CSotD: Smartening up
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Clay Jones nails it.
I'm glad he falls where he does on my daily run-through, because I'd seen several "Putin's Puppet" cartoons, and, while some were quite good, they just didn't blow my mind.
They offered a lot of comforting of the afflicted without doing much to afflict the comfortable, because Trump supporters simply shrug off such accusations as "fake news" and assume that progressives are as partisan and dishonest as the rightwingers they do believe.
Granted, I don't have a way of expressing my frustration with people who don't think and won't listen without it sounding like one more partisan attack.
But goddammittalltohell there was a time when we didn't trust Russia and when people who questioned the government were told "Why don't you move to Russia?" because that was an insult to any good American.
Clay Jones nails it, and his column is good, too.
And it won't make a damn bit of difference because Trump supports have already shoved the Cuban Missile Crisis and the entire Cold War down an Orwellian hidey-hole and so it never happened.
And Donald J. Trump is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life.
(They won't catch that reference, either.)
Meanwhile, it's come to this
Heidi MacDonald wins Headline of the Year, and those in the biz will recognize it as a "standing head" which means you put the type aside to use regularly.
I didn't even read the article, which is on a topic that has been covered on a number of sites, because I'm not much into comic books and don't much care about the inner workings at DC.
But, you know, two months ago, if some prominent guy anywhere — an air conditioner company, a butcher shop, a dog grooming salon — had been fired for this sort of thing, I'd have dove right in.
Now the dominoes are falling so fast that I only read the ones that matter to me.
Holy guacamole. It's come to this.
Which is good news, because we could use a shake-out.
As I said the other day, I don't expect relations between the sexes to suddenly blossom into perfection, because I believe there is a continuum from good attitude to bad actions with a whole lot of stupidity and human frailty in between.
But, just as I can't understand people who don't mind our president cozying up to a guy who murders his opponents and invades other countries, I can't understand people who cozy up to abusers on the pretext that you can't really tell where to draw the line.
For those who don't get it, Ann Telnaes offers this handy guide for the liars and propagandists, and it's a good expression of shock and fury over their willful refusal to confront the obvious.
But, while the falling of dominoes has, no doubt, emboldened Moore's victims to come forward, it's the more day-to-day harassment that people still don't seem to get.
That is, making sexual overtures to a 14-year-old, yes.
And blatantly telling a woman she will lose her job unless she has sex with you is pretty easy to parse.
But where in that long continuum between "Perfect Gentleman" and "Flaming A-hole" do you place the marker?
That's a sincere question.
I dated a "townie" freshman year, a very nice, very blue-collar South Bend Polish-American girl, and, if you've read more Jean Shepherd than just "A Christmas Story," you've read about girls like Linda.
Linda wanted to come up to my dorm room with her friend Diane. This was prohibited on threat of expulsion, but I snuck them up there, having asked my roommate to take Diane next door for 15 minutes or so while Linda and I smooched a little and hashed out our upcoming prom date. (Relax: I was barely 18, she was nearly 17.)
My straight-as-a-stick, chosen-at-random, future-distinguished-surgeon roommate says, "What, are they sluts?" and despite my saying they weren't, made some kind of pass at Diane that she couldn't tell us about until I had them out of the building because her laughter would have alerted the authorities.
He's lucky she didn't clobber him.
These guys really, really don't get it. They're not faking. They're not evil.
I suppose some of them ascend to positions of power because they keep their noses in their books and to the grindstone and never stick it anywhere that might make them even a little bit hep to the jive.
Which only explains their behavior. It in no way excuses it.
Anne Morse Hambrock has recently revitalized her graphic blog, "Anne and God," and offers this easy-to-grasp primer.
Even the summa cum laudes can understand it, I hope.
Speaking of things Hambrockian
It has been 11 years since a King Features sales rep sent me the sample packet for a new strip, "The Brilliant Mind of Edison Lee."
John Hambrock reflects on the anniversary here, which gives me a chance to reflect on the life cycle of comic strips.
Here's the first daily, and, aside from the smoother drawing of Edison's dad, you'll readily notice in current strips a much more subtle use of the genius kid/normal family set up.
Very few strips hit the ground hot, and even those few take a little while to work their way into your heart, to establish their flow.
Then they hit a groove.
And generally that groove deepens into a rut.
But, eleven years in, Edison Lee remains in a groove: Well-drawn, clever and often incisive.
Happy birthday, little guy.
Now here's your moment of Zen:
About four years after the Washington High Junior Prom, my very pregnant wife and I ran into Linda and her husband and small baby in the grocery store. She'd carved out a good blue-collar Polish-American South Bend life that Jean Shepherd would have approved, and it was very nice to see her.
If your past gives you sorrow, pal, look within.
Mike Peterson has posted his "Comic Strip of the Day" column every day since 2010. His opinions are his own, but we welcome comments either agreeing or in opposition.
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