Most people see what they expect to see, what they want to see, what they've been told to see, what conventional wisdom tells them to see - not what is right in front of them in its pristine condition.
Vincent Bugliosi
All humans make mistakes. But there is no room or allowance in the fevered world of conspiracy theorists for mistakes, human errors, anomalies, or plain incompetence, though the latter, from the highest levels on down, is endemic to our society.
'Helter-Skelter' was the motive for the murders. Manson borrowed that term from a Beatles song on the 'White Album.' In England, helter-skelter is a playground ride. To Manson, helter-skelter meant a war between whites and blacks that the Beatles were in favor of.
For the life of me, I still don't understand why humans pray.
I am more excited about 'Divinity of Doubt: The God Question' than any other book in my entire career, and I've had seven New York Times bestsellers, three of them reaching number one.
I was at a book convention, in a cab. On one side of me was Arthur Schlesinger; on the other side was William Manchester - real heavyweights. All they were doing was asking me about Charles Manson. The only thing that enables me not to be bored is the people talking about it - they're so interested.
If there is one thing that I take pride in, it is the fact that I never, ever make a charge without offering a substantial amount of support for it. You may ultimately end up not agreeing with me, but you will have to concede that I offered much evidence in support of my position, something that people frequently do not do.
Just look at what is right in front of you. People don't do that. They see what they expect to see, what they want to see, what conventional wisdom tells them to see. They only hear the music and not the lyrics of human events.
One thing I have seen over and over again in life is that there is virtually no correlation between intelligence and common sense. IQ doesn't seem to translate that way.
Since Kennedy's death, the nation has not seen, in any of his successors, his cosmopolitan intellectualism or the oratorical eloquence with which he sought to lead the nation by the power of his words.
And I think within the pages of The Betrayal of America I think I present an overwhelming case that these five justices were up to no good, and they deliberately set out to hand the election to George Bush.
This book here, 'The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder,' in it, I put together a case against George Bush that could result - it absolutely could result in his being prosecuted for first-degree murder in an American courtroom.
The very name 'Manson' has become a metaphor for evil... He has come to represent the dark and malignant side of humanity, and for whatever reason, there is a side of human nature that is fascinated with ultimate evil.
Yeah, I lost court cases and misdemeanor juries, but of felony jury trials I was successful 105 of 106 times.
We should not televise trials. There's only one purpose for a criminal trial. It's to determine whether or not the defendant committed the crime. Anything that interferes or has the potential of interfering with that should automatically be prohibited.
I'm still angry with Simpson for getting by with two murders.
If you're honest with yourself, you're going to find out whether you truly love America, or whether your primary allegiance is to the Republican party.
In my opinion, the Warren Commission's investigation has to be considered the most comprehensive investigation of a crime in history.
No matter what I do, I'll be forever known as the Manson prosecutor.
Nearly all Americans felt they knew JFK intimately, his charm and wit regularly lighting up the television screen at home. This is why polls showed that millions of Americans took his assassination like a 'death in the family.'
I start out with the assumption that a lawyer in a criminal case is going to be incompetent - substantially so. I find my assumption to be rarely wrong. Yet society starts out with the very opposite assumption.
We're a nation of celebrity and hero worshipers, so much so that we make heroes out of those who aren't, such as John Wayne: a patriotic, red-blooded, two-fisted American who spent the Second World War in the trenches on the movie lots of Hollywood.
We can know that the Christian God cannot exist. If he is all-powerful and all-good, as Christians maintain, there would not have been, for instance, the Holocaust. This is an inherent self-contradiction. So if Christians insist on having a God, they can do so, but if they have any respect for logic they'll have to redefine who he is.
Just like I'm still angry with Simpson for getting by with two murders.
As a trial lawyer, intelligence is important only in the sense that it allows you to play the game, if you will. Without it, you don't even have a ticket into the competitive arena. But beyond that, it doesn't get you very far at all.
These people have elevated audacity to symphonic and operatic levels. The Florida Supreme Court relied on new law to resolve the election dispute down there.
The reality is that most celebrity defendants are extremely unknowledgeable, naive, and vulnerable, and if they get into trouble, they usually call their lawyer friends who handle criminal cases, and if they don't know any, they call their business lawyers, who then refer them to lawyer friends of theirs.
The Florida Supreme Court wanted all the legal votes to be counted. The United States Supreme Court, on the other hand, did not want all the votes to be counted.
If anyone should be executed, it should be Charles Manson. Do I go around during the daytime, 'Geez, I'm upset that he's alive'? No, I don't even think about him. I don't think about this case.
A very beautiful honey blonde, Sharon Tate, looked into the eyes of the man who the evidence shows just four and a half months later would order her tragic and violent death.
Although the evidence at this trial shows that Charles Manson was the leader of the conspiracy to commit these murders, there is no evidence that he actually personally killed any of the seven victims in this case.
One of the people that wrote a forward to my book is Gerry Spence, whom I admire. Gerry is a friend of mine, and Gerry's perhaps the leading criminal defense attorney in the country.
So I don't blame Boies for the decision of the Court at all.
The votes of 60,000 Floridians were not counted. The Court threw out all 60,00 votes. And that's what the newspapers around the country are counting now.
There is no question at all that Manson was sending Tex, Sadie, Katie, and Linda out on his mission of murder.
You might not agree with me, but I always offer a lot of support.
Within the pages of The Betrayal of America I prove that these justices were absolutely up to no good, and they deliberately set out to hand the election to George Bush.
This is America, not a banana republic.
The ruling in the Paula Jones case is so silly.
The felonious five in their Supreme Court decision never said Gore did anything improperly in Florida.
It's unbelievable, there's a book out attacking Gore, when he's the most unfortunate loser in political history.
It's my view that any conservative who loves his country has to be extremely concerned.
It was OK for the media to pursue Former President Clinton year after year for lying about a private, consensual sexual affair, but we have five justices who committed one of the biggest crimes in American History, and it ceased to be a big story.
If it's a close election, then it's better for the Supreme Court to pick the president, whether or not he won the election. It's just insane on its face.
I'm trying to finish my book on the Kennedy assassination.
I view myself primarily as a trial lawyer who happens to be writing, as opposed to a writer who happens to be a trial lawyer, so the audience is like a jury to me.
I think I present an overwhelming case that these five justices were up to no good, and they deliberately set out to hand the election to George Bush.
I lost court cases and misdemeanor juries, but of felony jury trials I was successful 105 of 106 times.
A national legal organization is giving very serious thought to using The Betrayal of America as a legal basis for asking the House Judiciary Committee to institute impeachment proceedings against these five justices.
I, for one, can't be sure at all there is a God.
