Fear and Loathing at Rolling Stone by Hunter S. Thompson Page A

never been wrong. Dr. Heem was cursed by Eisenhower, mocked by Kennedy, jeered by Tim Leary, and threatened by Eldridge Cleaver. But he is still on the stump ... still hustling.
    “The future of Christianity is far too fragile,” he said recently, “to be left in the hands of the Christians—especially
pros
.”
    The Sports Desk feels very strongly about this. Further warnings will issue, as special problems arise. Which they will. We are absolutely certain of this, if nothing else. What we are faced with today is the same old Rising Tide that’s been coming for the past five years or more ... the same old evil, menacing, frog-eyed trip of a whole generation run amok from too many failures.
    Which is fine. It was long overdue. And once again in the words of Dr. Heem, “Sometimes the old walls are so cock-eyed that you can’t even fit a new window.” But the trouble with the
Jesus Freak
outburst is that itis less a window than a gigantic ingrown hair. Horrible things have been done in the name of “Christianity”: the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem Witch Trials, the Rape of the Congo, and the Conquest of the Incas, the Mayans, and the Aztecs. Entire civilizations have been done in by vengeful monsters claiming a special relationship with “God.”
    What we are dealing with now is nothing less than another Empire on the brink of collapse—more than likely of its own bad weight & twisted priorities. This process is already well underway. Everything Nixon stands for is doomed, now or later.
    But it will sure as hell be
later
if the best alternative we can mount is a generation of loonies who’ve given up on everything except a revival of the same old primitive bullshit that caused all our troubles from the start. What a
horror
to think that all the fine, high action of the Sixties would somehow come down—ten years later—to a gross & mindless echo of Billy Sunday.
    This is why the Sports Desk insists that these waterheads must be kept out of the building at all costs. We have serious business to deal with, and these fuckers will only be in the way.
    Sincerely,
    Raoul Duke
    Handwritten Note Concerning Hunter’s Invitation to National District Attorneys Conference
    3/4
    Jann
    This just came—& I think it’s a
must
.
    I
insist
on doing this one. After all, I’ve been
invited
.
    Right?
    HST

__ __ __ __
Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas
    Hunter’s invitation to the National District Attorneys Association’s institute on narcotics and dangerous drugs wasn’t quite as impossible as it might seem on the surface; having nearly been elected sheriff of Aspen not long earlier, Hunter made sure his name was on various political and law enforcement mailing lists. When the invitation did show up, though, he wasted little time in seizing the moment. What eventually followed, of course, was Hunter’s most sustained and compelling sui generis piece ever, begun in between stints working on the Salazar story.
    “Working with Hunter was already a major hand-holding job,” said Wenner. “It meant a minimum of two, maybe three people assigned to the task, including me. It was too much for any one person to handle, even that early on, because of the hours and the time Hunter took. He liked having a team of people working on his stuff. He liked the company, and he liked the crisis atmosphere. I could never change that pattern.
    “But ‘Vegas’ was completely different. He did that on his own. It took him several months to write it. He’d send me pages. I’d change a word here or suggest a little thing there, but it was already completely formed. I’d ask him to write transitions to make the narrative more complete, but he politely and firmly refused. It was his pure fantasy, coming directly out of his own mind. There was no real reporting involved, except when he wanted to go back and do the District Attorneys Conference, which was hysterical and had pure gonzo potential.”
    Letter from HST to JSW
    June 15 ’71
    Owl