Starting a church to worship Hunter S. Thompson

[shereads]

Nothing in literature will ever exceed the descriptive power of the first chapter of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas,nor will anyone ever propose a better word to use when training an attack dog than "Nixon!"

Nevertheless, it has taken the publication of HT's most recent book to inspire the founding of my new, non-profit-for-tax-purposes church.

Excerpts from Hey Rube: Blood Sport, the Bush Doctrine, and the Downward Spiral of Dumbness:

Louisville, Kentucky during Derby Week is an "orgy of Booze & Sex & Violence that, 99 times out of 100, swamps anybody who goes near it in a hurricane of Fear, Pain & Stupefying Disasters that will haunt them for the rest of their lives."

Who knew?

Also: Florida politics is "arguably the most vicious and corrupt in the nation" and "there is more public oral sex on the streets of Miami than anywhere else in the United States."

This beats your Fodor's Travel Guide, doesn't it?

"In two disastrous years this waterhead son of Texas took the country from a prosperous nation at peace to a dead-broke nation at war and that is a very long fall." HT credits GWB with making him miss Richard Nixon.

Donations to the church can be made via PayPal.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

One of my all-time favorite worse things to hear after having just ingested some sort of psychotropic substance comes from "Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas":

Oh my God! Look at your face! You took too much!

---dr.M.

 

[shereads]

One of my all-time favorite worse things to hear after having just ingested some sort of psychotropic substance comes from "Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas":

Oh my God! Look at your face! You took too much!

---dr.M.

That line is why I couldn't bear to see the movie. We each know in our hearts what that face looks like, and no director/actor/CGI artist could do it justice.

 

[Boota]

A newspaper writer who reviewed my book has taken it upon himself to help me out, which is great. But he wants to sell me as a Gen X Hunter Thompson and has requested that I get really wasted and make a spectacle out of myself. LOL. I'm really anti-drugs, but if it helps me sell some books...

 

[RavenSpirit2k4]

Louisville, Kentucky during Derby Week is an "orgy of Booze & Sex & Violence that, 99 times out of 100, swamps anybody who goes near it in a hurricane of Fear, Pain & Stupefying Disasters that will haunt them for the rest of their lives."

Who knew?

I did. I lived there from birth until I was 13. Ugh. Derby Day.

 

[shereads]

A newspaper writer who reviewed my book has taken it upon himself to help me out, which is great. But he wants to sell me as a Gen X Hunter Thompson and has requested that I get really wasted and make a spectacle out of myself. LOL. I'm really anti-drugs, but if it helps me sell some books...

It's not the drugs. It's the lizards. It's the bats. It's the fear and loathing. It's the sense that Nixon's existence made Thompson's drug abuse necessary.

Don't be a Gen X somebody else, Boota. Be the first and only Boota.

 

[shereads]

Re: Re: Starting a church to worship Hunter S. Thompson

I did. I lived there from birth until I was 13. Ugh. Derby Day.

Was it as awful as he describes it? Doesn't it frighten the horses?

 

[Seattle Zack]

Shereads, that particular book is a collection of HST's columns from ESPN.com's Page 2, I've been reading them for years. Pick up the documentary "Breakfast With Hunter" if you haven't already.

Went to a "reading" of his some years ago in Santa Cruz ... he showed up 45 minutes late, clearly drunk, didn't read anything at all, just a mumbled soliloquy about drug legalization and guns, then left abruptly.

We loved it.

Anyway, here's one of his most recent columns.....

Don't You Dare Cancel Football

Sean Penn called me last night and said he was quitting the movie business until after the football season.

"I am going on the road with Brett Favre and the boys," he said. "The Packers will kick ass this year, and I want to be part of it. I love Brett Favre."

His voice sounded strange, so I goaded him.

"The football season has been cancelled this year. The White House just announced it."

"No!" he shouted. "That's impossible! Football season will never be canceled in America -- not in an election year. There would be riots."

"Exactly," I replied. "Horrible riots every Sunday afternoon, in cities all over the country. Football fans will go crazy. I already feel the Fear."

It's true, but not because of our football season being canceled. No. We must have football. What would this country be without football in October?

That is a dangerous question, so I try not to worry. Only an imbecile would alienate every football freak in the country at a time like this.

What would we do without Brett Favre and NFL football this fall?
It would be political suicide.

Would the President do a thing like that?

Who knows for sure? He is already muttering about "postponing" the whole election, and that is almost as ugly as canceling a football season.

These rumors are dark and disturbing, especially for a football addict in July. Take my word for it, because I am a certified addict. It makes me feel crazy on some days, and this is one of them.

I am a football addict, and I am not alone in this country. We are legion, and we must have football ... Yes. It is righteous, and only a jackass would cancel it.

Election years are always weird in America, and they always happen in football season. That is a fact of life. The President will always be elected on the first Tuesday in November, for good or ill, and not even Richard Nixon could change it. He hated anything that stood between him and a Green Bay Packers game, especially on Monday nights.

Nixon was a bad loser. He hated losing worse than death, and that is why I enjoyed him. We were both football fans, both addicts; and on some days, nothing else mattered.

But that was yesterday, and George Bush is now.

Where is Richard Nixon, now that we need him? He was crooked in every way and his hands were covered with blood -- but he was a rabid, high-rolling football fan with a sly taste for gin; and on some nights, he could be good company.

Ah, but we live in a new century now, and the president is not a football fan. The first real game of the season will be a huge event for most of us; but for young George Bush, it will mean nothing. He will feel no relief, no escape from the same sense of doom that fell on his father, only 12 years ago. The old man failed when he tried to get re-elected, and so will his son. They both peaked too soon, about six months before football season; and after that, they sank like punctured fish.

So the time has come to get busy on what we call "the summer book" in the business of gambling on presidential elections. And right now the London/Vegas numbers are about 51-49 percent for Bush, if only because he is the filthy-rich incumbent and the son of a global oil-industry magnate.

That is big in the politics business; but this year, it will not be enough to make up for all the wretched, disastrous failures of the Bush administration. Betting on George Bush to win this coming election would be like betting the Denver Broncos to win the Super Bowl.

My own whim at the moment says that John Kerry will win big in November, and that the Colts will finally win the Super Bowl. Why not? This is the year of the monkey, and George Bush will be lucky to get out of Washington without being put on trial for treason.

Yes sir, we are coming around to some bold visions now, but my time is running out. Next week, I will tell you what happens in America if Kerry loses this election, along with the current odds on whether there will be an election this year. Okay. Mahalo.

 

[shereads]

Holygod, this is beautiful. Thank you, Zack. I can almost picture him at a book reading. If he had read something, it would have been out of character, don't you think?

They both peaked too soon, about six months before football season; and after that, they sank like punctured fish.

Perfection.

Mingled with hope:

This is the year of the monkey, and George Bush will be lucky to get out of Washington without being put on trial for treason.

Hope, followed by the expected acknowledgement that hope is an illusion:

Next week, I will tell you what happens in America if Kerry loses this election, along with the current odds on whether there will be an election this year.

I love this man. I'd hate to know him, because he's bound to be a pain to be around, and a worry to his friends. Plus, there would be the landmines to contend with. But I love this man.

 

[Seattle Zack]

Here's a link to his archived colums at ESPN.com ... he posts pretty irregularly, supposed to be every week, but I suspect even the higher-ups at ESPN don't push him too hard. I can't imagine an ABC exec venturing out to his "fortified compound" to chastise him for missing a deadline or seven.....

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/archive?columnist=hunter_s._thompson&root=page2

Many of them are in the book, but some were not included. Enjoy.

 

[shereads]

I can't imagine an ABC exec venturing out to his "fortified compound" to chastise him for missing a deadline or seven.....

A shotgun is kept at the ready to discipline intruders in the tall grass.

 

[Seattle Zack]

A shotgun? Are you kidding ? More like a rocket launcher.