On the surface, Michael Armstrong was a dedicated public and private servant whose genius is not revealed until you're about ⅔ of the way through the Sam Roberts NYT obituary in yesterday's paper.
Mr. Armstrong was noted for being the chief counsel to the Knapp Commission when it was investigating NYC police corruption in the early '70s.
Former NYC police commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said of Mr. Armstrong: "He pulled no punches in exposing the depth of corruption with a dramatic flair and was unbowed in his attempt to determine the facts."
As a chief of the United States Attorney's securities fraud unit in New York in 1967, Mr. Armstrong successfully prosecuted the government's case against Louis E. Wolfson for selling unregistered securities. The investigation even reached Justice Abe Fortas of the United States Supreme Court and led to his resignation.
Louis E. Wolfson owned thoroughbreds, notably Affirmed, the winner of the 1978 Triple Crown, the last Triple Crown winner before American Paraoh in 2015. Wolfson's Harbor View Farm breed and raced several champion thoroughbreds.
Being a racing fan, I recognized Harbor View's silks in the scene from an Aqueduct race being portrayed in the movie A Bronx Tale, in which Sonny rips up his tickets before the finish, even though his horse is leading by gobs of lengths, all because during the race he learns Moosh, the permanently jinxed member of the entourage, bet on the same horse. Sonny's horse, after the huge lead, folded like a church cellar chair, and winds up off the board and up the track.
After the Knapp Commission post, in 1973 Mr. Armstrong is appointed by Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller to finish the term of Thomas Mackell, The Queens County DA who was forced to resign after his son-in-law, who worked in the office, promoted a Ponzi scheme that crashed and burned. Up to then, Mackell was seen as a rising star in the Democratic Party, and a possible candidate for governor. Growing up and living in Flushing, Queens at the time, I remember all of this well.
It turns out Mr. Armstrong did not want to run for the Queens DA election when the interim term ended. He had little taste for clubhouse politics and did what is the true genius part of his life. He pre-emptively disqualified himself from ever running for public office.
Mr. Armstrong found a reporter he could count on to remember three things he believed in. Things that were political suicide, that the exposure of saying these three things—that he wouldn't deny ever saying—would assuredly keep the Italians, Irish or Jews (in other words, the vast majority of the registered voters at the time in Queens) from ever casting a ballot in his favor, assuring the election of any opponent who ran against him.
"No. 1. I believe there's a Mafia and it's all full of Italians. No. 2. I think it was a disgrace for the Irish to remain neutral in WW II. And No.3. I sympathize with the Palestinians in the Middle East."
Just think if more people, of all stripes, were to record time capsule views that pre-disqualified them from ever seeking public office.
There would be no cable news channels. There would be no talking heads with endless speculative views and opinions on everything. There would be no public relation spin artists. There would be no televised Senate confirmation hearings because the candidate would have their proxy unfurl their very unpolitically correct viewpoints ahead of time. The candidate wouldn't even get seated. Soap operas and game shows would return to television.
To use the words from the Louis Armstrong (no relation to Michael) song: "What a Wonderful World."
http://www,onofframp.blogspot.com
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