Craig Glazer – Jewcy

Solving the Drug Problem

Craig Glazer — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 02:00:00 +0000

I have been on both sides of the drug war and I can tell you that the war has been lost. Today more people use or have used illegal drugs than ever before. It is time to fix this national nightmare.

When I was an undercover agent for the Kansas Attorney General, we had meetings with the DEA and FBI about the need to make more drug arrests. Why? To make the streets safer? To help get people off drugs? No–to insure higher caseloads so we had more money coming in from the feds. It was all about Power and Money.

Just like with gambling. Why has the government allowed so many casinos? Our government wants the tax dollars. Same with the lottery–basically a legalized "numbers racket." Yet if you have a poker game at home or as the local bartender you take sports bets, it’s a felony and you can go to prison. The difference? In the activities they allow, the government gets the vig (the percentage a bookie takes). Same with alcohol. The government once tried to ban booze. It didn’t work. So now the government taxes it, takes a cut of the revenues, and punishes any negative behavior (drunk driving, etc.) that may result.

Why not do the same with drugs (and prostitution too)? Tax the product, make the distribution safer, and punish any negative behavior. Also, legal drugs that are safer than heroin, etc., exist today. One element in legalizing alcohol was that it would take dangerous moonshine off the street. There are legal drugs that can take deadly drugs off the street. The government just needs to make those safer drugs more widely available.

The new White House should convene a commission on revamping our entire approach to the drug problem and I’d love to be on it. (BTW, I’m on the board of directors of Renaissance West, a drug and alcohol rehabilitation clinic). If we don’t take a new approach, the drug problem is only going to get worse. Eighty percent of the people in prison are there because of drugs or drug-related crime. I know–I was one of them. Solve the drug problem and you solve our crime problem. It can be done.

Craig Glazer , author of The King Of Sting: The Amazing True Story of a Modern American Outlaw, spent the last week guest-blogging on Jewcy. Want more? Get his book!

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The First Jew On the Moon

Craig Glazer — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 05:28:05 +0000

When I was incarcerated at Boron aka Watergate Camp, only a couple hours from L.A., there were a few inmates connected to Hollywood. One of them was Seth Jaffe, an actor who had guest starred on TV series like "Cagney & Lacey" and "Remington Steele." He was also a very funny writer. So the warden allowed us to put on a comedy show in front of the 700 inmates. One of our skits went like this…

You all saw the landing on the moon, July 21, 1969. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were the first men to walk on the moon, right? Actually, I, Craig Glazer, was the first man on the moon. Here’s how it happened… The lunar module had just touched down when Houston called us: "This is Mission Control, we have a problem. The lunar surface where you have landed may be unstable, too dangerous for you to step down on." We were crushed. All of our work was for nothing! But then Mission Control called again and only spoke to Neil and Buzz: "We have an idea. Send the Jewish kid down first." I go down the stairs onto the surface of the moon. I check things out and everything seems safe. That’s when Neil lowers a camera to me and I film him jumping onto the surface.

Don’t believe me? Think about it. How the hell do you think they got that film of him coming down the stairs? The cameraman! That was me–the first Jew on the moon!

Even the goyem laughed–and considering this was federal prison that was almost everyone.

Craig Glazer , author of The King Of Sting: The Amazing True Story of a Modern American Outlaw, is guest blogging on Jewcy. Tomorrow he’ll publish his parting post. Stay tuned.

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The Good Things About Being Jewish in Prison

Craig Glazer — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 05:25:18 +0000

I was in federal prison for four-and-a-half years. I got into the best shape of my life thanks to weightlifting and being forced to give up drugs and alcohol. I made lots of friends, many of whom are still my friends on the outside today. I also found a new business partner who led me to becoming a co-producer of "Champions Forever," a boxing documentary. I had off-site jobs, went on an unsupervised furlough back home, took trips into town with the warden’s female assistant and boffed her, did stand-up comedy behind bars. While I was in a halfway house in Los Angeles, my buddy, actor Sonny Landham, came by and took me to the Oscars!

There were advantages to being Jewish too. Just like in school, I had the Jewish holidays off along with the ones for everyone else. At a couple of the prisons, including Terminal Island, I also landed a job as a cook for the other Jewish inmates. It was a pretty easy gig because there weren’t that many of us. At Safford in Arizona, most of the prisoners were Hispanic. There were only about 20 Jews. The corned beef and gefilte fish was a nice break from Mexican food. But what you never forget in prison is that you belong to the government. You are not free. There are a few things that might make that bearable but there is nothing that can make being in prison "good." Nothing. Here’s a lesson to teach your children: Try to not go to prison.

Craig Glazer , author of The King Of Sting: The Amazing True Story of a Modern American Outlaw, is guest blogging on Jewcy this week. Stay tuned.

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How The Aryan Brotherhood Saved My Jewish Ass In Prison

Craig Glazer — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 05:20:52 +0000

I never thought of myself as anything but Jewish–but survival knows no religion. So at the medium-security Federal Correctional Institution in Safford, Arizona, I buddied up to the Aryan Brotherhood. Hey, you do what you have to do. Mike Amos was one of their leaders. He was a very tough dude who had already spent several years in prison for being an accomplice in the murder of a federal agent. I told him about my being a cop back in Kansas but, fortunately, he thought that was cool. There was no way I was going to tell him I was Jewish though. So I said my mother was Italian, which meant I wasn’t “technically” Jewish. He bought it. But then the AB insisted I fight a black inmate in the yard as a test of my loyalty. At first I refused but I had no choice. I landed one punch on his jaw. The black guy landed the next 20 on my face. The AB wanted me to take revenge, presumably evening the odds by using a knife. But I wasn’t going to risk a life sentence. I refused, and they never spoke to me in public again. Amos though remained a friend. Thankfully. When I was later attacked in the shower by a couple of Hispanics, I was bloodied and knocked woozy, and Amos happened by. He jumped in fully clothed and stomped them. Kinda makes me feel good that if the Aryan Brotherhood now knows I really was Jewish, they must be hating themselves for saving my ass.

Craig Glazer , author of The King Of Sting: The Amazing True Story of a Modern American Outlaw, is guest blogging on Jewcy this week. Stay tuned.

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How I Almost Got the Editor of a Jewish Newspaper Fired

Craig Glazer — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 05:02:26 +0000

I guess some people only want to hear about Jews who do good things. I was a con man, a sting artist who posed as a cop to rip off drug dealers. Okay, so the guys I stung were worse than me but I still kept the drugs and money. Then I became a real cop, but that’s another part of the story. Anyway, I wrote my autobiography, "The King of Sting: The Amazing True Story of a Modern American Outlaw," after a few years in prison and many years of being a good citizen and community leader in my hometown of Kansas City.

The editor of The Jewish Chronicle in KC writes a front-page story about me and the book and all hell breaks loose. People call for his resignation and there are some nasty letters to the editor.

Why?

Because I’m not a good image for Jews. "You are glorifying a criminal!" they screamed. Apparently some people think the only stories about Jews should be about scholars, lawyers, doctors, teachers, etc. But Jews are criminals too, and cops. We are everything. Some of us have had the most outrageous adventures in the drug underworld, some of us carried a gun while we were going to college, some of us kicked ass. Okay, I don’t fit the stereotype for an upper middle class Jewish kid from the suburbs. Deal with it. David kicked Goliath’s ass. Damn straight.

Craig Glazer , author of The King Of Sting: The Amazing True Story of a Modern American Outlaw, is guest blogging on Jewcy this week. Stay tuned.

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