An associate... If you go by mob terms (which you should when discussing lcn) is someone on the record with a made guy... Just knowing a guy or doing biz with a gambino book, means nothing unless your a journalist.
That's just it. I don't think somebody has to be an associate to be connected. You equate the two as the same thing, while I don't. An associate is obviously connected, but a guy can be connected without being a full fledged associate on the record.
Btw... Im tryin to send u a pm but its says i cant
pizzaboy told me the same thing - that he couldn't send me a PM. In the past, I never had a problem sending or receiving PM's and I didn't do anything to change my profile or whatever. So I'm not sure what the problem is. If one of the mods read this, maybe they'll know.