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If you don't care what happened yesterday and are just delighted that your old buddy Gwarble came through it unscathed, no need to listen to me any further. I did guys. I'm still here, which is the most important detail of all this. I'm sure you'll all agree.
Moving on to the more intricate details of the situation yesterday, I'll explain my own position and allow the heads of Los Angeles and New York to do so if they wish. As you are probably aware, Chicago and New Orleans have been considered close friends of ours. Indeed, many remain to be such and will hopefully understand if not agree with the decision that was taken yesterday. They participated fully in the removal of CrazyNine from Philly and they aided us against New York and St Louis.
Why then, do we side with New York against them?
My own reasoning for bringing my city in was that I saw none of the same commitment from them in the war against New York that I had seen in the war against Philly. We had known all along that Jim Levenstein would be late to the affair and that was not an issue, however he said we would have his BG wackers by around 15:00 and several hours beyond that they still sat active, on the side line. That doesn't seem like the conduct of a staunch ally to me; instead rather like the conduct of someone hedging their bets to see which way the axe is going to fall.
Furthermore, when they did embroil themselves in the conflict, the effort was contrary to that of the other families and those who had already given their lives to the cause. It was obvious the strategy was to remove the biggest threat, Gaius and yet when I requested the New Orleans hitters joined in this effort, they did for one round, and then retreated to attack the much safer target of the sleeping Serotonin.
There is nothing wrong making decisions like that and I respect him for it. However, it was a misread of the situation and he should have appreciated how it would be perceived. A Godfather is tasked with making the tough calls and he made one.
I believe this decision taken by Jim Levenstein, which I asked several times for him and his RHM Grubby to reconsider, cost the lives of my members and those of my city. If I could understand the strategic importance of such a move, I would have supported it, but after so long on the sidelines twiddling their thumbs, I completely disagreed with them doing anything other than what the rest of us had been working towards for 12 hours and I was offered no explanation beyond "we'll work Serotonin's BGs."
"Why Chicago then?" I hear you ask. Well, the unfortunate nature of our business is that some cities are entwined with others, through their pasts and relationships. New Orleans and Chicago had been two such cities and I did not believe it would be possible to remove one and not the other. As a result, Chicago is also now currently vacant; something which I am not pleased about as I liked Iota, but it is something I believed to be necessary.
As you can imagine, especially with the loss of our great friend and Godfather Robert_Guiscard, the remaining Godfathers have much to decide in order to determine how business will progress from here. The money and lives of useful people on both sides in this conflict has been extraordinary, especially when tied in with the effect of the previous week as well. We now have the uphill task of replenishing our families and will be making moves to do so.
We have had preliminary discussions and I'm sure TheDean and SpaceMountain will have their own perspective to share on these events and where we are going from here. I have my own plans for Philadelphia and reshaping our business across America, which I hope to put into action shortly. I will be keeping you all appraised of what those are as and when they happen.
For now though, feel free to tell me how cowardly it is to attack people whilst they are sleeping, even though everyone was awake for this one, or something equally stupid and not applicable to this scenario like usual. Any intelligent contribution is also welcome, but admittedly I do prefer your stupid tears.
~G~warble. |
