With his arrest on charges of insider trading NY 27 Congressman, Chris Collins reign of terror in Western New York is coming to a predictable end. But unlike autocratic Collins who pushed everybody out of his way when he became Erie County Executive in 2007—laying off 1,200 county workers, reducing daycare money to single moms, cutting cultural programs and aid to the library system, while raising property taxes—the U.S. Attorney for the Southern district of New York plans a slow burn kind of love in the prosecution of Collins.
Slipping into his orange jumpsuit to the jaunty funk of Randy Newman’s , It’s Money That I Love the U.S. Attorney might engage Collins in some lighthearted foreplay, reminding him that the job of a congressman is to serve the people, not himself. That, seeking investments and endlessly talking up your biotech company Virionyx which morphed into Innate Immunotherapeutics, while both Erie County Executive and a Congressman is working for yourself, not the people. Furthermore, the U.S. Attorney could get all saucy and quietly whisper into Collins’ ear, that being a fucking rich guy is not an organizing principle and it doesn’t inoculate you from justice and truth no matter how gerrymandered your district.
But knowing the long history of Collins dismissing anyone who would challenge his hard right—I’m a rich guy and I know best— agenda, the attorney most likely will have to drive the point home more forcefully.
Maybe a future colleague from Cell Block C named Bonehead would provide this service with a lap dance while the congressman is handcuffed to a chair. Taking deep puffy breaths while gyrating his 6’8” frame against Collins, Bonehead might go through a list of the congressman’s greatest hits like: his poorly researched “Kids before Cons” proposal, which would have restricted money for inmates to take college classes despite thirty years of research showing every dollar spent on inmate education saves between four and five dollars are saved on re-incarceration costs; he might also remind Collins that his vote for The American Health Care Act would have cost home state New Yorkers three billion dollars; or how Collins quipped that his donors told him to get the 2017 Republican Tax bill done or don’t ever call them again even though his vote would cost New Yorkers up to fifteen billion dollars in lost revenue.
It is likely Collins would remain steadfast about his past positions and votes. But, as Lou Reed’s Strawman comes up in the mix with it’s slow building power the attorney might pierce Collins’ skin a bit and hit him were he lives, pointing out how dumb it was for a guy worth seventy million dollars to throw away his name, position and freedom for seven hundred grand of other people’s money. Finishing Collins off, as Lou Reed angrily strokes those power chords, the satisfied U.S. Attorney might smile and emphasize to Collins that he is: yet another politician caught with his pants down, money sticking in his hole.
See ya in four to six Chris.
In recent policy fights around health care and tax reform, Collins was the kind of politician who was blunt about the divisions within the Republican conference while finding a way to elevate Trump above the party infighting. He voted for the House’s Obamacare repeal-and-replace bill and the tax bill — both of which disproportionately disadvantaged New York constituents.
He says he did it for the party Trump now leads — not his constituents: “My donors are basically saying, ‘Get it done or don’t ever call me again,’” Collins said during the tax fight
