Of Animals and Manson Followers and Sarah Palin--Seriously.

When I was young, my mother used to tell me about Charles Manson and his family of murderers who killed a nice lady and her unborn child and wrote horrible messages in their blood all around the house they were murdered in.  Of course, she never went into detail, but my mother had a way, at that time, of saying things in ways that would let my imagination fill in details.  I imagine she could still do that, except for the fact that I'm jaded after years of horror movies and Stephen King books.  But her talking about Manson is one of the things that stands out in my memory.

I want to say that it was especially scary because she told us all this around the time that Jerry "Animal" McFadden kidnapped the jailer at the Upshur County Jail and broke out.  Most of you won't know the story, but McFadden had kidnapped three teenagers (two girls and a boy) at a lake located in the county next to ours, killed two and left them in a ditch, and then raped and killed the youngest girl and dumped her body on Barnwell Mountain, a little rest area (at the time) near where I lived.  When he escaped, the largest manhunt ever in Texas was conducted (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Sandy,_Texas--This is from Wikipedia, but check in with Richard Lingle on Facebook.  He was the Chief of Police then, and we are friends.  He's got some great clippings and pictures of this manhunt.).

Anyway, so I admit, readily, the obsession with all things horrible.  People like James Warren "Jim" Jones, the Branch Davidians, Heaven's Gate, and even weirder people like those from the Order of the Solar Temple.  Manson did not necessarily create a cult, but you could say that his followers had some cult identity.  Manson was able to obtain complete and utter loyalty from them, in return for drugs and an acceptance they had known nowhere else.  You must know that it was the 1960s, when everyone was messed up in some way, shape or form, and while this doesn't excuse the murders at all, in the context of history, nothing remotely like the '60s had ever happened before.  They tried with the "Roaring '20s," but the complete lack of cultural ritual from the offspring of the Baby Boomers created an air of dissatisfaction with all things "required" of them.  Or that's what I think.

So, back to Manson.  A little while back I created blog posts about Susan Atkins and Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme.  I am extremely happy to say that while Fromme was released from prison (I guess that trying to assassinate President Gerald Ford was not as bad as what some others did), but Susan Atkins was denied parole for the umpteenth time, and died 22 days later.  Here's my dilemma.  I'm really really glad that Atkins is dead.  I don't care what she did for misguided teens or whatever while in prison.  She stabbed a pregnant woman in the stomach repeatedly to kill both her and her baby, for no apparent reason other than that's what Manson wanted.  And I have a real problem with what has happened with the rest of the ones who went to prison with Manson.  Most have gotten married while in prison--Atkins herself was married to her attorney.  Several have fathered children, a couple have fathered three or four, and one even got out and moved near the prison so that she could be near Manson!  Unfortunately, after she started a website for him, she disappeared--they have no clue where she is!   My point is that they should never have been given an opportunity to have any type of normal life.  Most had been slated to die before the death penalty in California was commuted, and that's what they should have done.  Their ability to pull people into their "fold" is scary beyond belief.  But thank goodness they are not doing it in bulk, like some politicians are doing with lies and beliefs based on untruths.

This was just mainly to give an update on Susan Atkins, but it comes with a warning.  I no longer am frightened by what those people could do to me.  I no longer am concerned with what they did or could do.  They have very little hold on popular opinion at this time, and there is no media outlet for them to really grab more and more followers.  My warning is this:  beware the evolution of charismatic deviants.  Those of you who know me know that I'm talking about Sarah Palin.  I have never known anyone to spew so much sugar-coated hatred and advocate violence disguised as moral rights in my life.  Yes, I am comparing her to Charles Manson, in a certain personality-like way (she has crazy eyes, too--or is that a vacant expression?  I'm not sure as it's there ALL THE TIME).

Now I'll go.  And I know that this was not quite the intellectual blog that I espouse--there are no facts that I am presenting showing how Palin is like Manson.  It's just my opinion.  I've seen some articles recently that made me think about this, and for my next blog I may have a side note with these articles (and others).  But for right now, just know that the Joneses, Mansons, Koreshes, and Palins of this world want YOU to die for them (and their beliefs).