Will the Real Massa Please Stand Up? Alexander Massa In light of the recent scandals surrounding embattled New York Representative Eric Massa (D), many have mistakenly assumed that I am related to him. To the best of my knowledge, we are of absolutely no relation. The Massa family which I am related to hails from several towns in Southern Italy, in the province of Foggia, to be exact. However, there are several Massa families unrelated to my own that are Portuguese. I am unaware of Rep. Massa's ancestry, and whether or not he is Italian, Portuguese, or anything else, but I am in no way, shape, or form, related to him. Perhaps this would be a good time to relate some of my family history to my readers. It is something that fascinates me, always had, and likely always will. The actions of my grandparents personify what the American Dream is all about. My grandfather, Michele Massa, and my grandmother, Giovannina Recchia, were born in San Marco La Catola, Foggia, Italy, in 1933 and 1938, respectively. They grew up in Mussolini's Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany's dim-witted Axis cousin in Europe. Their hometown was on the front lines of the war during the Allied invasion of Italy – it is located near Foggia, which was a major Axis stronghold in the area. Their town was shelled and besieged by Canadian forces while German motorized units, just recently entrenched in the town, desperately retreated northwards. Allied artillery shells sheared off the second floor of the house directly next to my grandmother's. If that Canadian gunner had shot a few feet in the other direction, I might not be here to recount this tale to you today. After the war, Italy's economy was ravaged and in shambles. Searching for work, my grandfather took up a myriad of jobs; a truck driver and instructor in the post-war Italian Army, a private truck driver across Europe, and a factory worker in Southern France. Unsatisfied with the lackluster and sorry state of the collective European economy, he immigrated to the United States around 1960, shortly after my grandmother made the same decision in the very late fifties. From there, the Massa family took root in Springfield, Massachusetts, where it remains, for the most part, to this day. My grandparents had four boys, my father included. My grandfather, now retired, was a hard-working and industrious factory worker from the second he came here, until the mid-90s, when he finally retired. My grandmother was a seamstress in a textile factory; one that made baby clothes and pajamas. Both of my grandparents came to America with little more than the clothes on their backs. They did not receive a handout, nor were they looking to receive one. They were hard workers and built a family in America on the foundations of hard work, morality, and a close family. They lived the American Dream and made something out of nothing. As much as the proponents of welfare statism like to believe the American Dream is dead, it is still alive, and as long as we remain a free people, it always will live. Representative Massa should be ashamed of himself for what he has done; not only to his staffers, but to his office, his constituents, and the Massa name. His irresponsible and morally corrupt actions have given my family a bad name, and have given all Massa's in America bad names, regardless of the fact that they are not related to him, as many people are unaware of the fact that there is no relation. However, I must give Mr. Massa credit for stepping down from his office. He resigned with grace and accepted blame; he did not deflect it on others, he took responsibility for his egregious actions. That, in and of itself, is worthy of at least a small amount of praise. I am certainly glad that he did not follow in the footsteps of President Clinton, who dragged the country through long and arduous impeachment proceedings before finally being acquitted by the Senate in 1999. But like Clinton, Massa will be remembered not for his legislative accomplishments and achievements, but for his lewd sexual contact which ultimately cost him his job. Politicians should have learned decades ago that they cannot get away with sexual misconduct. Clinton couldn't. Foley couldn't. Craig couldn't. And now Massa has realized he cannot. Let this be a lesson to the other womanizers and morally bankrupt individuals in Washington. You can only hide for so long.