This one keeps coming up again and again and each time I mean to comment and set the record straight. Hunter S. Thompson NEVER said nor wrote: "The radio business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side."
What he did say was this original quote which first appeared in the San Francisco Examiner November 4 1985 and later in his book Generation of Swine:
"The TV business is uglier than most things. It is normally perceived as some kind of cruel and shallow money trench through the heart of the journalism industry, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs, for no good reason".
He went on to say: "For the most part, they are dirty little animals with huge brains and no pulse. Every once in a while they will toss up a token human like Ed Bradley or Edwin Newman or Hughes Rudd…. And there are others , no doubt, like Studs Terkel in Chicago and the twisted Rev. Gene Scott, who works like a sleepless ferret in the manic bowels in Southern California".
No mention of the "There is also a negative side" bit on the end, probably added by some journalist thinking he was clever, or the journalist inserted that thought and it was mistakenly included in the whole quote.
It is clear he is talking about the TV business and not radio.