PJ will get the last laugh

I got a call today from an old client and good friend up in Watertown NY.  When I first began my consulting practice PJ was one of my first clients and I think I learned quite a bit from him on how to and how not to run a business.  PJ wondered if I was OK as he hadn't seen me blog in awhile.  I forget sometimes its not just the 25 people with an interest in ethics in Albany that read the blog there are others out there. 

And sure enough the more I thought about PJ the memories of his fight with the regulators up in Watertown came flooding back, especially the missed opportunity to file an ethics complaint against PJ's chief tormenter, the head of the AG's Watertown office, John T Sullivan. 

In what has become standard operating procedure for me now when I first started with PJ I did a background on Sullivan.  And lo and behold found out that he had bought a car from one of PJ's companies and got a sweetheart financing deal from Honda, way better than his credit deserved.  There were even records and notes showing that with his spotty credit history he had no business getting this deal and that his position in NY State government was a big reason for it.

My instinct was to file the complaint with the old PIC showing an illegal gift a violation of the Public Officer's Law but nooooooooo we were all afraid of how the then AG would react if we criticized Mr. Sullivan.  So the bullet never got loaded and the trigger never got pulled.  You live and learn.

And then I saw Mr. Sullivan is still kicking around, he left the AG and went to the Medicaid IG and then retired and now lives in Saratoga Springs where last week he penned an op ed telling his old boss at the AG our present Governor how to be governor.  4 concrete suggestions that read more like concrete criticisms of the governor. 

Talk about biting the hand that protected you. You have no idea how lucky you were John.  Had it been up to me you would have been under oath explaining how you got that deal on that Honda.

By the way for those 25 people in Albany that read the blog or more specifically anyone around the gov  I still have all the records on Mr. Sullivan's sweetheart financing if you are looking for a little payback on the ungrateful Mr. Sullivan give me a call.

And John count your lucky stars that PJ is a gentleman had I seen you in that bar in Sackets Harbor you would have gotton bitchslapped, metaphorically of course.