Then again you can't really take those predictions seriously. It seems that EVERY new ethnic mob thats comes over to america is gonna replace the american mafia. I remember reading about all the hype in "The New Ethnic Mobs" (one of the best books if you want an overview of organized crime) that people thought the blacks were gonna take over, then the asians, it goes on.
I'm not sure if I entirley agree with you on the mob being national in scope. But let me ask for some clarifacation, did you mean the mafia as one large incarnation or the various outfits from NY, Chicago, etc.?
I never have taken those predictions seriously because they've never turned out to be right. In the 1960's the blacks were said to be taking over. In the 1970's it was the Colombians. In the 1980's it was the Chinese. In the 1990's it was the Russians. This decade it has been the Albanians. Each group carves out it's own piece of the underworld, but none of them take over or replace the LCN. "The New Ethnic Mobs" is a good book but the author backpeddles in the final chapter, bringing much of his thesis in the rest of the book into question.
What I meant by the Mafia being national in scope was all the Families. You had Families in the Northeast, the South, the Midwest, as well as the West Coast. And as Apalachin demonstrated, these Families had ties to each other. But since that time, those ties began to break down and the Mafia became more regional in it's makeup and influence.
