Good Fellas <\/em>catapulted Hill into the national limelight.\u00a0 He became a sought after guest for a number of tabloid television programs and a frequent quest on Howard Stern\u2019s radio show. In the years immediately prior to his death, he even authored a cook book.<\/p>\nHad Hill genuinely repented of his past transgressions; had he exploited his newly found popularity to wage a campaign against the underworld of which he had once been a member; had he tirelessly spoken out against the moral and aesthetic shallowness that informs Hollywood\u2019s efforts to romanticize the wastes of sperm in whose image he spent much of his life shaping his own identity\u2014then he would have been a worthy candidate for forgiveness.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But Hill, like Gravano and the legions of other rats that turned state witnesses for no other reason than to save their own asses, failed abysmally to make amends with God and the society that they undercut at every turn.<\/p>\n
The same narcissism that animated Hill\u2019s conduct while in the mob accounts for his decision to cooperate with the authorities in sending his friends to prison for the remainder of their natural existences.\u00a0 It is also this narcissism that explains the crass opportunism that Hill exhibited during his post-mob days.<\/p>\n
The Godly and the good are obliged to renounce evil.\u00a0 They have no option but to call it out for what it is regardless of where it rears its hideous head.\u00a0 Men like Hill\u2014gangsters and criminals\u2014we must be willing to recognize for the specimens of villainy that they are.\u00a0 At the same time, we should be just as willing\u2014just as eager\u2014to draw attention to the exemplars of virtue in our midst.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One such exemplar is Guardian Angel founder and radio talk show host Curtis Sliwa.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For over thirty years, Sliwa has helped untold numbers of people from across the country and throughout the planet combat crime in their communities by organizing themselves into citizen patrol squads.\u00a0 He has not only been remarkably successful; in start contrast to the Henry Hills of the world, Sliwa has used his fame for the purpose of identifying\u2014and stopping\u2014the wicked amongst us.<\/p>\n
The man is as courageous as his campaign against evil doers is indefatigable.\u00a0<\/p>\n
During the summer of 1992, in response to the relentless criticism that Sliwa would heap upon the organized criminal network of his nativeNew York City, and the Gambino family particularly, Gottis father and son arranged to have him beaten by several men with baseball bats.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sliwa took the beating.\u00a0 But he also returned promptly to his job on the radio where he returned fire with a vengeance.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A few months later, the Gottis struck again.\u00a0 This time, though, they went in for the kill.<\/p>\n
One night Sliwa hailed a cab.\u00a0 Unbeknownst to him, the driver was a hit man.\u00a0 At nearly point-blank range, he shot Sliwa five times.\u00a0 <\/em>During the mayhem, the latter managed to wiggle his way out of the passenger\u2019s window as the car was moving<\/em>. \u00a0<\/p>\nSliwa not only survived this attempt on his life.\u00a0 The very next day, from his hospital bed, Sliwa was back on the airwaves going at the Gottis with everything he had.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Years later, when Junior Gotti was on trial for all manner of criminal wrongdoing, including attempted murder vis-\u00e0-vis Sliwa, the crime buster reassured the media and his listeners of his plan to \u201cget in his [Gotti\u2019s] face\u201d as much as possible.<\/p>\n
The fight against evil requires not only that we repudiate the treacherous.\u00a0 It requires as well that we affirm the heroic.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Sadly, we should not expectHollywoodto follow this lead anytime soon.\u00a0 Hundreds of more films will be made lionizing rats and other parasites before anyone will dare to propose, let alone produce, a big budget film depicting the exploits of real men like Curtis Sliwa.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Last week, one ofAmerica\u2019s most notorious rats departed from the Earth.\u00a0 Perhaps with the exception of that of Sammy \u201cThe Bull\u201d Gravano, there was no other snitch with whose name Americans were more familiar than that of \u201cHenry Hill.\u201d Unlike Gravano\u2014who, being the right-hand henchman of the now deceased mafia star, John Gotti, achieved a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":399,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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