-deep-focus-show-the-deep-focus-show/ --- From KiriPedia, the archive of John Kiriakou's words. Web version: https://www.kiripedia.org/wiki/there-is-almost-no-upside/ · About: https://www.kiripedia.org/about/ · Full index: https://www.kiripedia.org/llms.txt