don and Al, brothers who never met. That we know of.
Al Capone was the most
famous gangster of the prohibition era. He was a ruthless murdering crime
boss whose downfall came from a small and insignificant breaking of the
law. If Al had had the inept Rudy Giuliani for a lawyer, he would never
have been brought down by the likes of the Federal Prosecutors on the small
charge. Eliot Ness got lucky.
But that was a different
era. They got “Al Brown” of the Bronx borough of New York on income tax
evasion. He died after serving time, his syphilis did him in, not his criminal empire that
had gripped Chicago and much of the rest of the nation.
And now, we have a
different kind of gangster. A con man, a deceiver of a magnitude Capone
could never have conceived of and we’re treating him the same way we treated
the anti-hero, Capone.
Throw stuff against the
wall and see what sticks. Plenty. But the “cops” who “got him” are
amateurs. They have no idea how to bring down a Mobster-Mastermind, which
precisely what trump is. (Neither did Giuliani, if you check his record as US
Attorney. Good thing he went into politics, because he had no future as a
lawyer as his current client shows.)
Yes, the Democratic
majority in the house of representatives impeached trump on two of a potential
11,356 possible counts. And maybe there’s more to come. Now, the totally nonpartisan United States
Senate will deliberate his fate for ten seconds and declare him “not guilty.”
After all, that phone call with the Ukraine president was … perfect.
And Chief Justice
Roberts will have no choice to pronounce the President as such. Delaying
the start of the trial sounds delicious. Let that hang over his head for a
while.
To be fair, trump is
more John Gotti than Capone. He doesn’t observe the kind of silence and grit
that Capone represented when questioned about his “associates,” as lawyers and
prosecutors call his groupies and lackeys.
Did you watch any of
that eight hour “debate” in the House on Wednesday? Screaming Republican
kindergarteners vs. boring self-righteous Democratic know it all frat boys and
girls.
New York Times columnist
Gail Collins worries in print that the crazy president will get even crazier
and do still more damage before he leaves office, which at some point he will
have to.
But what about Capone?
What would Al say to trump? Impossible to tell for sure, of course. But most likely it would be along the lines
of “Cancel the twitter account. Try to look more like a President. Hit a bucket or two of golf balls on a
driving range each morning. Don’t worry, pally, Americans have a collective
short term memory problem. If they can resuscitate my image, they can
resuscitate yours.”
I’m Wes Richards. My
opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
Comments? Please send to
wesrichards@gmail.com
© WJR 2019
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