If you are famous in America, you are what your obit says you are. Usually, it’s boiled down to some silly line you uttered in a commercial, your divorces or other legal problems. If you’re lucky, your accomplishments are great enough to make the lead paragraph.

I’m glad I’m not writing Michael Jackson’s obit.

I can’t think of a more conflicting legacy than that of Michael Jackson’s.

I flash back almost immediately to the memory of watching the Brady Bunch and Partridge Family in the late 60s and 70s like most every other white kid in this country, and then being absolutely knocked silly by the talents of Michael Jackson and the Jackson Five.  Read more...