Sometimes, too much knowledge can keep a person from enjoying life. Not because of the knowledge and experience per se, but because of the responsibility one can feel in sharing it with those who have been kept in the dark at great peril to their well-being. So it is with this guiding principle that I write.
There has always been a political tug-of-war between the political parties in America, and there has long been outsiders of the Marxist communist-type using money to try to influence the culture, politicians, media, and the education system with the goal of societal infiltration. What one must remember is that a communist utopia has never succeeded nor ever will. There are many examples of these misguided, failed attempts.
But we are also contending with an education system and culture that has, through the Marxist playbook, used dialectical materialism, agitprop, linguistics, racism, and the erasure of the past to cast a foglike trance, brainwashing our youth and populace. This is through no fault of their own, but by the vaulting ambition and fetish the radical Left has with encouraging weakness, dependency, and grievance, in addition to the unfettered flood of immigrants coming to America, and encouraged to suck off the teat of government.
This Marxist infection has even infiltrated the Catholic church with “Liberation Theology,” which is slowly inundating South America with Marxism through religion.
My grandparents came from Naples and Sicily at the beginning of the 20th century. At that time, millions of Italians came to America – legally. They had to have a sponsor, a place to stay, a little money, a job, a medical exam, and learn English. They came to America, much like the Irish, Jews, and Germans.
Each ethnic group went through a difficult assimilation process, but ultimately were grateful to be embraced by this land of opportunity. As Italians, our grandparents told us to speak English, prodding us forth, saying, “This is America!” We were taught to succeed, not to blame, and not to be victims.
It is with a history lesson that I would like to give Mayor Mamdani: there were more lynchings of Italians in New Orleans in 1886 than of any other people; we were spat on and ridiculed. In 1906, a New York Times article called Italians “inferior to negro laborers.” We Italians were paid less than our black brothers and sisters. Decades later, the epithets lived on: greaseball, dago, wop, criminal, and a few more colorful words that don’t need to be printed here. The difference is that we were not filled with hatred and grievance, as we see today among folks generations removed from past injustices. I refer to slavery, which was a scourge.
Slavery, even among white people, existed for centuries before America became a nation. But the agitprop of the Left creates an angry group, which we have seen boil over. President Barack Obama could have united us — all races and backgrounds. He pledged as much in a rousing speech, declaring there is no “White America or Black America.” I, too, was inspired by his soaring rhetoric. The disappointment came later, when he drove the racial wedge even deeper.
But Obama was the beginning of an explosive political era that seeped into the culture, far from his so-called vision for unity. Multiple genders with their own pronouns, stripping the importance of mothers, fathers, and the nuclear family from the culture, a youth that has been pampered, babied, and encouraged into gender “transition” before they can use proper discernment. This is the result of educators, politicians, media, and parents who have come out of the drug culture and usurped traditional values. It’s cultural and societal chaos.
In the 1960s and ’70s, Bill Ayers and Bernadette Dohrn, along with the Black Panthers, were blowing up the Pentagon, police precincts, and tearing down historic statues, crying about “American Imperialism” and inciting violence.
While many of the members of the Weather Underground were jailed, others infiltrated the educational system. They wrote textbooks and became involved in politics to take down the system from within.
One of my political mentors was the great conservative thinker David Horowitz, who was in the thick of that movement but left when he experienced the corruption from within. His brilliant book, “The Radical Son,” explains his political transformation from Left to Right. Horowitz went on to write some of the most prophetic books. One in particular called “Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left,” it was written in 2004, but is just as relevant today.
This brings us back to the Pied Marxist Piper, Zohran Mamdani, who is currently leading the radical Left, New Yorkers, and America into a utopian hell.
How did this smiling cobra of a politician get to where he is today? One must look at his parents, who are Muslims born in India, raised in Africa, and educated through the generosity of the Kennedy Airlift Foundation. Mayor Mamdani is a silver spoon-fed Marxist, thanks to parents who built lucrative careers from the generosity of the American taxpayer. He plays his pipe and attracts those who are purposely made to feel disenfranchised or have come here to game the system.
Contrast this with my family’s story, which likely sounds similar to that of many hard-working Americans. My grandfather, Franco Davi, came from Torretta, Sicily, in the early 1900s, enlisted in the U.S. Infantry during WWI, was critically wounded three times, but went back each time to continue fighting. He was murdered by a drunk who hit him over the head with a pipe.
My father, Salvatore Davi, enlisted in the U.S. Navy the day after Pearl Harbor was attacked. He was a gunner on a merchant marine ship, which was torpedoed. He lived on a raft drifting in the ocean for three days. He was 17-years-old at the time. He was discharged as post-traumatic stress disorder set in. He went to California, became a volunteer fireman in Pasadena, and tried to break into film, oddly enough. Missing his family, he came back to Astoria, Queens, and attended Samuel Gompers Trade School, where he became a draftsman and machinist. My father worked three jobs most of his life, and volunteered at church. He died when he was 56 years old, having paid off his house on Long Island after 30 years and a savings of $100,000.
My grandfather and father, with many Italians, Jews, Germans, and Irish, built much of New York City. They were Catholics, Jews, and Protestants.
My father raised the American flag in our front yard in Dix Hills, Long Island, every Veterans’ Day, Fourth of July, Memorial Day, and D-Day — whenever it was appropriate. He loved America and instilled that wonderful love in me. We had a large family with folks on all sides of the political spectrum, and we were encouraged to debate, discuss, and disagree, but nevertheless love this country.
Most of my cousins excel in their fields, all of them the result of Italian immigrants who barely spoke English but did so, with a Love for America and the opportunity it provided, choosing work over welfare and relying on merit over handouts, no matter how difficult. As a kid, I was taught that no matter how tough things got, anything was possible if you put in the work. There was never a thought toward grievance or entitlement that we see rampant today.
The tune Zohran Mamdani plays, and the Left propagates to corral the unassimilated immigrant, the white liberal, the angry black, and the brainwashed, misled, entitled youth, leads them to the promised land of meritless enslavement, where inventiveness is replaced by a crippling paralysis of Marxist ideology. Mamdani, AOC, Ilan Omar, Blowhard Bernie, and the rest of the bleeding-heart Left have it all wrong, joined by my Hollywood brethren and sisters who convene in their elite enclaves and pat each other on the back for their bloated, pampered proselytizing.
It is nice to be loved by your colleagues and to feel part of a group, rather than being ostracised for having a different worldview. I was brought to California in 1977 when I worked on my first film with Frank Sinatra, the son of Italian immigrants himself. Hollywood was different then.
The point is that Mamdani doesn’t know better. He has, since birth, been marinated in an intellectually toxic worldview that oppressed nations continue to encourage. They are taught to come to America, and we can take care of you from cradle to the grave.
When I see hardworking Americans being usurped by the radical Left’s Marxist takeover, it pisses me off. Of course, I have compassion, but the guiding principle of the Mamdani effect, while seemingly wonderfully compassionate, is to erase the past in order to pander and lead the ignorant into a newly created abyss, where the government is the new feudal lord.
Lastly, I wish to remind folks that radical movements always seem to get the most hold until they are subdued. What I fear we are seeing across American cities is more Islamists flocking to America to undermine our way of life. Which brings us right back to our Pied Piper. So, I challenge Mayor Mamdani to a televised debate where we discuss America — its people, way of life, history, and aspirations. Two men, two New Yorkers, two descendants of immigrants, two visions of America.
Shall we?
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Robert Davi is an acclaimed actor, singer, filmmaker, radio host, and sharp conservative political commentator who was named the “Godfather of Pop Culture Warriors” by Human Events.
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