Commentary
Sometimes you wonder if anyone is serious in the California Legislature. On Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk for signature or veto sits Assembly Bill 2799, introduced by Assemblymember Reggie Jones-Sawyer (D-Los Angeles). It passed unanimously in both the Assembly and Senate, with no Republican opposition. It would ban rap lyrics being used by prosecutors at a trial without a judge’s approval.
But consider some other cases. The Beatles song “Helter Skelter” drove mass-murder Charles Manson to believe he could start a race war by murdering actress Sharon Tate and four others in 1969.
J.D. Salinger’s “Catcher in the Rye” inspired Mark David Chapman to murder Beatle John Lennon in 1980, and John Hinckley, Jr.’s attempted assassination of President Reagan in 1981….