OWNING YOUR CRIME

EXCERPT...Paulie (Manafort) used to get up in the middle of the night, turn on his special prison reading light, and dig into the bible. And I'd wonder "Is this his way of acknowledging his crimes? Is he saying 'I'm sorry' to God?"....

In the process of USDA's hammering out plea deals with the accused, the government stresses that defendants should "own" their crime. Maybe they feel it's the first step toward rehabilitation and an indication of their defendant's maturity that they do that. Hard to say. You'd have to ask them. Whatever the issues which led to my stay at MCC, denial certainly wasn't one of them. I had absolutely no problem admitting that I'd underreported income and thus commanded the attention of the law.

Upon hearing about my predicament, a friend of mine's mother commented "Why do they bother with Billy? Why don't they go after Trump?" I appreciated the sentiment, but told John "My current dilemma has nothing to do with Donald Trump - and has everything to do with me. What he does is his business. And what I did is mine." But I appear to be in the minority when it comes to owning my indiscretions.

Take the President for example. Never mind about allegations that he's not the country's most diligent taxpayer and he's fought tooth and nail to not let the world see his tax returns. What happened when that "grab 'em by the pussy" tape surfaced? How would a real man respond? 

By me, he'd say "I'm completely embarrassed by what I said. It was totally inappropriate, insensitive, misogynistic and juvenile. I apologize to anybody and everybody offended and vow to never say anything like that again." That would have been a nice start. 

So what happened? Trump responded by citing Bill Clinton as a much worse offender when it came to talking trash about women. That is what I call not owning your crime. I wonder why I, a nobody in the grand scheme of things, is told to man up to my own mistakes, while the President of the United States gets a pass.

I roomed with Paul Manafort during my stay at MCC federal prison. Coincidentally, I knew more about Paulie's mistakes than 99% of the inmates and staff at the prison. In fact, one night down at suicide watch, after describing concisely exactly who Paul Manafort was - and what he'd done to get himself locked up to one of the suicidal inmates, Jeffrey Epstein (who was also in attendance) commented "That's the best synopsis of Paul Manafort's crimes I've ever heard!" And this was coming from the teaching part of Jeffrey's personality which gained the favor of many a multi-millionaire while he taught at one of New York City's most elite private schools. And not the part which led him to abuse teenagers.

I can say a few positive things about Paul Manafort. He was an intelligent and considerate celly. But not once did he own his crimes. It was all about the media twisting his story - and how abused he'd been by them - and all that horse shit so reminiscent of the guy whose campaign he ran. How difficult would it have been for him to say "I didn't feel like paying taxes on that Ukranian dictator's money. It was a poor decision in retrospect. Look where it got me." 

Paulie used to get up in the middle of the night, turn on his special prison reading light, and dig into the bible. And I'd wonder "Is this his way of acknowledging his crimes? Is he saying 'I'm sorry' to God?" I never asked him. I just took it as one of my cellies' (I had six of them in a year) quirks. They all had them.

I don't hold myself above Paulie or the President just because I own my crime while they don't. I just wonder how guys like that rise to the top of the food chain, and in the President's case, manage to gain the favor of the electorate given how they act when it comes to being a man. Then again...what the fuck do I know? I'm just a tax cheat. Who cares what I think?