[Music] do you miss the mob lifestyle you know i'd be lying if i say i didn't at times but you know people ask me all the time they say do you miss the money do you miss the power and all that you know to a degree i mean look it's great when you have anything you can want at your disposable because you got enough money to take care of it my i had my own jet plane i had a leader 25a i had a belt helicopter uh i had a couple of big automobile agencies that
i own so i drove whatever car i want and you know basically at homes all over the country so yeah that's nice but you know what i really miss uh i miss the camaraderie that we had with the guys you know what was so attractive to me about that life is hey when you come in it's a brotherhood don't ever worry about your wife your daughter your sister we got their backs wherever you go you know if somebody hurts you we got somebody to back you up that's very powerful very very powerful and i missed
that kind of camaraderie that i had so you know i also nice you know going into the back room i want to tell you this for those of you that saw goodfellas henry hill he never walked in through the back kitchen of the copacabana i can tell you that now but i did many times first with my dad and then later on with myself you know it's nice to go in and get a ringside table and be treated that way so to say i didn't miss it you know i'd be lying how do you learn
the art of this sit down because that's part politics like part journalism sounds like some of the interviews i've had when i was running to be mayor like they're trying to trip you up you say the wrong one thing that's the thing that'll kill you because you learn how to negotiate that a lot of it is experience you know you make mistakes in the beginning but i was fortunate i had my dad who schooled me well and you know who taught me basically how to conduct myself in these things and you know one thing brian
the major thing my dad taught me that has worked for me my entire life and in a serious way i'll get into it is be a good listener don't run your mouth don't be the first to you know present you just be a good listener let the other guy make a mistake think you know hard be prepared going in and for me uh i became a major target of law enforcement major target they never got me on tape saying anything wrong never there was one undercover operation they had me on they had 83 tape recordings
on me it was this whole thing with don king and al sharpton they couldn't use one of them because i never i never made a mistake on the tape because i was always listening i was careful how i spoke and i credit my father and listening to him you know okay i understand that you know so you got to be careful who you talk to same thing a minute sit down let the guy present himself you always say this too you're going to a meeting sometimes you're the smartest guy in a room but you don't
want anybody to know it let them think you're a dummy you don't know anything and they happen away yep and all the way up and away right it's a big advantage there's other times when you're not the smartest guy in the room but if you keep your mouth shut nobody knows that they don't know it so you let them talk commit themselves by the time they're finished then you can become the smartest guy in a room because they told you everything you know here's the thing it's it's all about the the media it's all about
entertainment i mean look when the godfather came out guys on the street were acting different because it elevated the persona of guys on the street in a big way i'm telling you i witnessed it i watched it all of these movies i speak to young kids michael come on man you know you had them you had the cars you had the money you had all the women you had people catering to you all the time it was i said i know that was good fellas right did you watch the second half of the movie who
got killed who lost everything who went to jail they don't see that they only see the money the power and that's an aphrodisiac to people but when i first started speaking i get out of jail i was pretty well known in new york we had a hot name maybe on the west coast florida yes that's where i got indicted there too in the midwest texas nobody knew who i was they put on the marquee the mob guy is going to be there standing room only people are interested in the lifestyle it's all the media hollywood
entertainment the news i mean john gotti come on you know how many people wanted to be john gotti how many people wanted to be michael corleone vito callie and it's it's an idiot because they see the upside but they don't see what comes they don't see it and they don't pay attention to it you actually had a lot of stuff going on with you had stuff going on with dealerships you want all these different things with the car i i bought a mazda agency when you couldn't give a mazda one i remember that i remember
reading because the michael engines were exploding you couldn't give one away and i built that into the biggest agency on long island as far as mozart was concerned and it was a lot of work and i had to do things differently but i was able to build i think i had a head for business i had a knack for it now you know don't get me wrong i'm not the smartest business guy around because there's a lot of things in business i don't enjoy doing but there were certain talents that i had that worked well
for me and i always tell people this when you're in business i don't think it's a good thing to micromanage because nobody can do everything good but here's the deal do what you do best and delegate the rest and then be a good you know watcher of these people make sure you get the most out of them that's how you do it you know it's uh you can't hang out with the wrong people and be accountable to the wrong people continue to do the wrong things and think it's going to end up okay you know
it's the definition of insanity you know keep doing the same wrong thing think you're going to have a different outcome so you know i look in this life i have found out number one we are who we hang out with we're judged by the people we surround ourselves with and who we are accountable to when i was on the street i was accountable to my oath to my boss i was a criminal every day of my life on the street i'm violating the laws of god and the laws of man because that's who i was
accountable to now you know with the grace of god i've been able to you know transform that part of my life i'm accountable to god to my wife to my children to people that trust me so i'm i'm on the right path i try to stay on it but you know remember this you know it's what i tell these guys too you can take the boy out of brooklyn can't always take brooklyn out of the boy i have the same instincts that i've had they don't go away you know sometimes i want to deal with
things the wrong way but i catch myself you know as much as i can but this is a tough life to navigate it's a violent life at times you're part of the life you're part of the violence there's no question about it but murder in that life was taken very seriously it was taken very very seriously you couldn't just go around rampant killing people i don't like this guy i want to kill him you know a made guy had a lot of respect and if that guy was in trouble first of all the only one
that can order a murder was the boss he had a sanction you couldn't do it without his okay not even a made men or a couple it has no of us has to be the boss and there was a lot of discussion about it it wasn't hey this guy's gonna go okay go get him tomorrow that's the end of that no it was taken very very seriously because remember the life is built on respect when you earn your stripes and you come into that life you're a respected guy so if something you did wrong or
they're going to make sure it was wrong and then if you violate the oath you know you're going to pay the consequences but it was something taken very seriously you know a lot of people think that we just went around and and random killing people and that's what the movie is i mean i certainly didn't witness that in my lifestyle you didn't witness that anymore not random stuff oh rank ran it was taken very seriously would you live the life all over again now because i'm i'm i'm a guy of faith now and i've turned
my life around i can never go back to that because i know that i did a lot of things that i regret during that time but take that away would i want to go back and at least have that experience again i'm being honest and i might get ridiculed for this but i think i might you to have the experience because look you know i learned things in that life that were invaluable to me throughout my life and if you take aways the bad stuff and just put me back in that environment around my guys
and some of them i think i might patrick and and again i'm hoping i'm explaining this right because you're going to have a 50 000 young kids right now go become mobsters no no no you got to say they're right no no no i don't want you know valuetainment produced 22 000 new mobsters no no no no let me make that clear let's give the disclaimer as well let me let me make that clear i said it's an evil life i said you're selfish if you put your family through that you're going to end up
in prison or dead one of the two governments got it all and it's morally wrong i mean there's no question about it but look there was some perks in that life you know that i i enjoyed i got to be honest with you now the price you pay as a result of the short time that you're going to have those perks is terrible because you're devastated for the rest of your life so it doesn't make sense i speak to a lot of young kids i speak to gang bangers i go into detention halls i have
an influence over them obviously and i tell them straight out you're going to be in prison for the rest of your life or you're going to die it's one of the two things and they'll say but michael you know i saw you in goodfellas and they had the money that had the power that had the girls i said yeah but did you watch the whole movie or did you just stop in the middle i said who got killed who went to jail who became an informant whose wife left them whose kids suffered why don't you
see that part and you know what they don't they only focus on it they don't realize it's very short-lived and that in the end you're going down and so please anybody listening parent don't get upset with me i i speak to these kids and i tell them the truth it's a bad life don't ever pursue it don't ever make the mistakes that i did you
