What a sad state of decline has descended upon Dr. William H. Cosby, Jr., Ed. D., the “Cos,” America’s beloved TV pitchman, and habitué of both Sesame Street and the Playboy Mansion.  The good doctor had been a media superstar since the 1960s, with his comedy record albums, his TV series I Spy, and later his miniaturist masterpiece Jell-O® commercials.  (The less said, the better, for his first sitcom, his variety show, all his movies, and maybe his second sitcom after the first three episodes.)

I blame his attorneys for this mess to begin with.  You would think a Hollywood zillionaire could find some entertainment lawyers in the Beverly Hills netherworld who could arrange hush money for a girlfriend/victim without making a total hash of it, but no.  They even had the Cos admit he procured drugs for his potential girlfriends/victims in a civil lawsuit.  Good grief, even a shyster like Greg Craig or David Kendall knows you always have your client insist he never had sex with that woman!  If that doesn’t do it, you say it’s all a right-wing conspiracy or that the women are trailer trash just looking for a payoff.  Or just shriek, “What difference does it make?”  Perjury?  Don’t worry about it, Geraldo Rivera assures his audience; they never prosecute you for that in a civil case, or almost never.

Mrs. Dr. Cosby, I must say, has not been much help here, either.  Supposedly one of Hollywood’s most extravagant spenders, now that it’s time to circle the wagons, Camille Cosby has made only the briefest of public defenses.  If she were really in this marriage for better or worse, she and her circle of media buddies would be running a "bimbo patrol," complete with private detectives to frighten, harass, and smear any alleged girlfriends/victims.

Well, that’s just so many sour Pudding Pops® – our guy Cos is nothing if not resilient, and I am sure he will dig his way out of the current fix.  I am thinking, if he no longer has a future in TV, he might turn to charity work, always a great venue for washed-up comedians.  Perhaps start his own foundation – call it the Cosby Global Initiative.  Foundations are really handy for a lot of things, including paying off girlfriends/victims; just ask the Rev. Dr. Jesse Jackson.  Now you would think ripping off a charity to provide hush money might involve tax fraud, embezzlement, conspiracy, and a host of other charges, but apparently not.

If the Cos foundation is going to really rake in some big contributions, it will of course need to work on an international scale to grab NGO aid money from big corporations and governments.  To play in that league, you have to say you are working to empower a whole third-world country.  Cos, being provably black, unlike Rachel Dolezal, having won the Spingarn Medal in 1985, can credibly say he is going to help some poor nation of black people as his theme.  Haiti is out, the Clintons having already sucked that lemon dry for a cool $10 billion, but apart from South Africa, which is Oprah territory, there are plenty of other poor places in Africa the Cos could raise money for, and take a big cut on the side.  Pretty soon he’d be a high roller again, rubbing his elbows with all the billionaire swingers like Jeffrey Epstein and confabbing in Aspen.  Heck, these foundations are also a great place to park your no-talent, high-living children in a cushy position, and Cos has a bunch of them.

Gee, what a great idea this is.  I would volunteer myself to be general counsel for the Cosby Global Initiative, for a nice seven-figure retainer, of course, but I have a feeling Lanny Davis would ace me out of the job in a heartbeat.

Frank Friday is an attorney in Louisville, KY.