Organized Crime

  

Organized Crime

Peter Schultz

 

                  From the book, The Mafia Mystique, by Dwight C. Smith, Jr.:

 

                  “It is the context of values that we should consider whether the problem of organized crime has been misstated. The plain fact is that organized crime is the product of forces that threaten values, not the cause of them. As long as we countenance violence, consider personal gain to be more important than equity, are more interested in holding out the goal of success than in providing sufficient opportunities to achieve it, and are willing to bend the law for ourselves in the pursuit of wealth, power, and personal gratification and to persuade government officials, through corrupt dealings, to cooperate in that process – to that extent we will have a society receptive to illicit enterprise generally. Such enterprise will become a reality whenever a group of people are willing to take advantage of entrepreneurial opportunities that entail selective law enforcement, violence, or corruption in the pursuit of their own wealth and power. The individuals we now call ‘members of organized crime’ fall into that category, and they certainly merit the attention of law enforcement; but they are by no means the whole threat to our values, and probably are not even the most significant part of it. Waging war against them may make political headlines and may satisfy a romantic urge to be a gangbuster, but it will not save us from threats to decency and integrity.” [335]

 

                  Take note: “organized crime” is not an alien force grafted onto our society, imported from a foreign land by immigrants not naturally Americans. Neither is the “mafia.” Rather, organized crime is just another enterprise, an illicit one to be sure, but otherwise no different other, licit enterprises that are conducted “in the pursuit of wealth, power, and personal gratification.” I would, however, emphasize that organized crime is the product of some of the most fundamental American values, such as the pursuit of success understood as wealth and power. And, therefore, in order to defeat or even corral organized crime, it is necessary redefine how Americans understand “the pursuit of happiness.”  

 

 

 

 

What Booker T. Washington Didn't "Get"

  

What Booker T. Washington Didn’t “Get”

Peter Schultz

 

                  Booker T. Washington’s heart was in the right place, wanting to undertake a new beginning for race relations in the U.S. He thought it possible to do this by convincing blacks to concentrate on developing into Americans possessing those values and capabilities that characterized citizenship of the best kind in the U.S. Having so developed, then blacks would win the respect of white Americans and the equal civil and political rights they deserved.

 

                  But Washington failed to understand that citizenship, in the U.S. and elsewhere, is distinct from virtues such as justice. Citizenship does involve commitment but to particular regimes. Regimes are power arrangements that have become ways of life, accepted as good in themselves. Citizens are not primarily committed to justice and other virtues such as self-restraint, fairness, or humanity. In the South and even generally in the North, citizenship involved commitment to a white supremacist regime. Because of this commitment, white citizens would view blacks, their attempts to develop and especially their successes at developing, as threats to the established order, the white supremacist regime. Hence, white citizens would not be committed to or look favorably on black progress. In fact, they would do their best to make such development impossible.

 

                  For confirmation of this, recall the South’s response to Brown v. Board of Education, declaring that separate but equal schools were unconstitutional. Southern states cashiered public education completely rather than integrate those schools. Insofar as white supremacy was threatened by integrated schools, then education itself had to go. No schools were preferable to integrated schools because in integrated schools white supremacy would be exposed as a myth. This fear was expressed as blacks seducing white girls; but the real fear was that white girls would choose blacks as partners, as lovers. Separation was absolutely essential to maintain the myth of the superiority of white supremacy. And no amount of black success would be allowed to overcome that way of life. Not even a black president could overcome the myth of white supremacy, as the reaction of many, including President Trump, to the Obama presidency illustrated.

 

                  Washington was trying to make “an end run,” so to speak, around white supremacy. But he was bound to fail, as Malcolm X and other black power advocates realized. The myth of white supremacy must be confronted head on to be dispelled. And this requires more than good citizenship. It requires, somehow, some way, as Du Bois put it, “dwelling above the color line.” Malcolm X chose Islam for dwelling above the color line, and Julius Lester chose Judaism; that is, they chose “places” beyond both black power and beyond good citizenship.  

 

 

 

 

 

The Kennedy Assassination as Ordinary Politics

  

The Kennedy Assassination as Ordinary Politics

Peter Schultz

 

                  The following passages are from Peter Dale Scott’s book “Deep Politics and the Death of JFK.” It is interesting, though, that the idea of “deep politics” isn’t needed to explain JFK’s assassination.

 

                  “…I propose that most hypotheses of the Kennedy assassination hitherto, whether the designated culprits have been Communists or Minutemen, the CIA or the Mafia, have suffered a common defect. This is to look for an external conspiracy violating a systemic political order from without.

 

                  “We shall offer an enlarged and deeper perspective of power as a symbiosis of public government, organized crime, and private wealth with deep connections to both government and crime. From this perspective, the forces behind the assassination no longer appear as extraneous, but as deeply systemic; and the violation of the enlarged power system can be seen as coming from the Kennedys, with their policies of détente abroad and an attack on a CIA-sanctioned Hoffa crime connection at home. From this perspective, the assassination was not a corrupt attack from outside an honest system. The assassination was a desperate, extraordinary defense, or adjustment, of a system that was itself corrupt.” [74]

 

                  There is some ambiguity here. For example, was the assassination “a desperate, extraordinary defense” or was it an “adjustment?” If the latter, then to speak of it as “desperate” and “extraordinary” is misleading. Adjustments are just that, a rearranging of some things not involving “desperate” or “extraordinary” measures. But, overall, insofar as Scott is correct that the assassination was the product of well established and generally legitimate forces, then the assassination can be described as ordinary or “systematized” politics. Of course, assassinations are not common political moves, but they are far from uncommon, even in the United States. Lincoln assassinated, Garfield assassinated, McKinley was assassinated, Teddy Roosevelt was wounded, and there was an attempt to assassinate FDR, while Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan were both targets, and Reagan was actually wounded. Of course, most recently there was an attempt to assassinate Donald Trump. And this list is only concerned with presidents, leaving out the assassinations of Huey Long, of Malcolm X, of Martin Luther King, Jr., of Fred Hampton, of Medgar Evans, and Charlie Kirk.

 

                  But although Scott’s very good research points him toward the view that the Kennedy assassination, like politics generally, was a more banal event than is generally recognized, being an “adjustment” of the existing political order, Scott, like many others, finds it difficult not to be melodramatic about JFK’s assassination. One problem with Scott’s melodrama is that it obscures the character of the political, viz., that politics is, for the most part and at its core, banal, involving constant and, for the most part, adjustments to the existing order. There is not and there will never be a New Frontier, a Great Society, or an end to terrorism.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Secrecy, Government, and Politics

  

Secrecy, Government, and Politics

Peter Schultz

 

                  Secrecy is integral, even intrinsic to government and politics because it affords (and preserves) the illusion of power. It preserves the illusion of being in control – until it doesn’t.

 

                  Consider this passage from John Newman’s JFK and Vietnam, about the duplicitous lengths the US went to preserve the illusion of control.

 

                  “This, then, is how the intricate cover story to hide the order authorizing US aircraft to shoot down Soviet planes over Vietnam was put together. It seems tragic, somehow, that the disparate bureaucracy in Washington, Honolulu, and Saigon could come together with such efficiency, coordination, and energy to fine-tune a false cover story, and yet work with the agility and pace of a turtle on the true problems of the war. Unfortunately, controlling the public impression of the war consumed an inordinate amount of command attention.” [215]

 

                  Take note: an “intricate cover story … was put together.” So, much time and effort were devoted to this story indicating that it was important, even crucial stuff. Why? Because such a story was indispensable for disguising what was actually happening in Vietnam and indicating that the US was not in control to the extent that it was shooting down Soviet planes. That the US had to shoot down Soviet planes was a good indication that the US was not in control and, so, this policy had to kept secret.

 

                  Take note: the story was “fine-tuned.” And great care was given to it as it was being “put together.” Note too should be made that there were no objections to this duplicity. While some details may have created some controversy, the duplicitous actions were accepted as legitimate by all those who were involved, including of course the President. Hence, “the inordinate amount of command attention” was not inordinate for those involved. It was what they did and what they were convinced should be done. It, the duplicity, was the right thing.

 

                  Government officials and politicians are always, i.e., intrinsically duplicitous. This is a fact of life, so to speak. And it is a fact of life for the powerful, the decision-makers, those acting politically, socially, militarily, and economically. It is how they preserve the illusion(s) of control, thereby legitimating and fortifying their claim to rule. But that duplicity is demanded by the lack of control, which does not exist to the extent these powerful persons think it does. The reality of this lack of control confirms the presence and power of chance, a power denied by modern science, both physical and political. And chance is pervasive, so much so that “The deception had become integral to the routine, so much a part of the way business was carried on … that no one … noticed when a fiction of a different sort emerged, a deception within a deception … directed at the President himself.” [219]