We all know Hunter S. Thomspon is dead, but is that all we know??

On Sunday February 20th Hunter S. Thompson, famed writer and personality and all around conscience of kings died at his home of self-inflicted wounds.

But who was Hunter S. Thompson, and why should you care?

To put in plainly he was and angry, self-righteous, drunken, intelligent, and fun SOB who could turn an opinion piece into a call-to-arms. He was as dynamic as he was scatter-shot. He was as unbelievable a man as ever lived.

And when he is called the 'Reigning Rant Master' it's only because Louis Black, Dennis Miller and Chris Rock couldn't hold a candle to him.

Ask 100 people in the field of writing, you’ll get 100 different reasons why he was an important figure. But still, why should you care?

Sure he followed Nixon around the campaign trail. Wrote a book that Terry Gilliam and Johnny Depp turned into a cult classic. Wrote about his times following the Hell's Angels around. Wrote about Clinton and Bush Junior, what does it all matter to us? What does it matter when the man eats a .45 on a Sunday afternoon?

Well hell!

I don't know what it matter how a man dies or how he is born, but gawd damit how he lives!!! Damn! Now that's somthin' to remember. And Hunter didn't give a damn what was politically correct. He could give half a shit what was popular! What was in the mattered to him was the truth. He knew what was right and he said it. He lived it.

Hunter was as true son of America as any could imagine. Taking that freedom not as a right, but a privilege. An ideal worth fighting for. You could always count on Hunter telling it to us strait. Sure he might not be strait, but his words were. And I can think of only one man whose spirit I would dare compare to Hunter. The man who gave the 13 Colonies the dream of freedom: Thomas Payne.

Yeah they called what Hunter did Gonzo funkin' Journalism. But that's just a sound-byte, a Buzz Words. What it was... What it is, is strait talk. Hunter would come by like some old friend and sit with you telling you about how things are, and how they should be. Served up with a heapin’ side of what, where and when.

Here was a man who reported what he saw, not the most popular SPIN on what he saw. Here was a man who took his own life and experiences and used them to connect to us. Here was a man who was more apart of the world then most America's ever will be.

But what does it matter to us that he's gone? He was only one man. A man whose words barely touched our world, our lives. He didn’t have a TV Show, he wasn’t on the cover of a magazine…

Nope he was in-between the pages of a magazine, and he was the original Too Hot For TV. Hunter maybe gone, but his words are still here. And we are still here.

Someone once said, 'you must be the change you want in the world.' Well Hunter S Thompson, was a right bastard and, love him or hate him, he was the change he wanted in the world. And I dare say he was a Hero. Perhaps one of the few real American Heroes we've had this last 50 years... maybe more.

But you don't have to believe a word I've said here. Hell good for you if you don't. Look at it yourself, though your eyes. Because that is part of what makes us who we are: owning those opinions. I respect that. Hunter would have... of course if he didn't agree with 'em he might have gone about trying to change 'em. But then don’t we all. And as the old saying goes 'if I believe all the same things today that I did yesterday, then I've learned nothing.'

What did Hunter's death mean to you? Whatever you wanted it to; Nothing. Everything. Something In-Between.

To me it means that I won’t get to read my favorite ESPN column, ever again. To me it means that one more soulja has fallen.

"This is the darkest hour that I have seen in my long experience as an American. This is evil."
- Hunter S. Thompson (about the Bush Administration)

For an interesting interview regarding Hunter’s works the NY Times has many articles, here is a link to just one of them:

http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/11/29/specials/thompson-campaign72.htm