Sands Casino Imploded

[William Kelly]

The Sands Casino in Atlantic City - So long, good bye, fairwell and good ridance.

I thought the implosion of the Sands would have all those who maintain the WTC imploded to have a look at a real implosion and compare the two.

As for the Sands, it was just built in 1980, not old enough to be historic, originally The Brighton, named after the really old hotel they tore down to build it.

The Brighton and the Sands, as it came to be called, was originally built by people affiliated with the Ocean City/Somers Point Golf Club, now Greate Bay, and was where Sinatra hung his hat and performed at the COPA Room.

I always wanted to have a benefit party for COPA in the COPA Room with Rat Pack impersonators.

Joey Bishop died within a day or two of the Sands Implosion, but few people noticed.

Atlantic City was home to Skinny D'Amato, John Martino, Jessica "Candy Jones" Wilcox and C.D. Ford, the CIA guy and suposed middleman in the Mafia plots.

According to Sly Hersh's "Dark Side of Camelot," D'Amato arranged for the West Virginia Sherriff's Association, who held their annual convention in Atlatnic City and were entertained at his 500 Club, to assit the JFK/LBJ ticket in the critical West Virginia primary.

D'Amato also ran the Cal-Neva Lodge for Sinatra and Giancana, and Atlantic City was suppose to be the scene of the great renomination party for JFK at the 1964 Democratic National Convention, but things just didn't turn out like they planned.

When the national press wrote about what a dump Atlantic City was, the old boardwalk hotels were 100 years old and the plumbing didn't all work - they approved casino gambling in 1976, using the old Havana hotel model.

Casinos were permitted in hotels with 500 rooms or more, and only Resort International's hotel, they bought the year before, qualified. Then came Bally and Casesars, all three of the first AC casinos being mob/syndicate connected.

The Sands was the smallest but with Sinatra it got that crowd.

The casino hotels, each with their own restaurants, bars, nightclubs, were self-contained entities, and they killed what was Old Atlantic City - Kentucky Avenue jazz, the fine restaurants, nice neighborhoods, and now its all casino glitz without a real soul.

Gone, but not forgotten.

BK

http:http://pressofatlanticcity.com/top_story/story/7510508p-740867

http://wwwhttp://www.casinocitytimes.com/n...ontentID=169285.

http://abclocal.go.com/wtvg/story?section=...2.html1c.html//

://http://wwwhttp://www.casinocitytime...1c.html//

Edited October 22, 2007 by William Kelly

[Michael Hogan]

The casino hotels, each with their own restaurants, bars, nightclubs, were self-contained entities, and they killed what was Old Atlantic City - Kentucky Avenue jazz, the fine restaurants, nice neighborhoods, and now its all casino glitz without a real soul.

Gone, but not forgotten.

In 1980, Burt Lancaster and Susan Sarandon starred in a Louis Malle directed film called Atlantic City.

I think Malle's film captured some of the flavor of Bill's post. Or vice versa.

A few excerpts from Amazon reviews:

....Louis Malle films are characterized by a tolerance of human differences, a deep psychological understanding, a gentle touch and an overriding sense of humanity. Atlantic City is no exception. What Malle is aiming at here is redemption. He wants to show how this pathetic old man finds self-respect (in an ironic way) and how the clam bar waitress might be liberated. But he also wants to say something about America, and he uses Atlantic City, New Jersey--the "lungs of Philadelphia," the mafia's playground, the New Yorker's escape, a slum by the sea "saved" (actually further exploited) by the influx of legalized gambling in the seventies--as his symbol. He begins with decadence and ends with renewal and triumph, and as usual, somewhere along the way, achieves something akin to the quality of myth. Even though he emphasizes the tawdry and the commonplace: the untalented trio singing off key, the slums semi-circling the casinos where Lou sells numbers, the boarded-up buildings, the sad, tiny apartments about to be torn down, Robert Goulet as a cheap Vegas-style lounge act, etc., in the end we feel that it's not so bad after all.

__________

However, in certain respects, Atlantic City itself really is the dominant character. I recall brief visits to it in the 1970s. The city then bore little resemblance to what it has since become, at least in the casino area. Of course the city then bore little resemblance, also, to the elegant seaside resort it once was 75 years earlier. My guess (only a guess) is that Malle's work in this film -- especially his establishment and enrichment of precisely appropriate tone and atmosphere -- had a significant influence on later films.

__________

Atlantic City is a film that captures the time of transition that this city went through as it reinvented itself after gambling was legalized. Burt lancaster is perfectly cast as an-old time and small time numbers runner who is hanging on the fringe of the old Atlantic City. His musings about the "good " old days are one of the highlights of this film. At one point he tells a younger drug dealing hustler "you should have seen the Atlantic Ocean back then, it was really something." as he stares wistfully into the distance.

The comparisons between old and new are extended into the characters and their tastes in everything from clothes to music. The soundtrack alternates between 40's big band and modern jazz.

__________

Atlantic City received five Oscar nominations; didn't win any. It was released in France and Germany, before the United States.

In 2003 the United States Library of Congress deemed the film "culturally significant" and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry.

Edited October 22, 2007 by Michael Hogan

[Dawn Meredith]

The Sands Casino in Atlantic City - So long, good bye, fairwell and good ridance.

I thought the implosion of the Sands would have all those who maintain the WTC imploded to have a look at a real implosion and compare the two.

BK:

I watched the implosion of the Sands for that very reason. Keith Obermann had it on and I wanted to do the comparison. Just because it did not look exactly like WTC does not mean 19 guys in caves managed to pull off WTC. (But, forgive me, as I try to keep out of these threads and so I don't know your position here. I just see two others constantly spout the party line and so I keep clear...)

Dawn

[Charles Drago]

The sacred Sands building was imploded some years ago.

And now they're all ... wait for it ...

dooby dooby dead.

I was very fortunate to have become a good friend of Sammy Cahn over the last five years or so of his life. For those who don't know, Sam wrote the lyrics to "All the Way," "Three Coins in a Fountain," "High Hopes," "Call Me Irresponsible," "Let It Snow," and about 2,500 other songs. He often was described as "the man who put the most words in Sinatra's mouth."

As it turns out, I wrote a few words for Sam. But that's a tale for another time and place.

But I do have stories. Including a few that cannot be repeated.

And yes, I did ask THE question.

Sam replied with a song.

"It's the last dance,

we've come to the last dance ... "

If there is an appropriate site on this forum for a discussion of popular song in general and the American version thereof in particular, I'll be happy to share some rather wonderful anecdotes and memories.

Charles

[Ron Ecker]

At one point he tells a younger drug dealing hustler "you should have seen the Atlantic Ocean back then, it was really something."

I saw the movie, don't remember much about it except for Sarandon's breasts, but that's a great line.

[William Kelly]

At one point he tells a younger drug dealing hustler "you should have seen the Atlantic Ocean back then, it was really something."

I saw the movie, don't remember much about it except for Sarandon's breasts, but that's a great line.

Hi Ron, Michael, Charles,.....

Indeed, Malle's film captured the city in transition, when all that was really Great became trash, and most of even those places are gone - the Club Harlem on Kentucky Ave. where the tuxedoed blacks ran things, and the log cabin mansion group rental in Longport was torn down shortly after the film was made, and the rotating car park next to the boardwalk is gone. From what I remember of the film only the White House Sub shop is still there, greasey and gritty as ever.

In the back of the shop there's an autographed photo of Lancaster and Sarandon, as they and the crew ate there during filming.

My railroad journey across country interviewing researchers and witnesses began in Atlantic City.

Atlantic City was also home to John O'Neill of 9/11 fame, Charlie Gondorf, the Big Con "inside man" of the Sting, as well as the Sundance Kid.

BK

[John Bevilaqua]

Ah yes, Frank Sinatra, Major Marco was it, in The Manchurian Candidate? Even though Sinatra

and Frankheimer insisted they just wanted to "Do Condon's book!" someone inserted 5 references

to Abraham Lincoln using close shots on Lincoln Bronze busts, and gratuitouosly inserted Lincoln

costumes at a Haloween party and surreptitiously hidden Lincoln head pennies in all the actors' pockets.

(Just kidding, I made that one up!) And though Benjamin K. Arthur is the only subtle reference

to Douglas MacArthur in the entire novel, the movie both begins (with a MacArthur oil portrait) and ends

with MacArthur references. Anyone else notice this and have any comments? Remember Dick Russell's

informant's reference to "THE MAN WHO COULD DO NO WRONG IN AMERICAN HISTORY" - Willoughby's

boss. Makes you think, right? Way Far Right! The FIRST Presidental coup attempt in history, The

Plot to Take the White House, also funded by J. P. Morgan and Draper money via John Raskob of

Chase Manhattan bank wanted either MacArthur as a replacement (he declined) or General Smedley Butler

who turned all the louts in after stringing them along to no avail. It was Butler who first said: "War is

Good for Business!" or something similar.

Also, did it ever become public why Sinatra's son was kidnapped? Ransom, blackmail or otherwise?

Edited October 23, 2007 by John Bevilaqua

[Dawn Meredith]

Also, did it ever become public why Sinatra's son was kidnapped? Ransom, blackmail or otherwise?

Actually, at the time, I did not think it was a real kidnap, but something to get the assassination off the front pages. (At 14 I was already very critical when it came to this case).

Dawn

[Ron Ecker]

It was Butler who first said: "War is Good for Business!" or something similar.

"War is a racket." (The title of General Butler's book.) After Butler told it like it is, Eisenhower was really a Johnny Come Lately on the military industrial complex, though it really came into its own (underwent a "transformation," as PNAC neocon Donald Rumsfeld would say) during and after WWII.

[John Bevilaqua]

It was Butler who first said: "War is Good for Business!" or something similar.

"War is a racket." (The title of General Butler's book.) After Butler told it like it is, Eisenhower was really a Johnny Come Lately on the military industrial complex, though it really came into its own (underwent a "transformation," as PNAC neocon Donald Rumsfeld would say) during and after WWII.

Got this from a free non-copyrighted website... posted here in Smedley Butler's honor.

Anybody read "The Plot to Take the Whitehouse" recently? by Jules Archer.

John Jacob Raskob of Chase Bank and J. P. Morgan trust account funds (like Wickliffe Draper and

The Mississippi Sovereignty Commission funding perhaps?) were used to fund this first Coup d'Etat.

WAR IS A RACKET

by Two-Time Congressional Medal of Honor Recipient:

Major General Smedley D. Butler, USMC [Retired]

Chapter One

WAR IS A RACKET

WAR is a racket. It always has been.

It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.

A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of the people. Only a small "inside" group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.

In the World War a mere handful garnered the profits of the conflict. At least 21,000 new millionaires and billionaires were made in the United States during the World War. That many admitted their huge blood gains in their income tax returns. How many other war millionaires falsified their tax returns no one knows.

How many of these war millionaires shouldered a rifle? How many of them dug a trench? How many of them knew what it meant to go hungry in a rat-infested dug-out? How many of them spent sleepless, frightened nights, ducking shells and shrapnel and machine gun bullets? How many of them parried a bayonet thrust of an enemy? How many of them were wounded or killed in battle?

Out of war nations acquire additional territory, if they are victorious. They just take it. This newly acquired territory promptly is exploited by the few – the selfsame few who wrung dollars out of blood in the war. The general public shoulders the bill.

And what is this bill?

This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations.

For a great many years, as a soldier, I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not until I retired to civil life did I fully realize it. Now that I see the international war clouds gathering, as they are today, I must face it and speak out.

Again they are choosing sides. France and Russia met and agreed to stand side by side. Italy and Austria hurried to make a similar agreement. Poland and Germany cast sheep's eyes at each other, forgetting for the nonce [one unique occasion], their dispute over the Polish Corridor.

The assassination of King Alexander of Jugoslavia [Yugoslavia] complicated matters. Jugoslavia and Hungary, long bitter enemies, were almost at each other's throats. Italy was ready to jump in. But France was waiting. So was Czechoslovakia. All of them are looking ahead to war. Not the people – not those who fight and pay and die – only those who foment wars and remain safely at home to profit.

There are 40,000,000 men under arms in the world today, and our statesmen and diplomats have the temerity to say that war is not in the making.

Hell's bells! Are these 40,000,000 men being trained to be dancers?

Not in Italy, to be sure. Premier Mussolini knows what they are being trained for. He, at least, is frank enough to speak out. Only the other day, Il Duce in "International Conciliation," the publication of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said:

"And above all, Fascism, the more it considers and observes the future and the development of humanity quite apart from political considerations of the moment, believes neither in the possibility nor the utility of perpetual peace... War alone brings up to its highest tension all human energy and puts the stamp of nobility upon the people who have the courage to meet it."

Undoubtedly Mussolini means exactly what he says. His well-trained army, his great fleet of planes, and even his navy are ready for war – anxious for it, apparently. His recent stand at the side of Hungary in the latter's dispute with Jugoslavia showed that. And the hurried mobilization of his troops on the Austrian border after the assassination of Dollfuss showed it too. There are others in Europe too whose sabre rattling presages war, sooner or later.

Herr Hitler, with his rearming Germany and his constant demands for more and more arms, is an equal if not greater menace to peace. France only recently increased the term of military service for its youth from a year to eighteen months.

Yes, all over, nations are camping in their arms. The mad dogs of Europe are on the loose. In the Orient the maneuvering is more adroit. Back in 1904, when Russia and Japan fought, we kicked out our old friends the Russians and backed Japan. Then our very generous international bankers were financing Japan. Now the trend is to poison us against the Japanese. What does the "open door" policy to China mean to us? Our trade with China is about $90,000,000 a year. Or the Philippine Islands? We have spent about $600,000,000 in the Philippines in thirty-five years and we (our bankers and industrialists and speculators) have private investments there of less than $200,000,000.

Then, to save that China trade of about $90,000,000, or to protect these private investments of less than $200,000,000 in the Philippines, we would be all stirred up to hate Japan and go to war – a war that might well cost us tens of billions of dollars, hundreds of thousands of lives of Americans, and many more hundreds of thousands of physically maimed and mentally unbalanced men.

Of course, for this loss, there would be a compensating profit – fortunes would be made. Millions and billions of dollars would be piled up. By a few. Munitions makers. Bankers. Ship builders. Manufacturers. Meat packers. Speculators. They would fare well.

Yes, they are getting ready for another war. Why shouldn't they? It pays high dividends.

But what does it profit the men who are killed? What does it profit their mothers and sisters, their wives and their sweethearts? What does it profit their children?

What does it profit anyone except the very few to whom war means huge profits?

Yes, and what does it profit the nation?

Take our own case. Until 1898 we didn't own a bit of territory outside the mainland of North America. At that time our national debt was a little more than $1,000,000,000. Then we became "internationally minded." We forgot, or shunted aside, the advice of the Father of our country. We forgot George Washington's warning about "entangling alliances." We went to war. We acquired outside territory. At the end of the World War period, as a direct result of our fiddling in international affairs, our national debt had jumped to over $25,000,000,000. Our total favorable trade balance during the twenty-five-year period was about $24,000,000,000. Therefore, on a purely bookkeeping basis, we ran a little behind year for year, and that foreign trade might well have been ours without the wars.

It would have been far cheaper (not to say safer) for the average American who pays the bills to stay out of foreign entanglements. For a very few this racket, like bootlegging and other underworld rackets, brings fancy profits, but the cost of operations is always transferred to the people – who do not profit.

CHAPTER TWO

WHO MAKES THE PROFITS?

The World War, rather our brief participation in it, has cost the United States some $52,000,000,000. Figure it out. That means $400 to every American man, woman, and child. And we haven't paid the debt yet. We are paying it, our children will pay it, and our children's children probably still will be paying the cost of that war.

The normal profits of a business concern in the United States are six, eight, ten, and sometimes twelve percent. But war-time profits – ah! that is another matter – twenty, sixty, one hundred, three hundred, and even eighteen hundred per cent – the sky is the limit. All that traffic will bear. Uncle Sam has the money. Let's get it.

Of course, it isn't put that crudely in war time. It is dressed into speeches about patriotism, love of country, and "we must all put our shoulders to the wheel," but the profits jump and leap and skyrocket – and are safely pocketed. Let's just take a few examples:

Take our friends the du Ponts, the powder people – didn't one of them testify before a Senate committee recently that their powder won the war? Or saved the world for democracy? Or something? How did they do in the war? They were a patriotic corporation. Well, the average earnings of the du Ponts for the period 1910 to 1914 were $6,000,000 a year. It wasn't much, but the du Ponts managed to get along on it. Now let's look at their average yearly profit during the war years, 1914 to 1918. Fifty-eight million dollars a year profit we find! Nearly ten times that of normal times, and the profits of normal times were pretty good. An increase in profits of more than 950 per cent.

Take one of our little steel companies that patriotically shunted aside the making of rails and girders and bridges to manufacture war materials. Well, their 1910-1914 yearly earnings averaged $6,000,000. Then came the war. And, like loyal citizens, Bethlehem Steel promptly turned to munitions making. Did their profits jump – or did they let Uncle Sam in for a bargain? Well, their 1914-1918 average was $49,000,000 a year!

Or, let's take United States Steel. The normal earnings during the five-year period prior to the war were $105,000,000 a year. Not bad. Then along came the war and up went the profits. The average yearly profit for the period 1914-1918 was $240,000,000. Not bad.

There you have some of the steel and powder earnings. Let's look at something else. A little copper, perhaps. That always does well in war times.

Anaconda, for instance. Average yearly earnings during the pre-war years 1910-1914 of $10,000,000. During the war years 1914-1918 profits leaped to $34,000,000 per year.

Or Utah Copper. Average of $5,000,000 per year during the 1910-1914 period. Jumped to an average of $21,000,000 yearly profits for the war period.

Let's group these five, with three smaller companies. The total yearly average profits of the pre-war period 1910-1914 were $137,480,000. Then along came the war. The average yearly profits for this group skyrocketed to $408,300,000.

A little increase in profits of approximately 200 per cent.

Does war pay? It paid them. But they aren't the only ones. There are still others. Let's take leather.

For the three-year period before the war the total profits of Central Leather Company were $3,500,000. That was approximately $1,167,000 a year. Well, in 1916 Central Leather returned a profit of $15,000,000, a small increase of 1,100 per cent. That's all. The General Chemical Company averaged a profit for the three years before the war of a little over $800,000 a year. Came the war, and the profits jumped to $12,000,000. a leap of 1,400 per cent.

International Nickel Company – and you can't have a war without nickel – showed an increase in profits from a mere average of $4,000,000 a year to $73,000,000 yearly. Not bad? An increase of more than 1,700 per cent.

American Sugar Refining Company averaged $2,000,000 a year for the three years before the war. In 1916 a profit of $6,000,000 was recorded.

Listen to Senate Document No. 259. The Sixty-Fifth Congress, reporting on corporate earnings and government revenues. Considering the profits of 122 meat packers, 153 cotton manufacturers, 299 garment makers, 49 steel plants, and 340 coal producers during the war. Profits under 25 per cent were exceptional. For instance the coal companies made between 100 per cent and 7,856 per cent on their capital stock during the war. The Chicago packers doubled and tripled their earnings.

And let us not forget the bankers who financed the great war. If anyone had the cream of the profits it was the bankers. Being partnerships rather than incorporated organizations, they do not have to report to stockholders. And their profits were as secret as they were immense. How the bankers made their millions and their billions I do not know, because those little secrets never become public – even before a Senate investigatory body.

But here's how some of the other patriotic industrialists and speculators chiseled their way into war profits.

Take the shoe people. They like war. It brings business with abnormal profits. They made huge profits on sales abroad to our allies. Perhaps, like the munitions manufacturers and armament makers, they also sold to the enemy. For a dollar is a dollar whether it comes from Germany or from France. But they did well by Uncle Sam too. For instance, they sold Uncle Sam 35,000,000 pairs of hobnailed service shoes. There were 4,000,000 soldiers. Eight pairs, and more, to a soldier. My regiment during the war had only one pair to a soldier. Some of these shoes probably are still in existence. They were good shoes. But when the war was over Uncle Sam has a matter of 25,000,000 pairs left over. Bought – and paid for. Profits recorded and pocketed.

There was still lots of leather left. So the leather people sold your Uncle Sam hundreds of thousands of McClellan saddles for the cavalry. But there wasn't any American cavalry overseas! Somebody had to get rid of this leather, however. Somebody had to make a profit in it – so we had a lot of McClellan saddles. And we probably have those yet.

Also somebody had a lot of mosquito netting. They sold your Uncle Sam 20,000,000 mosquito nets for the use of the soldiers overseas. I suppose the boys were expected to put it over them as they tried to sleep in muddy trenches – one hand scratching cooties on their backs and the other making passes at scurrying rats. Well, not one of these mosquito nets ever got to France!

Anyhow, these thoughtful manufacturers wanted to make sure that no soldier would be without his mosquito net, so 40,000,000 additional yards of mosquito netting were sold to Uncle Sam.

There were pretty good profits in mosquito netting in those days, even if there were no mosquitoes in France. I suppose, if the war had lasted just a little longer, the enterprising mosquito netting manufacturers would have sold your Uncle Sam a couple of consignments of mosquitoes to plant in France so that more mosquito netting would be in order.

Airplane and engine manufacturers felt they, too, should get their just profits out of this war. Why not? Everybody else was getting theirs. So $1,000,000,000 – count them if you live long enough – was spent by Uncle Sam in building airplane engines that never left the ground! Not one plane, or motor, out of the billion dollars worth ordered, ever got into a battle in France. Just the same the manufacturers made their little profit of 30, 100, or perhaps 300 per cent.

Undershirts for soldiers cost 14¢ [cents] to make and uncle Sam paid 30¢ to 40¢ each for them – a nice little profit for the undershirt manufacturer. And the stocking manufacturer and the uniform manufacturers and the cap manufacturers and the steel helmet manufacturers – all got theirs.

Why, when the war was over some 4,000,000 sets of equipment – knapsacks and the things that go to fill them – crammed warehouses on this side. Now they are being scrapped because the regulations have changed the contents. But the manufacturers collected their wartime profits on them – and they will do it all over again the next time.

There were lots of brilliant ideas for profit making during the war.

One very versatile patriot sold Uncle Sam twelve dozen 48-inch wrenches. Oh, they were very nice wrenches. The only trouble was that there was only one nut ever made that was large enough for these wrenches. That is the one that holds the turbines at Niagara Falls. Well, after Uncle Sam had bought them and the manufacturer had pocketed the profit, the wrenches were put on freight cars and shunted all around the United States in an effort to find a use for them. When the Armistice was signed it was indeed a sad blow to the wrench manufacturer. He was just about to make some nuts to fit the wrenches. Then he planned to sell these, too, to your Uncle Sam.

Still another had the brilliant idea that colonels shouldn't ride in automobiles, nor should they even ride on horseback. One has probably seen a picture of Andy Jackson riding in a buckboard. Well, some 6,000 buckboards were sold to Uncle Sam for the use of colonels! Not one of them was used. But the buckboard manufacturer got his war profit.

The shipbuilders felt they should come in on some of it, too. They built a lot of ships that made a lot of profit. More than $3,000,000,000 worth. Some of the ships were all right. But $635,000,000 worth of them were made of wood and wouldn't float! The seams opened up – and they sank. We paid for them, though. And somebody pocketed the profits.

It has been estimated by statisticians and economists and researchers that the war cost your Uncle Sam $52,000,000,000. Of this sum, $39,000,000,000 was expended in the actual war itself. This expenditure yielded $16,000,000,000 in profits. That is how the 21,000 billionaires and millionaires got that way. This $16,000,000,000 profits is not to be sneezed at. It is quite a tidy sum. And it went to a very few.

The Senate (Nye) committee probe of the munitions industry and its wartime profits, despite its sensational disclosures, hardly has scratched the surface.

Even so, it has had some effect. The State Department has been studying "for some time" methods of keeping out of war. The War Department suddenly decides it has a wonderful plan to spring. The Administration names a committee – with the War and Navy Departments ably represented under the chairmanship of a Wall Street speculator – to limit profits in war time. To what extent isn't suggested. Hmmm. Possibly the profits of 300 and 600 and 1,600 per cent of those who turned blood into gold in the World War would be limited to some smaller figure.

Apparently, however, the plan does not call for any limitation of losses – that is, the losses of those who fight the war. As far as I have been able to ascertain there is nothing in the scheme to limit a soldier to the loss of but one eye, or one arm, or to limit his wounds to one or two or three. Or to limit the loss of life.

There is nothing in this scheme, apparently, that says not more than 12 per cent of a regiment shall be wounded in battle, or that not more than 7 per cent in a division shall be killed.

Of course, the committee cannot be bothered with such trifling matters.

CHAPTER THREE

WHO PAYS THE BILLS?

Who provides the profits – these nice little profits of 20, 100, 300, 1,500 and 1,800 per cent? We all pay them – in taxation. We paid the bankers their profits when we bought Liberty Bonds at $100.00 and sold them back at $84 or $86 to the bankers. These bankers collected $100 plus. It was a simple manipulation. The bankers control the security marts. It was easy for them to depress the price of these bonds. Then all of us – the people – got frightened and sold the bonds at $84 or $86. The bankers bought them. Then these same bankers stimulated a boom and government bonds went to par – and above. Then the bankers collected their profits.

But the soldier pays the biggest part of the bill.

If you don't believe this, visit the American cemeteries on the battlefields abroad. Or visit any of the veteran's hospitals in the United States. On a tour of the country, in the midst of which I am at the time of this writing, I have visited eighteen government hospitals for veterans. In them are a total of about 50,000 destroyed men – men who were the pick of the nation eighteen years ago. The very able chief surgeon at the government hospital; at Milwaukee, where there are 3,800 of the living dead, told me that mortality among veterans is three times as great as among those who stayed at home.

Boys with a normal viewpoint were taken out of the fields and offices and factories and classrooms and put into the ranks. There they were remolded; they were made over; they were made to "about face"; to regard murder as the order of the day. They were put shoulder to shoulder and, through mass psychology, they were entirely changed. We used them for a couple of years and trained them to think nothing at all of killing or of being killed.

Then, suddenly, we discharged them and told them to make another "about face" ! This time they had to do their own readjustment, sans [without] mass psychology, sans officers' aid and advice and sans nation-wide propaganda. We didn't need them any more. So we scattered them about without any "three-minute" or "Liberty Loan" speeches or parades. Many, too many, of these fine young boys are eventually destroyed, mentally, because they could not make that final "about face" alone.

In the government hospital in Marion, Indiana, 1,800 of these boys are in pens! Five hundred of them in a barracks with steel bars and wires all around outside the buildings and on the porches. These already have been mentally destroyed. These boys don't even look like human beings. Oh, the looks on their faces! Physically, they are in good shape; mentally, they are gone.

There are thousands and thousands of these cases, and more and more are coming in all the time. The tremendous excitement of the war, the sudden cutting off of that excitement – the young boys couldn't stand it.

That's a part of the bill. So much for the dead – they have paid their part of the war profits. So much for the mentally and physically wounded – they are paying now their share of the war profits. But the others paid, too – they paid with heartbreaks when they tore themselves away from their firesides and their families to don the uniform of Uncle Sam – on which a profit had been made. They paid another part in the training camps where they were regimented and drilled while others took their jobs and their places in the lives of their communities. The paid for it in the trenches where they shot and were shot; where they were hungry for days at a time; where they slept in the mud and the cold and in the rain – with the moans and shrieks of the dying for a horrible lullaby.

But don't forget – the soldier paid part of the dollars and cents bill too.

Up to and including the Spanish-American War, we had a prize system, and soldiers and sailors fought for money. During the Civil War they were paid bonuses, in many instances, before they went into service. The government, or states, paid as high as $1,200 for an enlistment. In the Spanish-American War they gave prize money. When we captured any vessels, the soldiers all got their share – at least, they were supposed to. Then it was found that we could reduce the cost of wars by taking all the prize money and keeping it, but conscripting [drafting] the soldier anyway. Then soldiers couldn't bargain for their labor, Everyone else could bargain, but the soldier couldn't.

Napoleon once said,

"All men are enamored of decorations...they positively hunger for them."

So by developing the Napoleonic system – the medal business – the government learned it could get soldiers for less money, because the boys liked to be decorated. Until the Civil War there were no medals. Then the Congressional Medal of Honor was handed out. It made enlistments easier. After the Civil War no new medals were issued until the Spanish-American War.

In the World War, we used propaganda to make the boys accept conscription. They were made to feel ashamed if they didn't join the army.

So vicious was this war propaganda that even God was brought into it. With few exceptions our clergymen joined in the clamor to kill, kill, kill. To kill the Germans. God is on our side...it is His will that the Germans be killed.

And in Germany, the good pastors called upon the Germans to kill the allies...to please the same God. That was a part of the general propaganda, built up to make people war conscious and murder conscious.

Beautiful ideals were painted for our boys who were sent out to die. This was the "war to end all wars." This was the "war to make the world safe for democracy." No one mentioned to them, as they marched away, that their going and their dying would mean huge war profits. No one told these American soldiers that they might be shot down by bullets made by their own brothers here. No one told them that the ships on which they were going to cross might be torpedoed by submarines built with United States patents. They were just told it was to be a "glorious adventure."

Thus, having stuffed patriotism down their throats, it was decided to make them help pay for the war, too. So, we gave them the large salary of $30 a month.

All they had to do for this munificent sum was to leave their dear ones behind, give up their jobs, lie in swampy trenches, eat canned willy (when they could get it) and kill and kill and kill...and be killed.

But wait!

Half of that wage (just a little more than a riveter in a shipyard or a laborer in a munitions factory safe at home made in a day) was promptly taken from him to support his dependents, so that they would not become a charge upon his community. Then we made him pay what amounted to accident insurance – something the employer pays for in an enlightened state – and that cost him $6 a month. He had less than $9 a month left.

Then, the most crowning insolence of all – he was virtually blackjacked into paying for his own ammunition, clothing, and food by being made to buy Liberty Bonds. Most soldiers got no money at all on pay days.

We made them buy Liberty Bonds at $100 and then we bought them back – when they came back from the war and couldn't find work – at $84 and $86. And the soldiers bought about $2,000,000,000 worth of these bonds!

Yes, the soldier pays the greater part of the bill. His family pays too. They pay it in the same heart-break that he does. As he suffers, they suffer. At nights, as he lay in the trenches and watched shrapnel burst about him, they lay home in their beds and tossed sleeplessly – his father, his mother, his wife, his sisters, his brothers, his sons, and his daughters.

When he returned home minus an eye, or minus a leg or with his mind broken, they suffered too – as much as and even sometimes more than he. Yes, and they, too, contributed their dollars to the profits of the munitions makers and bankers and shipbuilders and the manufacturers and the speculators made. They, too, bought Liberty Bonds and contributed to the profit of the bankers after the Armistice in the hocus-pocus of manipulated Liberty Bond prices.

And even now the families of the wounded men and of the mentally broken and those who never were able to readjust themselves are still suffering and still paying.

CHAPTER FOUR

HOW TO SMASH THIS RACKET!

WELL, it's a racket, all right.

A few profit – and the many pay. But there is a way to stop it. You can't end it by disarmament conferences. You can't eliminate it by peace parleys at Geneva. Well-meaning but impractical groups can't wipe it out by resolutions. It can be smashed effectively only by taking the profit out of war.

The only way to smash this racket is to conscript capital and industry and labor before the nations manhood can be conscripted. One month before the Government can conscript the young men of the nation – it must conscript capital and industry and labor. Let the officers and the directors and the high-powered executives of our armament factories and our munitions makers and our shipbuilders and our airplane builders and the manufacturers of all the other things that provide profit in war time as well as the bankers and the speculators, be conscripted – to get $30 a month, the same wage as the lads in the trenches get.

Let the workers in these plants get the same wages – all the workers, all presidents, all executives, all directors, all managers, all bankers –

yes, and all generals and all admirals and all officers and all politicians and all government office holders – everyone in the nation be restricted to a total monthly income not to exceed that paid to the soldier in the trenches!

Let all these kings and tycoons and masters of business and all those workers in industry and all our senators and governors and majors pay half of their monthly $30 wage to their families and pay war risk insurance and buy Liberty Bonds.

Why shouldn't they?

They aren't running any risk of being killed or of having their bodies mangled or their minds shattered. They aren't sleeping in muddy trenches. They aren't hungry. The soldiers are!

Give capital and industry and labor thirty days to think it over and you will find, by that time, there will be no war. That will smash the war racket – that and nothing else.

Maybe I am a little too optimistic. Capital still has some say. So capital won't permit the taking of the profit out of war until the people – those who do the suffering and still pay the price – make up their minds that those they elect to office shall do their bidding, and not that of the profiteers.

Another step necessary in this fight to smash the war racket is the limited plebiscite to determine whether a war should be declared. A plebiscite not of all the voters but merely of those who would be called upon to do the fighting and dying. There wouldn't be very much sense in having a 76-year-old president of a munitions factory or the flat-footed head of an international banking firm or the cross-eyed manager of a uniform manufacturing plant – all of whom see visions of tremendous profits in the event of war – voting on whether the nation should go to war or not. They never would be called upon to shoulder arms – to sleep in a trench and to be shot. Only those who would be called upon to risk their lives for their country should have the privilege of voting to determine whether the nation should go to war.

There is ample precedent for restricting the voting to those affected. Many of our states have restrictions on those permitted to vote. In most, it is necessary to be able to read and write before you may vote. In some, you must own property. It would be a simple matter each year for the men coming of military age to register in their communities as they did in the draft during the World War and be examined physically. Those who could pass and who would therefore be called upon to bear arms in the event of war would be eligible to vote in a limited plebiscite. They should be the ones to have the power to decide – and not a Congress few of whose members are within the age limit and fewer still of whom are in physical condition to bear arms. Only those who must suffer should have the right to vote.

A third step in this business of smashing the war racket is to make certain that our military forces are truly forces for defense only.

At each session of Congress the question of further naval appropriations comes up. The swivel-chair admirals of Washington (and there are always a lot of them) are very adroit lobbyists. And they are smart. They don't shout that "We need a lot of battleships to war on this nation or that nation." Oh no. First of all, they let it be known that America is menaced by a great naval power. Almost any day, these admirals will tell you, the great fleet of this supposed enemy will strike suddenly and annihilate 125,000,000 people. Just like that. Then they begin to cry for a larger navy. For what? To fight the enemy? Oh my, no. Oh, no. For defense purposes only.

Then, incidentally, they announce maneuvers in the Pacific. For defense. Uh, huh.

The Pacific is a great big ocean. We have a tremendous coastline on the Pacific. Will the maneuvers be off the coast, two or three hundred miles? Oh, no. The maneuvers will be two thousand, yes, perhaps even thirty-five hundred miles, off the coast.

The Japanese, a proud people, of course will be pleased beyond expression to see the united States fleet so close to Nippon's shores. Even as pleased as would be the residents of California were they to dimly discern through the morning mist, the Japanese fleet playing at war games off Los Angeles.

The ships of our navy, it can be seen, should be specifically limited, by law, to within 200 miles of our coastline. Had that been the law in 1898 the Maine would never have gone to Havana Harbor. She never would have been blown up. There would have been no war with Spain with its attendant loss of life. Two hundred miles is ample, in the opinion of experts, for defense purposes. Our nation cannot start an offensive war if its ships can't go further than 200 miles from the coastline. Planes might be permitted to go as far as 500 miles from the coast for purposes of reconnaissance. And the army should never leave the territorial limits of our nation.

To summarize: Three steps must be taken to smash the war racket.

We must take the profit out of war.

We must permit the youth of the land who would bear arms to decide whether or not there should be war.

We must limit our military forces to home defense purposes.

CHAPTER FIVE

TO HELL WITH WAR!

I am not a fool as to believe that war is a thing of the past. I know the people do not want war, but there is no use in saying we cannot be pushed into another war.

Looking back, Woodrow Wilson was re-elected president in 1916 on a platform that he had "kept us out of war" and on the implied promise that he would "keep us out of war." Yet, five months later he asked Congress to declare war on Germany.

In that five-month interval the people had not been asked whether they had changed their minds. The 4,000,000 young men who put on uniforms and marched or sailed away were not asked whether they wanted to go forth to suffer and die.

Then what caused our government to change its mind so suddenly?

Money.

An allied commission, it may be recalled, came over shortly before the war declaration and called on the President. The President summoned a group of advisers. The head of the commission spoke. Stripped of its diplomatic language, this is what he told the President and his group:

"There is no use kidding ourselves any longer. The cause of the allies is lost. We now owe you (American bankers, American munitions makers, American manufacturers, American speculators, American exporters) five or six billion dollars.

If we lose (and without the help of the United States we must lose) we, England, France and Italy, cannot pay back this money...and Germany won't.

So..."

Had secrecy been outlawed as far as war negotiations were concerned, and had the press been invited to be present at that conference, or had radio been available to broadcast the proceedings, America never would have entered the World War. But this conference, like all war discussions, was shrouded in utmost secrecy. When our boys were sent off to war they were told it was a "war to make the world safe for democracy" and a "war to end all wars."

Well, eighteen years after, the world has less of democracy than it had then. Besides, what business is it of ours whether Russia or Germany or England or France or Italy or Austria live under democracies or monarchies? Whether they are Fascists or Communists? Our problem is to preserve our own democracy.

And very little, if anything, has been accomplished to assure us that the World War was really the war to end all wars.

Yes, we have had disarmament conferences and limitations of arms conferences. They don't mean a thing. One has just failed; the results of another have been nullified. We send our professional soldiers and our sailors and our politicians and our diplomats to these conferences. And what happens?

The professional soldiers and sailors don't want to disarm. No admiral wants to be without a ship. No general wants to be without a command. Both mean men without jobs. They are not for disarmament. They cannot be for limitations of arms. And at all these conferences, lurking in the background but all-powerful, just the same, are the sinister agents of those who profit by war. They see to it that these conferences do not disarm or seriously limit armaments.

The chief aim of any power at any of these conferences has not been to achieve disarmament to prevent war but rather to get more armament for itself and less for any potential foe.

There is only one way to disarm with any semblance of practicability. That is for all nations to get together and scrap every ship, every gun, every rifle, every tank, every war plane. Even this, if it were possible, would not be enough.

The next war, according to experts, will be fought not with battleships, not by artillery, not with rifles and not with machine guns. It will be fought with deadly chemicals and gases.

Secretly each nation is studying and perfecting newer and ghastlier means of annihilating its foes wholesale. Yes, ships will continue to be built, for the shipbuilders must make their profits. And guns still will be manufactured and powder and rifles will be made, for the munitions makers must make their huge profits. And the soldiers, of course, must wear uniforms, for the manufacturer must make their war profits too.

But victory or defeat will be determined by the skill and ingenuity of our scientists.

If we put them to work making poison gas and more and more fiendish mechanical and explosive instruments of destruction, they will have no time for the constructive job of building greater prosperity for all peoples. By putting them to this useful job, we can all make more money out of peace than we can out of war – even the munitions makers.

So...I say,

TO HELL WITH WAR!

[Charles Drago]

Ah yes, Frank Sinatra, Major Marco was it, in The Manchurian Candidate? Even though Sinatra

and Frankheimer insisted they just wanted to "Do Condon's book!" someone inserted 5 references

to Abraham Lincoln using close shots on Lincoln Bronze busts, and gratuitouosly inserted Lincoln

costumes at a Haloween party and surreptitiously hidden Lincoln head pennies in all the actors' pockets.

(Just kidding, I made that one up!) And though Benjamin K. Arthur is the only subtle reference

to Douglas MacArthur in the entire novel, the movie both begins (with a MacArthur oil portrait) and ends

with MacArthur references. Anyone else notice this and have any comments? Remember Dick Russell's

informant's reference to "THE MAN WHO COULD DO NO WRONG IN AMERICAN HISTORY" - Willoughby's

boss. Makes you think, right? Way Far Right! The FIRST Presidental coup attempt in history, The

Plot to Take the White House, also funded by J. P. Morgan and Draper money via John Raskob of

Chase Manhattan bank wanted either MacArthur as a replacement (he declined) or General Smedley Butler

who turned all the louts in after stringing them along to no avail. It was Butler who first said: "War is

Good for Business!" or something similar.

Also, did it ever become public why Sinatra's son was kidnapped? Ransom, blackmail or otherwise?

The attempted Roosevelt coup must be understood in all its implications if we are to have the slightest chance of discovering the "who" and "why" of the Kennedy assassination.

To reduce it to near-absurdity: "This time," says MacArthur in late 1962, "no more Mr. Nice Guy!"

Make no mistake: The Butler lesson had been learned.

The Old Soldier's blessing was the "go" order without which certain highest-ranking officers would not act to strike JFK. I have reason to believe they received just such a sanction.

I would submit, John, that the first presidential coup in American history was targeted -- successfully -- at Mr. Lincoln. Further, let me simply note that there are -- how shall I put it -- continuities of characters and motivations in the Lincoln-to-Roosevelt-to-Kennedy progression.

If only JFK had had a Smedley Butler on his JCS.

As for the theft of Frankie, Jr.: Question the timing.

Charles

[John Bevilaqua]

Also, did it ever become public why Sinatra's son was kidnapped? Ransom, blackmail or otherwise?

Actually, at the time, I did not think it was a real kidnap, but something to get the assassination off the front pages. (At 14 I was already very critical when it came to this case).

Dawn

I also heard the alternative explanation that because Frank Sinatra had been so active in fighting The Hollywood Seven efforts

in the 1940's against Rev. Gerald L. K. Smith and even standing up for Alger Hiss in the 1950's that his early inquiries into the

JFK murder perpatrator's identities made certain people very nervous and they kidnapped his son as a definite warning to him.

I saw an interview with his son in the 1990's and he still indicated that the experience for him was real, it was haunting and it

was above all else frightening. He changed the subject quickly after indicating that he did not want to speculate about the

motivations of his kidnappers and he might even have said that there were no ransom demands made either. Can't recall.

Absent any other details, I think the conclusion of the program was that there was a definite "message" in the kidnapping which

no one in the Sinatra family was willing to discuss. Of course, the right wing then jumped in and blamed it on "Mob" in-fighting.

But after his death FOIA releases indicated that in fact the FBI had cleared Frank Sinatra of any Mob connections years previously.

I lean towards the version which indicates a warning to get off the JFK case... NOW! And I rarely lean towards idle speculation but

the evidence seems to support this thesis. With his resources and connections Frank would have drilled down very quickly IMHO

to the probable conspirators. I mean the obvious first response perps were patently obvious when you review the newspapers

and the magazine clippings from those days, and I still don't see how we let the perps control the investigation and point the fingers.

It is still happening today. The first response scapegoaters as I have said before were of the ilk of Revilo Oliver, Gerald L K Smith,

Robert Welch, Robert Morris, Frank Sturgis, Billy James Hargis and even Clare Booth Luce and they all had their stories neatly

synchronized, too. It was just a masterful whitewash. And even Sen. James Eastland formed the Eastland Commission to

Investigate the Assassination of JFK according to Jim Marrs. Why didn't he form The Eastland Commission to Investigate the Asssassination of Medgar Evers, Jr.? It was his friggen nephew who went to jail for it. Byron DeLa Beckwith. What a country!

Can anyone think of others from this genre who jumped onto the false perpatrator bandwagon who had access to their own media

publications and friendly media outlets? Like the Manchurian Candidate list of writers: Arnold Bennett, George Sokolosky and

Westbrook Pegler? Willis Carto of The Liberty Lobby revisionist history crowd and Human Events comes to mind as well. The drawbacks

of a Free Press include being subjected to co-ordinated Mind and Thought Control efforts of the opposition. Happens on this forum, too

and everywhere else for that matter. And you know what? There are many who do not even realize that they have been successfully

brainwashed as they spout the appropriate propaganda on request or even when it was not requested. No names please. But someone

is going to jump in here and say "Hey, I resemble that!" and defend his or her brainwashed position. Amazing stuff. A Mind is

a Terrible Thing to Baste or to Waste. It is Psychological Warfare in fact Par Excellence! What do you expect when the Gang of

Five were almost all trained in PsyWarOps? Angleton, Morris, Draper, Willoughby, Vonsiatsky etc. being among them. Though

Colonel Ulius Amoss was dead by 1961 he was also a master of that art. Thanks to James Richards for putting me on his case.

Google him and you will only get about 500 words of unique copy, but from almost 500 different sites. How did that happen?

[Ron Ecker]

I would think that Sinatra would have had no interest in pursuing JFK's killers. I thought that Sinatra and JFK were on the outs, over Sinatra being slighted in some way or other. And I remember someone posting a photo on this forum of Sinatra, sometime after the assassination, sitting back in his den with his feet propped up on top of a book. JFK's face was on the book cover, under Sinatra's heels.

[John Bevilaqua]

Ah yes, Frank Sinatra, Major Marco was it, in The Manchurian Candidate? Even though Sinatra

and Frankheimer insisted they just wanted to "Do Condon's book!" someone inserted 5 references

to Abraham Lincoln using close shots on Lincoln Bronze busts, and gratuitouosly inserted Lincoln

costumes at a Haloween party and surreptitiously hidden Lincoln head pennies in all the actors' pockets.

(Just kidding, I made that one up!) And though Benjamin K. Arthur is the only subtle reference

to Douglas MacArthur in the entire novel, the movie both begins (with a MacArthur oil portrait) and ends

with MacArthur references. Anyone else notice this and have any comments? Remember Dick Russell's

informant's reference to "THE MAN WHO COULD DO NO WRONG IN AMERICAN HISTORY" - Willoughby's

boss. Makes you think, right? Way Far Right! The FIRST Presidental coup attempt in history, The

Plot to Take the White House, also funded by J. P. Morgan and Draper money via John Raskob of

Chase Manhattan bank wanted either MacArthur as a replacement (he declined) or General Smedley Butler

who turned all the louts in after stringing them along to no avail. It was Butler who first said: "War is

Good for Business!" or something similar.

Also, did it ever become public why Sinatra's son was kidnapped? Ransom, blackmail or otherwise?

The attempted Roosevelt coup must be understood in all its implications if we are to have the slightest chance of discovering the "who" and "why" of the Kennedy assassination.

To reduce it to near-absurdity: "This time," says MacArthur in late 1962, "no more Mr. Nice Guy!"

Make no mistake: The Butler lesson had been learned.

The Old Soldier's blessing was the "go" order without which certain highest-ranking officers would not act to strike JFK. I have reason to believe they received just such a sanction.

I would submit, John, that the first presidential coup in American history was targeted -- successfully -- at Mr. Lincoln. Further, let me simply note that there are -- how shall I put it -- continuities of characters and motivations in the Lincoln-to-Roosevelt-to-Kennedy progression.

If only JFK had had a Smedley Butler on his JCS.

As for the theft of Frankie, Jr.: Question the timing.

Charles

Absolutely correct on all counts, Charlie. I have always maintained that Lincoln was killed for upsetting

the apple cart regarding his attitude about taking the "cotton pickers" from the status of slave wages to

minimal wages. And FDR fought the Drapers and their "cotton mill" owners over Social Security, Child Labor

Laws, and Labor Unions to a certain extent plus fairer wages and conditions and JFK took it to the ultimate

extreme by currying favor with Labor Unions, and pre-OSHA safety measures plus he denied them 3 times

on raising tariffs on cheap foreign textile imports which was not only the death knell for the domestic textile

industry and Draper's shrinking monopoly on textile loom equipment and machinery but for JFK himself

when you come right down to it. Four years later, (1967) the Drapers had arranged to sell out The Draper Corp.

to Rockwell-Standard once Colonel Rockwell had enough Viet Nam contracts to justify floating a new issue

of Pfd Stock in the amount of $100,000,000.00 to cover the takeover and the payback. That was on 3/22/67

the SAME BLACKMAIL DATE focused on in the Dear Mr. Weiss letter found by the occupants of Gordon Novel's

former apartment after he had scurried to Columbus, Ohio to avoid extradition to face Jim Garrison's probe.

Draper was one of the few people who received this kind of direct payback trail shortly after the JFK hit. Rev.

Gerald L K Smith and Vonsiatsky being the others. Smith's Christ of the Ozarks Theme Park and Bible Museum

sprung out of a Eureka Springs hillside in the Spring of 1964 to the tune of $500,000.00 ++ when he

had less than $5,000 to his name at year end according to his biographer, Glenn Jeansonne. Where the

hell did THAT money come from? Miraculous intervention?

And yes, I do think that the Sinatra kidnapping was a DEFINITE warning.

Edited October 23, 2007 by John Bevilaqua

[John Bevilaqua]

I would think that Sinatra would have had no interest in pursuing JFK's killers. I thought that Sinatra and JFK were on the outs, over Sinatra being slighted in some way or other. And I remember someone posting a photo on this forum of Sinatra, sometime after the assassination, sitting back in his den with his feet propped up on top of a book. JFK's face was on the book cover, under Sinatra's heels.

Whatever. The fact is that Sinatra and Frankheimer did an interview and they both expressed honest remorse and

concern regarding the demise of JFK. And Frank's son did the same and said that his father was crestfallen over it.

Even if you could produce this picture, it would not change my mind and my guess is you can't. It might just be a

figment of your fertile imagination. Do you think Sinatra was a mobster, too?