Dear Dirty America

ADAM MICHAEL LUEBKE

Robin Abcarian of the LA Times makes it known that she does not subscribe to conspiracy theories surrounding the death of journalist Michael Hastings:

As many people who knew him suspected, the fiery death of the young journalist Michael Hastings in a single car crash was the result of tragic circumstances, not a government plot to get rid of an inconvenient truth teller.

Instead, she would rather rely on traces of drugs in Hastings’ system to wash away the suspicious circumstances of his early morning death. She is ignoring the local residents living around the crash who reported they’d heard a huge explosion before the vehicle hit the tree. Abcarian is not taking into account the fact that experts have watched the following surveillance video and determined Hastings’ was going around 30-40, not 100-130mph. Which is why the tree he ‘slammed’ into is not damaged.

Because Hastings had traces of marijuana and amphetamines in his system, Abcarian is conveniently ignoring the glaring inconsistencies of the official story that the famed Rolling Stone writer simply ran his car into a tree on Highland Avenue.

Even if the amphetamines in Hastings’ system were from ‘uppers’ and not some cold medicine or a wide range of household drugs that can slightly register on a toxicology report, could those amphetamines really be the reason for the following?

• There were no skid marks on the street where Hastings’ was reported to have lost control of his Mercedes vehicle.
• Surveillance video from a local restaurant on Melrose and Santa Monica captured a series of bright explosions before the car hit the tree.
• The tree was hardly scratched despite the story of it being hit at 100+mph.
• Hastings’ Mercedes is torn up in back and damaged on both the driver’s and passenger’s sides.
• And the biggest inconsistency? The engine and drive train blown out behind the car.

Instead of satisfying us about why Michael Hastings Mercedes-Benz was found, engulfed in flames, up against a tree in the median of Highland Avenue, Robin Abcarian seems all too satisfied to pretend there is no story here, and no inconsistencies in how Hastings died. What Abcarian mostly wants us to take away from her perspective is that she doesn’t carry the conspiracy card. She’ll play it safe from her desk.

Meanwhile, San Diego 6 News won’t leave Hastings’ death alone. I applaud them, and so should you. Journalists with integrity, with an actual platform from which to speak, has become a rare phenomenon.

Enjoy: