Jennifer Mascia, rabid anti-gunner Joe Nocera’s editorial assistant, did most of the heavy lifting compiling the New York Times’ Gun Report. She revealed that she’s the daughter of a former mafia hit man when she published her book, Never Tell Our Business to Strangers, five years ago. It’s an interesting tidbit the newshounds at aljazeera.com recount in noting her latest gig. To wit . . .
In spite of the daily drudgery involved with the Gun Report, a secret from [Jennifer] Mascia’s own past helped keep her going: A family history of gun violence that began in 1963 in Owl’s Head Park in Brooklyn. It was there that her father, John Mascia, shot and killed a man for the first time . . .
“His name was Joe Vitali, his nickname was Joe the Fish, he was a heroin addict,” Mascia said. “My father lured him into the park with the promise of some heroin. And he and an accomplice turned around and shot him to death.”
Mascia discovered later in life that her father had been a mob enforcer. He killed Vitali because he was a suspected police informant. John Mascia was convicted for murder and served 12 years in prison before being paroled. He met Mascia’ mother just before his release.
Mascia didn’t find out her father was a murderer until she was 22 and he was dying of cancer. After he passed away, she learned an even darker secret from her mother.
“She said, ‘You know how you always asked me, “Did he shoot more than one person?” Well, he did.’”
Her mother confessed that her father had killed up to six other people over drug deals after he got out of prison, crimes for which he was never arrested, never convicted, never paid the price. The weight of her father’s sins helped drive Mascia’s work at The Times.
Drudgery? We consider gun blogging an honor. I wonder why Mascia didn’t join the Justice Department or, I dunno, work to tackle gang violence. How would gun control – The Gun Report’s not-so-hidden agenda – have stopped her father? Were any of the guns he used to commit the crime obtained legally?
Anyway, The Times canned the column. Mascia’s boss, Nocera, claimed that the feature had made its point with its contextless litany of “gun violence.” Mascia reckons her request for more pay led to the decision. Either way, like her father’s victims, the column now sleeps with the fishes (if you’ll excuse the levity). Mascia was out of work. But not for long.
Mascia was recently hired by the gun-control advocacy organization Everytown for Gun Safety – started and funded by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg – to help launch a digital newsroom and website devoted solely to tracking gun violence in America.
“We’re going to focus on victim stories, especially because putting a face to these crimes really helps drive it home for readers,” Mascia said.
The new site will launch in the coming months, with the aim of keeping everyday victims of gun violence in the media and in people’s thoughts.
“This is going to be everything I imagined for the Gun Report that I wanted to do” she said. “This will hopefully keep the conversation going. It will be a steady drumbeat. We’re not going to let this fall out of the media.”
Conversation? I don’t think that word means what she thinks it means. As to whether her father’s homicidal criminal record disqualifies her from blogging for gun control, I say no. But it does put her zeal for anti-gun agitprop into perspective. Thank you, Al Jazeera.
Two things come to mind.
First, she’s not her parents. In this country, she is held neither accountable nor responsible for their actions, good or bad, successes or failures.
Second, organized crime was around for, oh, as long as humanity itself, and enforcers managed quite well, thankyouverymuch, before the invention of guns. I suspect that they’ll do so well after firearms have been surpassed by whatever succeeds them. (I’m personally hoping for focused graviton beams, but I digress.)
So this whole thing seems to me to be a dreary personal interest sort of story, all fluff and no substance to add.
Bullcrap.
These days, I’m being held accountable because I’m white, and therefore enjoy “white privilege.” That’s not only my parents, but a whole line of ancestors going back a long damn ways that contributed toward my material and intellectual success, according to my “politically correct” detractors.
If that’s how the lunatic left wants to play it in this country, then I can hold this entitled little left-wing twat accountable for her father’s line of business, which he was able to pursue mostly because he came from the correct Italian lines of blood.
This
Yeah tell me about it. I am supposed to hate myself because I’m white. I work at a company that had been audited and they found over a dozen illegal aliens. They had to be let go obviously. Of all the replacement employees one was white. White people don’t get raises at my work and yet during those events two non-white guys that come in late all the time and are not very good workers were given promotions. Good times being white in America.
FACT
+100000000000000000000000000000000000
Persecution complex much?
I really wish you’d stick to posting about gunsmithing and other technical matters. Those are actually interesting and informative.
No, I’m holding liberals to their own standards.
If I can be called out for “white privilege” by the NY Times, then I can call out one of their little twerps for the sins of her father.
You obviously didn’t study logic much, if at all. But nice try.
I would agree with Dyseptic in that her father’s background and her background will not play well in Peoria. Oh gee, the mob wants gun control for me so I cannot defend myself from criminals like them. Yeah, that will sell really well with much of the public. This may not have the impact that Bolshevik Bloomy is hoping for.
Summary: My dad was a mafia enforcer, multiple murderer, and God only knows what else. Since he ignored laws at will nobody could stop him, so I’m going to join an organization to disarm everyone else.
Well, she obviously missed the mark. She should be trying to outlaw pinky ring-wearing Italian men from murdering drug dealers, drug users, and snitches.
Back when the Mafia was murdering drug dealers we had fewer murders. Perhaps we should bring back the Mafia.
AFAIK, Prohibition brought about the dramatic increase of non-government organized crime in America. It’s something from which we’ve never fully recovered. Prohibition II isn’t substantially different.
We (apparently) learned nothing from Prohibition I. It never works, and far more lives are being destroyed only because the drugs are illegal, than ever would be if those who were so inclined could just go to the drugstore/liquorstore and buy inexpensive, pharma-grade drugs. Prohibition doesn’t cut the number of addicts, it makes it more likely for said addicts to die from product issues, causes violence all up and down the distribution chain, make criminals out of recreational users (the vast majority of drug users).
Since 1971, over $1Trillion has been wasted on the ‘War on Drugs’. That’s ruined far more lives than the drugs, left legal ever would have. We have almost exactly the same addiction rates as when one could get morphine and cocaine from the Sears catalog…
Alcohol prohibition (another brilliant idea of “progressives” and the same sort of noisy, busy-body women we see in the MDA “movement” today) was what enriched the mob and allowed it to rise from an ethic crime group into a national crime empire.
Just as the Mafia grew in size and reach as a result of Prohibition, the south/central American drug cartels have grown in size and influence as a result of drug prohibition.
Whenever something common is turned into contraband, then said common stuff goes from being a commodity with low profit margins (of like 2 to 5%) to something with huge profit margins. Look at the cigarette issue in some states now. They’re still legal, but the taxes are so onerous on them that there’s a black market in untaxed cigs out there, with high profits and death due to criminal competition – just like the drug market.
Ok, I’ll buy that, but then she first needs to turn over her families ill- gotten gains, which likely include proceeds from family homes, and probably significant money derived (how was college paid for), to the families of daddy’s many victims. Mom too. IRS too! Admitting wrong doing is only part of the punishment owed. I hope the victims families can still go after dad’s estate. “Let’s see…dad gave us a great comfortable life using guns for criminal purposes, so therefore I think I’ll work to demonizes honest gun owners now….” A whole family of scumbags and bad Americans.
Good point!
John, the obvious point is that she wants to advocate for the infringement of our constitutional rights in order to distance herself from the sins of her father, his having been a professional button man for the mob. It really has been that simple a public story…one with new chapters every year.
We, many of us in many families, have been law-abiding owners of guns in the colonies, now states, for a very long time. My son is the eleventh generation since our family came to the Delaware Valley. Not a murderer among us. But now the princess of an immigrant professional murderer feels it is fitting to say, “my father used guns to murder, so you peaceful folks should not have guns except under the strictest regime of bureaucratic intrusion!” Screw that.
I think it is completely just to assume she should let a generation or two pass before telling us our own long-defended constitutional tradition (and details) need alteration. For our part we might tell her to prove her non-mob bona fides by working directly to eliminate organized crime. I see no special effort on her part to pursue that.
As for what of the father gets visited on the children, you seem to have skipped reading any serious history of the various criminal mobs in America.
I understand what you (and the comments above) are saying. I truly do.
That said, do you really want to give someone either a pass or a punch based on something that was not their doing, in fact may have happened before that person was born? Having been on the receiving end of that … No. No, I don’t. I’ll stand on my own merits and faults, thank you.
Re this particular story, I don’t care who her daddy was or what her reasons are; she’s working for a would-be tyrant to remove some of our fundamental rights and liberties. I need no other reason to have a low opinion of her.
Unless she ran for office as a republican on a pro-2A platform. Then she would be hung by her father’s profession. Only a democrats gets a free pass for a parent like that. Kennedy Klan comes to mind. Joe was a bootlegger so it can be assumed that he ordered many murders to protect the family business. Ted was in fact a murderer.
Color me shocked! A Mafia princess wants gun control? Is that because she prefers to keep a tilted playing field for her daddy and her relatives to perpetrate their criminal schemes? Quite probably.
What’s next? An extremely anti-gun CA state senator being arrested by the FBI for running guns to gang members?
Of all the people I don’t trust in this world, lefty anti-gunners of all stripes top the list. She’ll get plenty of media love because she is reasonably pretty. But I wouldn’t give up a dull Swiss Army knife for her, much less a fine firearm.
Amazing how fast that story was swept under the rug.
When the trial starts we’ll see more about this…
Is it wrong to say that she’s attractive? (I don’t want to go swimming though.)
Eh, I dunno.
What you do in your Bear-lair is nobody’s business.
With your claws, you could give her scratches on her back she’ll *never* forget… 😉
Possible. Quite average looking.
“Were any of the guns he used to commit the crime obtained legally?”
Now that’s funny right there.
Civilian disarmament is the primary HSE (Health-Safety-Environmental) initiative for any respectable mafioso. It’s the steel-toed shoes, guard rails and lock-out-tag-out for their work environment.
Gun control is a mafia tradition.
“Gun control? It’s the best thing you can do for crooks and gangsters. I want you to have nothing. If I’m a bad guy, I’m always gonna have a gun.”
— Sammy Gravano
Jennifer’s daddy would be proud.
According to Progressives, every culture should be embraced.
Even thuggish, violent and murderous culture.
Every culture except the ones they think should be “re-educated” or exterminated that is… (ex: “gun culture”)
The sin of the father is visited on the 2nd and third and fourth generations. Maybe she got a little evil from pops…yeah I said it…
“…“We’re going to focus on victim stories, especially because putting a face to these crimes really helps drive it home for readers,” Mascia said.”
Am I the only (cynical) one here who read that as “Bring Me The Bloody Shirt, I’ve Got Some Waving To Do!”
That’s what I read too.
Fortunately for us, logical minds read the same news storys and think, “if only the victim had a gun. He/she wouldn’t have been a victim.”
No, you aren’t the only person that reads it like that, and I don’t even think that’s being cynical in this case.That may not mean you are any less cynical of a person, but hell I don’t know you so I have no idea, in this case it’s just being honest though.
Wait. Her dad was a convicted felon? And he still managed to kill 6 people? How? Guns are the only things that can kill people. And convicted felons cannot own guns legally so how did he do it?
BTW as everyone knows – There is no Mafia!
It’s weirdo’s all the way down!
This has nothing to do with guns, but once upon a time my daughter said…
I was born in Tennessee, it’s not my fault my parents are Yankee’s.
So a girl with daddy issues ends up being a nutball lefty?
I’m shocked. Shocked, I tell you, shocked.
Its not like the mobs whackers give a flip about laws and they certainly are going to go buy a gun with “universal checks.” They like guys like Leland Yee better.
It must be very hard for her to admit to herself that her loving father lived a second life as a homicidal monster. Much easier to blame his evil actions on “guns”.
This doesn’t make what she is doing anymore right, but maybe it will help us understand her motives.
I don’t want to understand her motives. I just want her to STFU.
We understood Germany’s motives in the 40s. Didn’t stop us.
It will be a steady drumbeat.
Their version of a “conversation” is sticking their fingers in their ears and yelling “la-la-la-la-la-la…”
Shall not be infringed; the original “conversation” stopper.
Yeah, keep stirring the pot Jennifer! Keep it on the front burner. Good luck with that.
Hey Jennifer, wrap your brains around this: Gun control has lost. It failed miserably. After 20 kids were slaughtered, Obummer couldn’t ban the AR. Remember the recall election? Do you think keeping it on everyone’s mind with the help of Bloombags endless deep pockets are going to make a difference? If you think that, you are sorely mistaken and truly lost. But I don’t blame you for spending Bloombags money. You stick your hand out for a paycheck! You go girl. You won’t make a difference and you are of no consequence. The only people who will read your garbage are the ignorant and clueless and those are just the folks who are easily misled. You know, those who don’t matter anyway…like you!
The real reason she took that job with Every Town for Gun Safety … probably because she didn’t have any other options. Who else is going to hire her to blog about stuff she doesn’t understand? If she were a valued journalist, the New York Times would have moved her to a different project instead of letting her go.
And she might be double-dipping … organized crime may be paying her for promoting an agenda that dovetails nicely with their business model.
Remember, gun control bolsters black-market sales … a core competency of organized crime. Gun control also makes their “jobs” safer.
I think you just won the comments section for today.
Taking criminal law advice from a Mafia Princess is like taking grooming advice from a crack whore. But I’m sure she’s all about making her relatives’ jobs safer.
So, she wants to make the job easier for her dad’s successors by offering us a conversation we won’t be able to refuse?
Of course one of the most significant parts of this story is how so much of actual real news these days, news that is not liberal propaganda, comes from Al Jazeera.
Wow, what a crappy Italian daughter. You never discuss family business to others. You deal problems and issues within the family.
Also paid to post comments on the side?
http://www.captainsjournal.com/2015/03/06/bloombergs-anti-gun-apparatchiks/
“We’re going to focus on victim stories, especially because putting a face to these crimes really helps drive it home for readers,” Mascia said.
What she didn’t say. “Without victims to exploit, we’re nothing.”
I worked with Jennifer for several years and she is not her parents. This is a strong, independent, cultured and polite, brilliant woman who left that life behind, got an education, and ended up one of the good guys. Give her a chance, ugly trolls of the Internet. Would that everyone could start fresh, and from such high ground, as Jennifer.
She can’t be all that good of a person and certainly isn’t “brilliant” since she’s working to infringe upon the right of the individual to keep and bear arms. Despicable scumbag is much more descriptive of her choices… and I’m being kind.
Oh, is “treasonous dictator wishing to eliminate other people’s basic human rights” the new leftist term for “good guy?”
Her father oppressed, bullied, and victimized people and was responsible for the deaths of numerous innocents.
By joining with the antis, she just wants to continue the family business.
A more interesting part of the story is that she has been working sub-Rosa on the internet to sow dissent and confusion among gun owners and supporters of The Second Amendment.
http://www.captainsjournal.com/2015/03/06/bloombergs-anti-gun-apparatchiks/
Not only was she a paid shill for Bloomberg but she was actively using a second identity to create discord in the ranks. Not illegal but certainly indicative of a very shaky moral system or borderline sociopath.