Michael Benson

Wheatland-Chili H.S., Hofstra U., married, excellent wife, two excellent kids. Writer.

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

Funding ‘Gangsters vs. Nazis’: A journey https://t.co/fmjJvSG8ia

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

Prices slashed all weekend long. #books #sale #mafia #mob #redhook

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

#books #booksale #mafia #brooklyn #redhook

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

Moguls: The Lives and Times of Hollywood Film Pioneers Nicholas and Joseph Schenck https://t.co/mDNfgidshI

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

Here's a link to a trailer for the audio version of MOGULS. Check it out: https://t.co/2DfCJkRFpt #Hollywood #newbooks #audiobooks #moguls

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

https://t.co/UHxtFiUp30 #moguls #movies #filmhistory #Hollywood #MGM

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

Haven’t preordered your copy of MOGULS yet? Now’s the time! @BNBuzz is offering B&N Rewards Members 25% off ALL preorders from Sept. 4-6. Use code PREORDER25 when you order here: https://t.co/g8Qqj4Rq2N

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

(585) Magazine

[Kensington Books @KensingtonBooks]

GANGSTERS VS NAZIS by Michael Benson was featured in The New York Post! https://t.co/qbCLVNntVl

[Tom Schulte @tgschulte]

I just reviewed Gangsters vs. Nazis by Michael Benson. #GangstersvsNazis #NetGalley https://t.co/zd7UDNMzpH

[Kensington Books @KensingtonBooks]

Acclaimed crime writer #MichaelBenson uncovers the shocking truth about the insidious rise of Nazism in America in the years leading to WWII in GANGSTERS VS NAZIS. https://t.co/pPBcGYAK78

[Imtiaz Mahmood @ImtiazMadmood]

The Nazis lost their fashion style. No more Hugo Boss designs. The pro-Hamas/pro-Palestine should reintroduce the drums, for more circus effect.

Bam! Kapow! When 1930s Jewish mobsters beat up Nazis in the streets of America

A new book, “Gangsters vs. Nazis: How Jewish Mobsters Battled Nazis in Wartime America,” tells the fascinating story of how Perlman secretly directed an army led by Jewish gangsters across the United States in a successful yearlong campaign to squelch two key American Nazi organizations, the Bund and the Silver Legion (better known as the Silver Shirts).

What they did actually worked and drove the Nazis back underground.

“It wasn’t the numbers of American Nazis] that really upset Judge Perlman as much as it was the brazen way they behaved. It never occurred to them that they would encounter resistance. They assumed Jews were soft and would be afraid to fight back,” Benson said.

It seems the Jew-haters are making the same assumption today.

[Atlas Media Corp @AtlasMediaCorp]

Thnx cast & crew for an amazing shoot for our doc film based on Michael Benson's bestselling book: "Gangsters vs. Nazis: How Jewish Gangsters Battled Nazis in WW2 Era America". (Yes, that's the author holding a baseball bat!) #GangstersvsNazis #MeyerLansky #GermanAmericanBund

[Robert Bellissimo At The Movies @RBatTheMovies]

Thank you @kensingtonbooks for sending me a copy of MOGULS: The Lives and Times of Film Pioneers Nicholas and Joseph Schenck by Michael Benson (Gangsters vs. Nazis) and film director @craigsinger17

Stay tuned for my interview with the authors !

#books #filmbooks

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

Preorder RED HOOK ahead of its release in December. Don’t miss the great deal @barnesandnoble, running from July 10 - 17. They’re offering B&N Rewards Members 25% off all preorders (35% off for premium members!) when you use the promo code PREORDER25! #BarnesAndNoble #BookSale

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

Preorder your copy of my upcoming book, MOGULS ahead of its release in December, don’t miss the great deal @barnesandnoble is running from July 10 - 17. B&N Rewards Members get 25% (35% off for premium members!) when you use the promo code PREORDER25! #BarnesAndNoble #BookSale

[CALL TO ACTIVISM @CalltoActivism]

Here is Robert De Niro’s full statement about how Donald Trump should NEVER be president again:

“I’ve spent a lot of time studying bad men.  I’ve examined their characteristics, their mannerisms, the utter banality of their cruelty.

Yet there’s something different about Donald Trump. When I look at him, I don’t see a bad man. Truly.

I see an evil one.

Over the years, I’ve met gangsters here and there. This guy tries to be one, but he can’t quite pull it off. There’s such a thing as “honor among thieves.” Yes, even criminals usually have a sense of right and wrong. 

Whether they do the right thing or not is a different story — but — they have a moral code, however warped.

Donald Trump does not. He’s a wannabe tough guy with no morals or ethics. No sense of right or wrong. No regard for anyone but himself — not the people he was supposed to lead and protect, not the people he does business with, not the people who follow him, blindly and loyally, not even the people who consider themselves his “friends.” He has contempt for all of them.

We New Yorkers got to know him over the years that he poisoned the atmosphere and littered our city with monuments to his ego.  We knew first hand that this was someone who should never be considered for leadership.  We tried to warn the world in 2016.

The repercussions of his turbulent presidency divided America and rattled New York City beyond imagination.  Remember how we were jolted by crisis in early 2020, as a virus swept the world.

We lived with Donald Trump’s bombastic behavior every day on the national stage, and we suffered as we saw our neighbors piling up in body bags.

The man who was supposed to protect this country put it in peril, because of his recklessness and impulsiveness. It was like an abusive father ruling the family by fear and violent behavior.  That was the consequence of New York’s warning getting ignored. Next time, we know it will be worse.

Make no mistake: the twice-impeached, 4-time indicted Donald Trump is still a fool. But we can’t let our fellow Americans write him off like one. Evil thrives in the shadow of dismissive mockery, which is why we must take the danger of Donald Trump very seriously.

So today we issue another warning. From this place where Abraham Lincoln spoke — right here in the beating heart of New York — to the rest of America:
This is our last chance.

Democracy won’t survive the return of a wannabe dictator.

And it won’t overcome evil if we are divided.

So what do we do about it?  I know I’m preaching to the choir here.  What we’re doing today is valuable, but we have to take today into tomorrow – take it outside these walls.   We have to reach out to the half of our country who have ignored the hazards of Trump and, for whatever reason, support elevating him back into the White House. 

They’re not stupid, and we must not condemn them for making a stupid choice.  Our future doesn’t just depend on us. It depends on them.

Let’s reach out to Trump’s followers with respect.  Let’s not talk about “democracy.”  “Democracy” may be our holy grail, but to others it is just a word, a concept, and in their embrace of Trump, they’ve already turned their backs on it. 

Let’s talk about right and wrong.  Let’s talk about humanity. 

Let’s talk about kindness.  Security for our world. 

Safety for our families. 

Decency. 

Let’s welcome them back. 

We won’t get them all, but we can get enough to end the nightmare of Trump, and fulfill the mission of this “Stop Trump Summit.”

[CALL TO ACTIVISM @CalltoActivism]

A British writer penned the best description of Donald Trump I’ve ever read:

“Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?”

A few things spring to mind. Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed. So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever. I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.

Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface. Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.

And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead. There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.

• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish: ‘My God… what… have… I… created?' If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.”

-Nate White

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

https://t.co/6lhajiTj3q

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

@FayeOBri Obviously I don’t look at twitter much. My email is [email protected]

[Michael Benson @Michael09030107]

@Pattriciau36 Local interest. The Devil at Genesee Junction (Rowman & Littlefield) by Michael Benson. On sale Nov. 16