A Friend Indeed?

Miko Brando considers himself a friend of the fallen pop icon, Michael Jackson.

Jackson, after all, was the godfather to Brando's child. Miko, the son of another icon, the actor Marlon Brando, and Jackson were indeed tight as thieves.

So no doubt that Miko Brando has convinced himself that he and Jackson were friends.

I just wonder how Michael would have done if he didn't have friends such as Miko Brando in his inner circle.

Like, maybe he'd still be alive right now.

I'm not blaming Brando for Jackson's death, which appears to be drug-related. I won't go quite that far. But I will blame Brando, and others close to Jackson, for being idle observers to a life gone out of control, when it comes to the drugs.

CNN has been trotting Miko Brando onto their shows a lot lately, in the wake of Jackson's death. He's done several shots on Larry King's show, for sure.

I don't know why CNN keeps putting Brando on the air, because he adds nothing to the discussion.

All Brando wants us to do---and it's verified in both his words and his body language---is look at his "friend" through rose-colored, revisionist history glasses.

"Why don't we just focus on the positive," Brando said, exasperated, on CNN late last week, "instead of all this negative stuff?"

Brando wants us to talk only about how great of a guy Michael Jackson was.

I'm not here to debate that.


Miko Brando, with his rose-colored glasses perched on his head


But wouldn't a true friend want to know what happened to his or her fallen compatriot? Wouldn't that friend want to get to the bottom of it, both for closure and to help ensure that it doesn't happen again, to someone else?

I'd feel a whole lot better about "friends" like Miko Brando, if they'd only say something like this on CNN and the like.

"I think it's important that we find out what happened to Michael, so that we can make sure this doesn't happen to anyone else."

That would be grand.

Instead, Miko seems to have a lot of his dad in him---the same eye-rolling, love/hate relationship with the media. The same disdain for responsibility.

"It's all speculation right now," Brando said. To a degree, he's right. But if he believes that the folks at CNN are going to abandon their responsibilities as journalists and have a love-in about Jackson on their airwaves, when he died under such mysterious circumstances, then Miko isn't too bright.

This isn't John Lennon.

Lennon was gunned down, in cold blood, outside his apartment. The only thing mysterious about it was the exact motive involved.

Jackson died under a shroud, clouded by likely abuse of prescription drugs.

Speaking of motive, I think I have one as far as why pals like Miko Brando are so eager to sweep everything under the rug.

Could it be that they, too, have things to hide?

Like why they didn't do more---or even anything---to dissuade Jackson from securing so many prescription drugs.

Brando's irritation with this whole process strikes me as thinly-veiled guilt about his own lack of action.

Yeah, Jackson was a great guy. Fine. Duly noted.

But he's dead. Mysteriously. At age 50.

A real friend ought to want to know what the hell happened.

I think Miko Brando already knows, but he's not telling.

With friends like those...