Eek! My hometown!

[Myshkin]

"SANTA MARIA, California (CNN) -- Singer Michael Jackson arrived Friday morning at a California courthouse for his arraignment... "

"Reporters from a number of countries, including Japan, Britain, Germany and Australia, were in this city of 82,000 people. "

I guess I have another way to explain to people where I grew up now. I served my first jury duty and paid my first traffic ticket at that courthouse...

I think I wrote here when I told y'all about where I grew up that Michael Jackson was seen several times in town back in the late 80's, once my a friend of mine who worked at Target ^_^ He came in with two bodyguards, walked around the whole store and went out without buying anything.

[Wazza]

Probably couldn't buy anything, as he had his mask on, and the store had the public inside! Seems to only go on shopping sprees now, when no one is around.

A bit whacko this character, but I still bought his greatest #1 hits CD, last month, with a Xmas music gift voucher. ;) Some hits are pretty cool, like Thriller, Billie Jean, Bad... Goes on....

:")

[Commander]

When Michael Jackson was shopping at Target, did he spend a lot of time in the boys underwear department, or the toys department by chance? )=)

[Justin Martin]

Hmph, and i'll bet Santa Maria isn't likely to become synonymous with nutcases as my hometown did after the international media focused their attention on our village idiot. And i'm not referring to Prez Bush either.


I never have to look for ways to explain where i'm from, I say "Waco", and people say "Oh", and start slowly backing for the door. ^_^

[Myshkin]

Heh good point Justin.

Santa Maria has the advantage that Michael Jackson actually doesn't live there, I consider where he lives a completely different town and area... but if you read through the details, he's in Santa Barbara County court, which I guess for them is Santa Maria. Before this case I would have thought he would go to Santa Barbara, as it's just a hop over the mountain ridge... maybe 30 minutes away as well, but in the other direction.

You never know though how this one will turn out... maybe he will barricade himself in Neverland Ranch and maybe he has a bunch of automatic weapons and the ATF will come knocking and his followers will stay with him and fight to the bitter end.... well not so likely.

I might be a little guilty of wondering about Waco before going there. I imagined it was smaller than it is... kind of like when one thinks of Idaho and their militant anti-government and/or racist groups. Chances are you would never even see them unless you went looking for them.

[Justin Martin]

Automatic weapons? Who needs automatic weapons when you're Peter Pan and you can send Tinkerbell to neutralize those pesky little ATF/FBI agents with her little magic wand. ^_^

[Commander]

Not only that, but Michael Jackson firing an assault rifle would have a simialr effect as when Wylie Coyote straps himself to one of those red Acme rockets. ^_^

[lewi]

hey, hey hey!!! Let's keep it nice, I'm an MJ fan. Allright, I'd admit he's not the most normal person in the world but u gotta respect what he's done both with singing and humanitarian efforts. I personally beleive that he hasn't dun anything wrong, but he may have put forward the wrong ideas in his interviews. Have you noticed that these rumors only surfaced after that 2003 Martin Bashieer interview when MJ says he shared the bed with that kid? And if you were the parents, would you be after money if YOUR child was sexually abused? I dun think so. Personally, I think this case has a lot of "speculative evidence" surrounding it but the media really have hyped the public into thinking he's guilty, which is unfair to any person unless they have actually stood trial and come forward with an "un-tarnished" opinion to start off with. Anyway it happens, I give my full support to the guy and hope he's given a fair trial.

[Myshkin]

Lewi: I hope you weren't talking to me. I did joke about them barricading themselves in Neverland Ranch, I have not said a thing about whether he is guilty or not. You believing he is innocent is just that... a belief. I have not seen evidence that he is guilty, so I don't know one way or the other. He is eccentric, but that does not bother me... except if it has warped his sense of morals ( :eek: ) to the point that, if he did it, he sees nothing wrong in it. Or if he thinks that as the "King of Pop" he is beyond reproach.

Also, we talked about this before but this is a criminal case. They are not suing him for money. You might think that one could just pay them to not testify, but you know that would be illegal, and if they were caught they'd all be in trouble.

That kind of answers your question, what would a parent do if their child was sexually abused? Report it to the police, and the guy would probably be charged and have to defend himself in court. Which is exactly what is happening.

[lewi]

Oh, whoops:") Well, I was sorta comparing it to the 1993 case, where they went to the press first. Indeed though, you gotta wonder if he's guilty or not, cos it looks suspicious from both sides of the stories.