OPINION:
This past week, my matutinal readings of the obituaries in the morning newspapers were particularly rewarding. Truth be known, the first thing I turn to in the morning newspaper is generally the obituaries. They are so lively and informative, particularly in The New York Times, whose obits I find better written than the rest of the newspaper. Last week they featured two malcontents from the 1960s generation, Linda Kasabian, a minor malcontent but amusing in her way, and Angela Davis, a superstar among malcontents. If she is not dead yet, she will be soon.
Kasabian ran away from home at an early age. She fell in with the Manson Family, a group of lunatic killers and petty criminals, living on a ranch in — where else? — California. Charles Manson, the leader of the group, quickly found a place for Linda among the other girls who, for the most part, dominated the Family, mainly because she was the only member of the Family who had a driver’s license. With it, she made the perfect lookout for the Family as they murdered the actress Sharon Tate and at least five others.
When Linda was caught, she was sent to the slammer for a time and quickly faded into obscurity. Perhaps among the Mansonites, she was not that much of a malcontent. At least she never murdered anyone. She died on Jan. 21, and her obituary appeared in the Times last week. She had said that she spent the rest of her life looking for God. I hope she found Him. Incidentally, Manson died on Nov. 19, 2017 — of natural causes, alas.
One famous malcontent for whom I have been searching the newspapers to no avail is Bobby Seale. I had encountered him in 1984 at a taping of “Summer Sunday USA,” and even back then, he did not look particularly well. He and the always-angry Huey P. Newton had co-founded the Black Panthers. By the way, I always wanted to ask Bobby what the P. in the middle of Huey’s name stood for. My guess is that it was for “Percy.” Unfortunately, Huey turned to room temperature on Aug. 22, 1989.
Yet Bobby is still with us, and so he will brighten up one of my mornings someday. Back in 1984, he and three other malcontents — one being the radical lawyer William Kunstler, another being Wavy Gravy — pummeled me mercilessly — or thought they did—on national television. They also got pretty drunk, and by the time Bobby had drained his last beer, he was bawling to me about how a corporate deal for him to write a cookbook had fallen through because he failed to turn in the contract’s obligatory number of low-salt recipes. I tried to be supportive, because he was pretty upset. As I recall, I said, “Well, Bobby, what did you expect with Ronald Reagan in the White House?”
As for the superstar malcontent, that would be Angela Davis. While she did not die, she looked like death warmed over when she appeared with Henry Louis Gates Jr. on his PBS television show, “Finding Your Roots.” Actually, Mr. Gates found some of Angela’s roots, believe it or not, on the Mayflower. Angela is a descendant of one William Brewster, a Puritan leader who landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620 and even signed the Mayflower Compact. Her family, or at least some of it, came over on the Mayflower, fought in the Revolutionary War, and on her mother’s side, owned slaves. Do you have such a rich background? Does it go back all the way to the Mayflower?
Now, of course, Ms. Davis is advocating reparations from White America to Black America and the teaching of critical race theory in our schools. Will she, with her heritage extending back to the Mayflower Compact, be ponying up for reparations and the advocacy of critical race theory? We know, as my colleague David Keene has written, that throughout the 1960s and 1970s, she was in on every left-wing project she could get in on. From the Black Panther Party to the Communist Party USA, there was nothing too red for her to avow or disavow.
Over the last couple of decades, she has become an almost beloved figure. Now I shall await her obituary breathlessly. Did her ancestors really come over on the Mayflower and own slaves? How will she be treated in the left’s “1619 Project”?
Glory to Ukraine!
• R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr. is founder and editor in chief of The American Spectator. He is a senior fellow at the London Center for Policy Research and the author most recently of “The Death of Liberalism,” published by Thomas Nelson, Inc. His memoirs, “How Do We Get Out of Here: Half a Century of Laughter and Mayhem at The American Spectator — From Bobby Kennedy to Donald J. Trump,” will be published by Post Hill Press in September and can be ordered online now from Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
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