Former chess great Bobby Fischer dead at 64

JJR512

JJR512

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Former chess great Bobby Fischer dead at 64
GUDJON HELGASON

Associated Press

January 18, 2008 at 6:34 AM EST

REYKJAVIK — Bobby Fischer, the reclusive chess genius who became a Cold War icon by dethroning the Soviet world champion in 1972 and later renounced his American citizenship, has died. He was 64.

Mr. Fisher died in a Reykjavik hospital on Thursday, his spokesman, Gardar Sverrisson, said Friday. There was no immediate word on cause of death.

Born in Chicago and raised in Brooklyn, N.Y., Mr. Fischer was wanted in the United States for playing a 1992 rematch against Boris Spassky in Yugoslavia in defiance of international sanctions. In 2005, he moved to Iceland, a chess-mad nation and site of his greatest triumph.

Garry Kasparov, the former Russian chess champion, said Mr. Fischer's ascent in the chess world in the 1960s and his promotion of chess worldwide was "a revolutionary breakthrough" for the game. But Mr. Fischer's reputation as a genius of chess was eclipsed, in the eyes of many, by his idiosyncrasies.
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Complete article http://www.theglobeandmail.com/serv...?page=rss&id=RTGAM.20080118.wbobbyfischer0118
 
funny story that makes me look like an idiot:

i had occasion yesterday to reference the SNL spartans cheerleading skit which contains this cheer:
"go ask your momma, and make sure you listen
cuz one thing's for certain -- bobby fischer's missin'
bobby fischer! where is he? i don't know! i don't know!
bobby fischer! where is he? i don't know! i don't know!
HE'S GONE!"

and the people i referenced it to were like, "he's dead!"... but i was like, "i know!"... because i thought he was dead already.
that's what happens to me sometimes. like how when i heard bob hope died. i could have sworn he had died already. like, 3 times. he, and bobby fischer, are a little bit before my time, you see.
 
My mom and I went to Wendy's for lunch on the day Dave Thomas died... but we didn't know that until later that day.

Anyway, the AP story I read on it made it seem like he was really good at chess but a major-league asshole.
 
Not really going out on a limb there to make that guess, really, since that's true of everyone.

Anyway, back to something that's not a total waste of time and space, I saw a video clip on the news of Fischer saying something I didn't understand. He said, "The United States is an illegitimate country, like Israel; it has no right to exist." Umm...what?
 
He thought it was stolen from the native Americans, same as he felt the Jews stole the land from the Palestineans. He also thought the Jews were running the US government and were specifically targeting him. BTW, his mother was Jewish.
 
Yeah, I'd heard about his mother...Wasn't Hitler's mother Jewish, too?

I guess I forgot to look at it from that point of view, and I suppose he makes a valid point. The USA's land was stolen from the people who were here before the Europeans. But isn't much, if not most, of Europe pretty much in the same boat? Haven't the various lands in Europe been conquered, taken, reconquered, taken back, been subdivided, and recombined many times throughout history?
 
JJR512 said:
Yeah, I'd heard about his mother...Wasn't Hitler's mother Jewish, too?
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I don't think she was, but from what I've read he was consumed with a paranoia that she was Jewish. I'm far from an expert on the subject though, but I do recall reading that as part of my study of Charlie Manson.
 
Fischer's nuts: an anti-American, anti-Semitic wackjob.

He revoked his American citizenship, called for the death of President Bush, called for the destruction of America, the murder of most of the Jews, and he died in his chosen country--Iceland.
 
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