Fear and Loathing in America

by Hunter S. Thompson

  Which reminds me about that note I sent inre: Joe Eszterhas in Cleveland. He strikes me as having excellent instincts, along with a pretty firm head and decent work-background.

  But fuck all that. What I was calling about was the NY/Wash trip—and as of now I plan to leave on Tuesday, for NY, to see Sanders inre: The Process & also to hassle with Silberman … which brings up another aspect of the thing that suddenly mushroomed on Wednesday, when I called Lynn to demand money. She informed me that Silberman was “not interested” in publishing Vegas in tandem with anybody—which resulted in a lot of yelling, from me, and then a quick bit of harsh explanation from her … which is something else we should talk about, when there’s time. Because it involves Silberman’s opinion—for good or ill—of the entire St. Arrow book operation.

  Anyway, I told Lynn that she would have to call Alan. I refused to. And about three hours later she called back to say everything was fine—but that word came thru Sandy, because I wasn’t here to talk with her (Lynn). In any case, I’m assuming that the word I got was valid … and I’m sure I’ll learn more about what happened when I get to NY. Actually, I already know what happened—& I can’t even feel guilty about it, because I have a taped conversation that makes it absolutely clear that I actually effected, at one point, a RS-RH joint publishing agreement, at least for one book. But of course this is meaningless, except as a sort of object lesson—along with that other one I mentioned earlier: The ugly truth that Silberman was quick-witted enough to buy control of Vegas, in book form, by paying all expenses for both trips, without even asking for a breakdown. The bill I sent him was about three lines long: One figure of $500-plus for the Mint 400 & another $500-plus for the Drug Conference—and then a total of $1000-plus. He never even asked what the money went for. He just sent the check and jotted down “Vegas/Thompson” on his list of RH futures.

  You’ll recall that I warned you about this at the time. And you’ll also recall that the situation developed because whoever sent me that $500 in Vegas made sure that it went against my retainer, instead of “expenses” … which gave Sil-berman his opening.

  Maybe something can still be worked out. If possible, you should track me down for a phone talk before I leave NY. For instance I have no idea how to deal with Sanders inre: his Process material. And unless I hear something definite from you, I’ll go ahead & deal with him as a free-lance writer.

  I figure on getting down to Washington by the weekend (18/19), then renting a car and sort of looking the place over. But I can’t see much real good coming from it unless we can talk, first, about what I’m looking for. I’ve worked the DC thing out into two separate categories—and the root-difference between them works out to the difference between a “Washington bureau” and a “contributing editor based in Washington.” This is also the difference between looking for a house on Capitol Hill, and a safe apt. in Georgetown. I can probably scout both possibilities while I’m there, but I can’t do anything definite until after we’ve talked.

  Meanwhile, I’ve settled the deal with Stranahan & have tentatively leased both houses until June ’72—but I can’t sign the contract for this one until we arrange something definite inre: Washington. (I realize that I’m laying all this gibberish on you at a bad time, and I wish there was some kind of supra-wisdom I could spray it all with … but the truth is that if I had any wisdom for you, I’d have let you know a long time ago. I wish I did, but …)

  Anyway, call me when you can. And in the meantime, I’ve taken a definite liking to the Randy Agnew story. I think that would be a nice way to kick off the Washington gig—so I’ll get onto it during the scout visit, if possible. Greene43 might be useful as a leg man, but the tone of his letter indicates a pervasive lack of brain-speed & essential curiosity—along with a full belly, which means we probably shouldn’t count on him. Okay for now. Send word ASAP….

  H

  TO BILL CARDOSO:

  Thompson’s friend from the 1968 Nixon press bus had given up his post as editor of the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine for a job in the Azores.

  September 10, 1971

  Woody Creek, CO

  Billy …

  My health is excellent, although failing in various critical areas that I choose to ignore. For some peculiar reason, your letters always seem like a shout from the far shores of sanity. Your current gig sounds good … as a matter of fact I’ve been thinking about it all afternoon, since your letter came, and it occurs to me that maybe Sandy & I could lash out there for Xmas. Weird, eh? You can always count on your friends to fuck you around when you find something good. It never fails….

  Anyway, current plans say I’ll be moving to Washington (for a year—no more) on Nov 1, as the Chief Political Correspondent for Rolling Stone. I’m going there in a few days to look it over & try to find a house … then back here for a month of steady work on another book. I just finished one. Rolling Stone will publish it in two parts, beginning in October, and then Random House says they’ll put it out in book form. The Stone version will list “Raoul Duke” as the author, but RH insists on going with HST—which will make life difficult for me in Washington, because the book is a first-person account of an incredible string of felonies committed in Vegas. (But more on this later; I’ve just finished the bastard, and I’m “high as a fucking pigeon.”—L. Buckley.)

  In any case, this Washington gig looks definite. For the first time since that heinous political fuckaround, things seem to be going fast & hard for me. I just managed to buy 2 houses and 128 acres in Woody Creek for no money down, & there are also signs that I’m learning how to beat the NY money machine … and on the basis of all this, I think it would be entirely fitting for me & my bride to spend Xmas in the Azores. Could you handle it?

  One possibility is that you might work out—or at least put me onto—some kind of free-ride hookup with whatever airline services that filthy place. What better way to get right smack in the middle of the Hip Map than inviting the Sports Editor of Rolling Stone out for a visit? With one fell stroke, I could make Funchal the “in” place to go this year. Maybe you could check out that crowd at the Hilton on this.

  But what the hell? We have plenty of time for that gig. I’m serious, though. We could leave the kid in Florida, with Sandy’s mother, and rip out there with a satchel of fine mescaline—which would definitely be worth a story. I’ll be writing a column out of Washington, in addition to the normal stuff, so I figure I might as well ride this trip all the way out—for a year; why not?

  Let me know at once. It’s possible that I could actually pay my own way, but shit, nobody else does, so why the fuck should I? And it seems to me that the Funchal Hilton could use just about any publicity they can scrape up. Selah.

  On other fronts … your tale of [William] Kennedy’s visit sounds well nigh intolerable, and all your observations seemed dead on. That thing about “too late hipped in life …” is worth stealing. I guess the fucker has gone a bit wild with his new status. Although in fact we had considerable trouble with him out here during the election. He came out to cover it for Harper’s (this was before his LOOK gig), and since he was “an old friend” I gave him total access—denied to all other press. So he went immediately nuts & developed into a hell of a problem. We ended up making him stand guard duty outside the house in 12 degree cold with a .30-.30—on the 3 to 5 a.m. shift. And no dope, because we told him he had to be alert, in case the vigilantes attacked.

  And so much for that. I’ll get on him for dragging a bunch of creeps into your place. No excuse for it. He is an old friend, but I suspect you’re right about his head. Selah.

  Inre: Your piece for RS—I sent it immediately to the wrong editor. But I didn’t understand this until a week or so ago. I thought the guy was a heavy, but it turns out that he’s about to be fired. The weird thing is that—although he never acknowledged receipt of your piece until I finally yelled about it—he actually went to Boston, looking for Avatar, and came back to SF with all kinds of variation
s (featuring you, personally) on that piece you wrote. When I sent it on, I made no guess about whether or not it was true, but he came back from Boston muttering about the “mythical freak, Cardoso.” And he never put his rumors together with the story he had on his desk … which is shitty, but the truth is that most of the people at RS aren’t much better than what you had at the Globe. Their hair is longer & they smoke a few more joints, but so what? This cocksucker (the editor in question) didn’t even acknowledge 2 hits of mescaline I sent him … so you see what I’m dealing with.

  I am, however, getting this RS trip under control. I even have Raoul Duke on the masthead as a “contributing editor.” When I go to Washington I’m going to promote Duke into my spot as Spts. Ed…. so I can use him to spew out my pure gonzo stuff. (You’ll want to read my Vegas thing; it’s a must. Let me know if you have any problem getting RS out there; maybe I can get you a free sub. I’ve never tried that, but maybe I can convince Wenner that it’s important for RS to be seen in the Azores. I think I can. Send a note & remind me.)

  OK for now. Everything in your letter gets my head moving. I definitely want to make it out there for Xmas. Check the free-ride thing and let me know if it’s possible. I can lean on somebody over here, if you send me a name.

  Ciao …

  Hunter

  FROM OSCAR ACOSTA:

  Acosta had been arrested.

  October, 1971

  San Francisco, CA

  Hunter,

  I hung around Frisco with Henry for two more days with heavy dope and his constant babble after I left you in the dust with The Blue Mustang. I took another peek in the city for a pad then played the game all the way out and looked around Berkeley to please Marco. Knowing all the time I’d not find my sitio in any place where there is danger. I had become so paranoid I even secretly accused you of many evil things. (Fortunately I kept it all to myself so I got no apologizing to do.)

  Saturday I picked up Marco, talked to his mother and auntie for a couple of hours and nearly went out of my skull with the fear that I was actually hung up on something so out of my league. She still likes opera, Pepsi and [Adlai] Stevenson, probably in that order.

  It worked well, however, because that was the last push in the butt I needed to get out of sin city. I came back to my parents’ house in Modesto, kicked my old man out of his room, painted it a funky red-green-gold&pink and am now a writer in residence. I haven’t felt this good, safe and open since 1968.

  I have nothing but memories here to haunt me and even those seem trivial. It sure beats the shit off the fucking banging around I’ve been getting the past year. That whole trip was so bizarre I’m afraid it’ll take even a heavier writer than you or me to make any sense of it. Not that either of us will actually try, but I’m going to take a stab at it.

  Then Monday we returned to L.A. for my court bit. First my old man’s station wagon completely broke down at the foot of the Grapevine and we had to hitch it in to the land of fear. Then my lawyer got sick and I had to go to court all alone, with Marco as my bodyguard. They’ve put one of the heavy D.A.’s on the case and he started in on me right away. I was dressed like when you last saw me. And in no mood to play the lawyer anymore. He refused, that’s right, refused to arraign me….

  “You’ve been charged with, etc…. How do you plead?”

  “Not guilty.”

  That’s what the entire hearing consisted of, legally that is. He argued with the judge that I was a defendant like any other one, and that since this was a felony I had to have a lawyer present. The judge reminded him I, me, was a lawyer….

  “I see no reason to treat him differently than any other person charged with a crime,” the bastard argued.

  The judge says, “But, counsel, this is a special case.”

  I finally got into it and thought I might end up in jail again. “This is a special case.” The D.A. charges everyone else with a misdemeanor, but on me he files a felony.

  Anyway, the motherfuckers are really after me. They want my ass so bad it drips all over them.

  I really felt like pleading guilty and getting the fucking thing over with. Do my time, pay my fine and then get into what the fuckers really want … my license.

  My lawyer and I spent a long time talking about the case and we’ve decided it’s going to be as weird as The Biltmore.

  We found out that the guy in the car who told us he dropped it, apart from his fantastic inconsistencies, lied through his ass to position his friend, my exclient in the Biltmore case … to make a long story short, I am now convinced he is totally useless and in fact dangerous as a witness … we are paranoid as hell because the only way we can use him is if he testifies differently than he remembers … which is perjury … which, if we encourage it, is subornation of testimony and conspiracy on our part … and it would completely knock out our main defense, which ultimately is: I didn’t have it & the cops know I didn’t, and based on their own statements about the whole reason for tailing me for three hours, the chances are that they planted it on me…. So, as of today, we are not planning to call him.

  I picked up the transcript of the testimony of the feds & sheriffs and it is a real doozy.

  I really felt strange in that court room. It ain’t paranoia no more. But no one believes me. How is it that a folk hero such as I was in East L.A. this past year is suddenly without a single fucking supporter? I who taught them how to make points off the man by whopping it up in his face, who defended perhaps 100 dudes, never had a client sent to jail, got 100,000 votes, t.v.’s most popular kid in L.A. … I mean, how would you feel if they were out to get your union card so that you’d never be able to write again?

  The sickness, the real wretchedness comes from the realization that I’ll neither be found guilty or innocent. So I can look forward to perhaps two or three trials. And if there is a conviction … perhaps three years of appeals …and then the fun begins. The action to take away my license could last five years.

  Do you hear me, boy? If you do, you and Neil [Herring], my lawyer, are the only two in town who do. But I seriously doubt that you do. You are so much into the Vegas thing, R/S & D.C. that you fail to see which side your bread’s buttered on and it’s getting all over you … fuck it, I may as well run it all down.

  When I called you last September on the Salazar case we made an agreement that from here on out things would be on something more than a personal basis. Each would have some voice, some control, a piece of the action …excluding bread. Although we spoke of 50/50, I told you that wasn’t my bag nor my need. After a hell of a lot of work on both our parts we got it out. The final piece you wrote and I put my complete trust in you … and I have no regrets, you came through like a champ. But if you read the piece carefully, you’ll notice that a good half [of] the info, the stuff on which you base your opinions, art, etc…. would not have come from your pen as it did had I not been around. Can anyone in his right mind believe that Rudy, Benny, & Frank44 would have talked to you without me? Or that you picked up all those paragraphs on the Chicano Movement from someone other than me & the gang?

  To a lesser degree, much vaguer on details, the Vegas thing was no different.

  As a result of Salazar, I got booted out of the gang. My life threatened, etc. In your large head you think it was the writing. In your racist head you think it was cause they hate white people. Quite simply, it was a matter of personal loyalties. It was because I told them you were my camarada that the axe fell. If I’d said, “Man, I’m just using this honkey fool to get my picture in the paper and maybe a contact with a publisher….” Shit I’d still be on top…. Instead, I got no friends, they took my fucking grant away from me and I ended up doing the Biltmore without their support. And now I got to do my own case with nothing but me & Neil.

  Do I indulge myself? Sure would be easy to simply lay it down to paranoia, wouldn’t it?

  So what am I bitching about? I got my picture in the paper, didn’t I? And, as you’ve strongly hinted, I got
a contract from Wenner—Not Alan—through you.

  And I can hear you right now … I told you I didn’t want to write about friends. You knew what you were getting into.

  … ultimately, I’ve had absolutely not one iota of control except that which I’ve sneaked in over your head; i.e., I’ve had a measure of influence into what ultimately went into the work by my mere presence and godlikeness.

  What, do I want recognition? Perhaps a little footnote that says, this idea came from Oscar?

  If that is what you think—and I think you do—then buddy you don’t know shit about your subject.

  All I want is for you to quit playing the role that I’m some fucking native, a noble savage you discovered in the woods. I mean, your Frisco-R/S action this time was a bummer.

  Like, did you even so much as ask me if I minded your writing & printing the Vegas piece? Not even the fucking courtesy to show me the motherfucker. No, I don’t control what you write or what anyone prints … but as a friend, pendejo,45 as a friend who has already suffered the pangs of purgatory because of your first piece, one would think my old buddy would say, Here it is, what do you think, and do you mind? Your only statement on the subject, which I tried very hard to raise on several occasions …“Your name’s not on it.”

  Jesus Christ, can one change history—facts—by merely calling it a different name? Even the lesbian knew better than that.

  I forgot, you told Wenner it was all fiction. And you told me you knew how to write good dialogue before we went to Vegas.