Stop Worshiping This Creepy Man

America’s being asked to deify Michael Jackson, “but I can’t get past the creepiness,” writes John Kass of the Chicago Tribune. You know all about his “Willy Wonka-style” ranch, the little boys he slept with there, and the “Jesus juice” wine he allegedly offered them. “What most people are mourning isn’t Jackson, but their own youth.” But you can’t mourn “when half your brain is wondering: What ever happened to Bubbles the Chimpanzee?”

And the way people are reacting to Jackson's death is almost creepier than he was. There’s the “maudlin media coverage,” the pseudo-intellectual gushing about Jackson’s importance, and yesterday’s “creep-fest variety show/memorial service,” complete with that giant image of Jackson with his arms outstretched like Jesus. His own dad is using the death to promote a new record label. “If you don’t think that’s creepy,” says Kass, “then your creep-dar is beyond repair.” (More Michael Jackson stories.)