LSD, JFK, CIA?

[Paul Mackin]

Well, Doug, I didn't know I was speaking to aliens from outer space who would
not recognize that "common knowledge" in the context of likely Pynchon readers
(the relevant population) does not mean common knowledge of the country at
large.

But let me ask this. Aside from your gratuitious need to correct me, what
bearing does the date the great majority of Americans learned about
LSD--whatever that might have been--have on the LSD revelations--or lack
thereof--in Lot49?  Are you sure it isn't just a smokescreen?

But God bless you, Doug. I really am trying to deal with your positions
seriously whether you can see it or not.
                                         P.


Doug Millison wrote:

> Paul, I'm simply countering your absurd assertion that use of LSD in the
> early 60s was common knowledge.
> You are engaged in your common pattern of rewriting my post, to start an
> argument I presume.   The research and recreational use of LSD up to the
> mid-60s was not widely known, had not been exposed in the mass media. In
> fact, knowledge of LSD was restricted to relatively few people, from a
> handful (in the whole world) in the '40s, to a few tens of thousands (in the
> whole world) by the mid-60s.  By the time Time magazine puts the hippes and
> the Summer of Love on its cover, LSD is part of the U.S. mass media
> consciousness, but not before.
>
> I repeat an earlier question:  what other literary novel, in 1966 or before,
> of similar stature to COL49, features LSD as prominently as COL49?