AHC/WI: Organized crime infiltrates TV evangelism

Yeah, yeah, I know. "Whaddya mean, TV preachers are already organized crime!"

Jokes aside, with a POD of any time since the advent of TV evengelism(or radio evangelists even), have the mob infiltrate and manipulate broadcast ministries. Maybe something analagous to what they did with big-city unions, though with the preachers, blackmail tactics might play a bigger role.

How it could work, for example...

The mob wants to open up a casino somewhere, but are in battle with another company for the only gaming license the city is planning to give that year. So they send someone to talk to a prominent TV preacher saying "Unless you want us to release the photos we have of you ducking into a motel with your secretary, make sure that your next anti-gambling segment features lots of stuff about all the people led into a life of sin and dissolution at our rivals' casinos." Not sure if that would work(could backfire if it turns people against gambling generally), but that would be the general idea.

A problem could be the ethnic-divide. Big-city gangs with heavy represntation from Jews, Italians, Irish etc might not hit it off so swimmingly with the protestant crackers who tend to make up the bulk of the TV preachers. Maybe biker gangs might be the ticket? Or converts from traditionally Catholic ethnicities(Hispanic or filipino evangelicals etc)?
 
Perhaps this could be satisfied by televangelists in the African-American community? Individuals like Eddie Long, who was faced with allegations of abusing underage boys; or people like Creflo "$60,000,000 private jet" Dollar could be good candidates. Both seem to be based in Georgia, which doesn't seem to have commercial gambling; though according to Wikipedia, there is "charitable gambling", which seems like a good enough way to launder money and be used as a front for some criminal dealings. Also, both men faced an inquiry into their tax-exempt status by the US Senate, leading to a downturn in donations. This may encourage the men to get further in bed with a certain criminal element in an ATL.

A popular ministry being entwined with a crime syndicate could become a sort of political machine, especially if it becomes tied to an area's dominant ethnic group. That would certainly have an influence on how people voted, and could lead to the loosening of gambling laws in the gang's favor. Of course, I may be getting too hung up on the casino thing.
 
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This doesn't seem that implausible, maybe the mob funds a TV evangelist as a means to launder money? Covering it up as donations to the Church involved perhaps? People taking advantage of people's beliefs to fill their own pockets not only sounds plausible but it probably happened/happens.
 
Perhaps this could be satisfied by televangelists in the African-American community? Individuals like Eddie Long, who was faced with allegations of abusing underage boys; or people like Creflo "$60,000,000 private jet" Dollar. Both seem to be based in Georgia, which doesn't seem to have commercial gambling; though according to Wikipedia, there is "charitable gambling", in which seems like a good enough way to launder money and be used as a front for some criminal dealings. Also, both men were an inquiry into their tax-exempt status by the US Senate, leading to a downturn in donations. This may encourage the men to get further in bed with a certain criminal element in an ATL.

Perhaps a popular ministry being entwined with a crime syndicate could become a sort of political machine, especially if it becomes tied to an area's dominant ethnic group. That would certainly have an influence on how people voted, and could lead to the loosening of gambling laws in the gang's favor. Of course, I may be getting too hung up on the casino thing.

I think I picked the casino scenario because gambling is one industry that is a) closely linked with the mob, and b) widely subject to religious condemnation. And yeah, "charitable gambling" could create a perfect-storm scenario to get the mob and the church in bed together. (I'd actually be surprised if there was never any gang incursion into big-city Catholic bingo games.)

The other industry I was thinking of was music, specifically rock music during the Satanic Panic era. You could have mobsters leaning on music companies to get whatever they want from them, and threatening to pressure the evangelists to denounce this or that musician, band, or even record-label, as Satanic, if the companies don't comply.

Though, apart from the odd "Johnny Fontane" scenario, I'm not sure what the mob would want from the rock music industry.
 
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