Posted on 02/20/2005 8:14:19 PM PST by HAL9000
AP News Alert
ASPEN, Colo. (AP) -- The son of Hunter S. Thompson says the author shot himself to death at his Aspen-area home.
He was a great political prankster, like Donald Segretti and Dick Tuck.
Here was one of my favorites, as described by Tim Crouse in "The Boys on the Bus" about the 1972 Democratic primary campaign -
But what baffled Thompson was that some of the straightest men on the bus soon began to accept him and to read his articles. The first sign that Hunter had caught on with the straight press was when they began searching newsstands all over the country or phoning their home offices to get them a copy of his lengthy chronicle of the Florida primary. Thompson had loaned his press card to a freak, who had run amuck aboard Muskie's whistle-stop train, insulting reporters and heckling the candidate when he tried to speak at the final stop in Miami. Many of the reporters, seeing only the badge on the freak's lapel, had taken him for Hunter S. Thompson of Rolling Stone. In the article, Thompson explained the mistake but revelled in its consequences. The piece was a big hit with the press corps, and they soon began to read him regularly. Thompson's best lines were quoted in Newsweek. "Ed Muskie talked like a farmer with terminal cancer trying to borrow on next year's crop." Hubert Humphrey was a "treacherous, gutless old wardheeler who should be put in a goddamn bottle and sent out with the Japanese current."
And then there is the story about him flying with Nixon, chatting about football, smoking a cigarette while it was refueling... ugh.
It's amazing he made it to 67.
Part of the problem is that HST was excellent at sending himself up. Americans, as a rule, aren't good at laughing at themselves.
However, I finally got to see the movie Sideways the other day and it was one of the few American films I've seen that showed that capacity.
If you can't see that miserable maggot was about twisting and warping the minds of the innocent and gullible you have no discernment in life. One does not have to judge Thompson .. he openly admitted his evil and never repented.
Some people will see this as schadenfreude, I see it as poignant, sad, and miserably heroic.
Great book, awful movie.
"No! You're thinking of Viva Las Vegas.
Or Vegas Vacation."
No, it was National Lampoon Christmas Vacation. No, wait, it was National Velvet.
Anyway, anyone who blows his brains out may be going out macho but he's a selfish POS to make anyone in his family find him that way. Can you imagine what that must have been like for his son?
Sleeping pills may be for sissies, but I think they're better for your family left behind than a Magnum to the skull.
I knew you'd like it, any flick with lots of alcohol and good writing is a good thing.
How long till the expat wannabe publishes some self indulgent crap?
Why do most men shoot themselves when committing suicide? Do they just want to make a big mess for the little woman to clean up? Why can't they take a more genteel way out like carbon monoxide or pills which leaves no bloody mess.
Wouldn't the world be so much more fun if everyone had the exact same views? I don't think so.
You forgot about Bonnie Raits father. He also passed away today, though I dont know what end of the political spectra he'd be on.
Just like the Kerry voter who after election day went to Ground Zero to commit suicide, PEST claims another victim.
RIP. Though I disagreed with much of what he wrote, he had the courage of his convictions.
Available real estate ping!
He was a good and influential writer. That's all that's needed for him to contribute to humanity.
Neither do I. But I could do without the nutcases and a**holes.
..the ones that lament that all comedy died with Red Skeleton and Hee Haw. ..
heh heh
how ya doin cs? tapu
Honestly, because I believe we want to get the friggin' job done.
I know it's possible to survive a suicide-attempt with a firearm...the fact remains that blowing one's brains out FEELS like a damned sure bet.
Yeah, well, Richard Farnsworth went out that way, and he was one hell of a rough guy and a brilliant actor.
Suicide sucks, but its a decision he made, I don't like it, but I don't live in his head and don't know what he was going through.
So all Americans who voted for Kerry would be a 'Good Riddance' death for you?
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