As the US manager of a small office of a large Australian media company in New York in 1981 I had about five seconds to decide what side I was on. I was told one morning by Pat, the personal aide to Kerry Packer, the president of the company (and major shareholder) who was visiting from Sydney, to get $10,000 in cash from the bank account in hundred-dollar bills and take them to his hotel suite a couple of blocks away from our office at Madison and 49th. I knew from company chatter over the years that he liked to…