elk (fwd)

[Forwards locked in the basement]

Found at http://vizlab.beckman.uiuc.edu/people/jlindqui/humor/elk.html

------------

(From an interview of Hunter S. Thompson by P. J. O'Rourke in Rolling
Stone's 20th Anniversary issue.)

Q:
      Recently you told a college audience at Marquette University, "George
      Bush should be killed. He should be stomped to death and I'll join
      in." How did the students react?
A:
      Hey they cheered! Then I called for a voice vote. It was two-thirds to
      stomp him.  Meanwhile some fucking maniac recorded it and took it to
      the Milwaukee Journal. And the U. S. attorney in Milwaukee was about
      to indict me on two felony charges: five years for threatening the
      vice president and another five for inciting others to do it. I
      started getting calls from the Secret Service.
Q:
      Did you answer any of those calls?
A:
      Not at first because I thought they were cranks. If it was important
      they'd leave a message. And then the Secret Service showed up at the
      Examiner and at my lecture agency. I realized they were serious. So I
      called the Secret Service guy in Denver, Larry Hoppe. And he was very
      nice. And I said, "What's going on here, man?" And Hoppe said, "Dr.
      Thompson, let me tell you one thing: I would advise you not to go to
      Washington without talking to me first." So I said, "Come on over.
      What the hell."

      Well, we talked for a while, and by that time Hoppe knew it was a
      joke. I said, "Have times changed? I've threatened to drag people
      around Washington by their nuts behind Oldsmobiles at a hundred miles
      an hour. I've advocated the slaughter of all politicians.  What are
      the guidelines now?"

      He had a pretty good sense of humor. He said, "Well, you can't say
      that he should be strung up. If you say that to people, WHAP! Ten
      years. You can say he should be tarred and feathered." And I said,
      "Wait a minute. I don't grasp it. What's the difference?" And Hoppe
      says, "I don't know. That's the way it is. Don't go out any more and
      threaten to string George Bush up or stomp him to death."
Q:
      Now, to what level of public figure does this extend? Take somebody I
      really hate, like Meese. Meese is not an elected official. Can I say
      that somebody should slice Meese open and wrap his intestines around a
      phone booth?
A:
      No, you probably can't. He should be flogged -- just not to death.
Q:
      What if we said Meese should be fucked by an elk?
A:
      That's apparantly harmless as hell. I believe that Ed Meese -- being a
      person without any honor, a fat bastard, really a congenital cheap pig
      in the style of and on the level of Richard Nixon -- should be locked
      in a large concrete basement with an elk.  And the elk should be
      ram-fed full of acid before he's put in there.
Q:
      An angry, horny acid-crazed elk.
A:
      Meese is naked, and the elk is huge, maybe 800 plus.
Q:
      Elk can be ugly customers.
A:
      And once they're full of acid, and they're really horny -- oh yeah,
      all night long!

------------