"There was a tipping point with rock music in the early 1960s, and that had to do with music but also technology—portable radios, which had to do with...the development of special kinds of batteries and the transistor."

Yes, yes. Go on.

"I would like to see, if this [election] is to serve as a tipping point for Iraq, some similar combination of factors. It's not enough for this simply to be a political transformation. There has to be some other kind of transformation that joins forces with this to create some kind of lasting and permanent change. I'd like to see, for example, some sort of economic...tipping point. Or I would like to see some change on the religious front that permits the political change to have much more legs."

Wow! So you're saying that the spontaneous emergence of an Iraqi tech bubble a few Duracells and a magic frog that shoots peace rays from his eyes may be all that stands between Iraq becoming the next member of the G8?

Thanks Malcolm, I'm sure you'll be getting a call from Rumsfeld once he puts down his dowsing rod.

To sum up: no end in sight.

3/1/05
March is in like a lion here in the Cha (Rochester, for all you non ChaChas). It is a circus lion to be sure, as the snow is fluffy, soft and melting, but can still bite your head off if you provoke it. This is the land of lake effect weather, after all.

If you don't visit the Iraq Coalition Casualties tally once in a while today's a good day to break out your big foam fingers and watch the score. 1499 Americans have been killed so far. Who will be the lucky grunt to roll us over into 1500 land? A Milwaukee father of four? A star high school fullback? That nice young man who used to shovel your driveway? Who???

There really ought to be an awards show for our valorous young-to-middle aged men of the desert. They sure as hell work harder than Hollywood's glitterati. You just know that Cheney would want to pick the host, however, and we'd wind up with someone like Art Linkletter because Chris Rock is just too sassy. Bi-partisan wrangling would eventually result in a Jay Leno compromise... as if that wasn't what Dick wanted all along! Mwuh! Mwuh ha ha ha!

Still, 1500 corpses is actually pretty good stats for a war, and it sure beats the 16,00-18,000 (or even 100,000) people the Iraqis have lost. Wouldn't it be great if those were soldiers? We can always use our make believe, kids!

Recently I heard a general on the radio being asked about our country's ability to tolerate much more blood. The man replied that he had every confidence that America had not forgotten Gettysburg, by which he meant that our nation still recognizes the virtue of slaughter, not that war is a brutal exercise in collective insanity to be avoided at all costs.

So there you have it: anything less than Gettysburg will count as a win. By that measure we still have a live soldier surplus of roughly 6100 men (that's 12,200 boots on the ground!). On the down side, we know how our President likes to spend his capital. He'll tear through those troops like I would a bag of Milanos.

Still, if we can just keep the Iraqi guerillas from shifting their focus to the civilian population and triggering a civil war which will surely demand a deepening involvement on our part...

Uh oh.

...

New cartoon this week, and boy is she brief! It's a lampoon of the "30 Second Bunny Theatre" you may have heard about. Yes, it's a parody of a parody. Shameless? Shameless like a fox maybe!!

Naw, just shameless. Watch it here, or better still, watch it on Newgrounds and vote me into their upper echelon of fame!

2/24/05
Yes, it's an update! Would you have believed you'd live to see the day when people didn't refresh their blogs every week, much less every day? Today's generation, man. Nothing but a bunch of slackers.

To recap: I am NOT lazy. Far from it. Very far. Fuckin' Alpha Centauri far. I have, as I think I mentioned a coupla times, been chuggin like a locomotive to complete the next issue of Deep Fried. This has demanded every particle of my attention. Shit, I only play Soul Calibur three hours a day now. How am I supposed to get good on Seung Mina at that rate? If it weren't for Deep Fried my roommate wouldn't own me with Nightmare!

And what are you going to come away with after all this effort? A damn fine comic, son! Lemme give you a sneak peak:



Now tell me you don't want to know the story behind this panel! And what's more, I've got a great freebie deal with giveaways for all new subscribers to my mailing list! FIND OUT MORE!

...

The world's a-changin'. If you thought Space Jam was the worst scheme that Warner Bros ever hatched to hollow out their venerable cartoon franchise like a jack-o-lantern, say hello to the Loonatics!



That's right! Rootin' tootin' laser shootin' lobster-clawed upgrades to the classic Warner Bros. pantheon of greats will soon be overstimulating a nephew near you! Think "WB2K"! Think "Bugs Bunny Beyond"!

Think of how fast this one will make its way to the landfill.

The premise is that the revamped toons will be crime fighting super heroes of the future that do karate, shoot ..nng...lasers from their eyes and...nnn...excuse me, but just describing this makes me need to take a shit. Be right back.

Warner Brothers has been trying to breathe life into their Loony Toons properties for decades since their animation department abandoned the concepts of irreverent satire, slapstick and craft. With money now firmly ensconced as their lodestar it is not surprising that they have "re-imagined" their cast as vaguely malevolent refugees from Tron with...what the fuck are those things coming out of their heads? Pincers?

Here's a couple of quotes that ought to complete the picture for you, courtesy of WB animation prez Sander Schwartz: "The reaction by kids in test groups has been phenomenal...This is a kids show intended for kids today who are growing up in the Internet age, an age of technology, an age of hip, cool animation, and something that we hope will resonate with that age group."

With it's harsh, dark design and aggressive, girl-hostile ethos, none of which are lacking in the cartoon spectrum these days, its not hard to guess whether or not the Loonatics will still be charming audiences generations from now. If Mr. Schwartz could stop reading from his network notes I would make the following suggestion to him:

Instead of trying to turn Bugs Bunny and pals--characters that already resonate with every age group--into some sort of neo-Soviet kids show that you might have seen people watching in RoboCop, take your new Hell Bugs, paint him gray and stick him in a rabbit hole. Then find a couple of writer's whose influences aren't exclusively American McGee and Aidan Hughes and create a few brand new animated shorts that start with "What's up, doc?", end with "Ain't I a stinker?", and include, somewhere in the middle, a histrionic opera singer.

Call me loony, but I bet that would really go over big.

2/10/05
Benjamin Hayden, the Deep Fried fan with the most time on his hands I have ever seen, continues to make the rest of you look about as loyal as Arnold Schwarzenegger's hands are to Maria's ass. Behold his bizarrely upsetting Weapon Brown action figure!



Benjamin's next project: knitting pairs of tiny trousers for his troll dolls.

2/7/05
What kind of self-promoter am I not to have let you know that a review of Deep Fried #1 and a revealing, downright tit-flashing interview with yours truly can be found on SilverBulletComics.com?

A bad kind, is what! By the way, did I ever show you this on Newsarama?

2/6/05
Four years of web cartooning only to have The Cuddly Menace become my first legitimate claim to Internet phenomenon status. Google "Cuddly Menace" or "Zogg" and see what I mean.

Apparently a fellow named Damien received all the Zogg material in an e-mail and, not realizing that it already had a home here, created a web page for it. This resulted in a ton of links to his website to see my work, which leads me to wonder: what is my site? Chopped liver??

To anyone reading this: always make sure to link to my page when you are spreading my fame! (whaddaya mean "ungrateful"? Shaddup!)

1/30/05
Hooray for democracy! Our Iraqi friends today voted for freedom, liberty and running water, with only a piddling 36-ish people dead in the process. These came courtesy of nine suicide bombings that we can be sure were carried out by disgruntled Ohio Democrats.

Eight million Iraqis are said to have cast ballots, or roughly 60% of the registered voters (look for those stats to be recrunched downward in the next few days.)

Wow! After half a century of despotic tyranny only 60% of Iraqis wanted to have a say in their country's future. Coincidentally, last November only 60.7% of Americans chose to play a role in their government, and that was after only four years of tyranny! I guess when it comes to chilling civic mindedness the Ba'ath party has a lot to learn from the Republicans.

1/27/05
I couldn't resist a little tweaking of my perrenial conservative target James Lileks, even though I've sworn off reading his columns a jillion times. His observations on Operation Iraqi Quicksand are so quaintly optimistic and so unerringly false that I am beginning to suspect that genetically he is Shinzon to Rumsfeld's Picard (if you don't get it you never will. Be thankful for that.)

In his blog of 1/28/05 (yes, I can see into the future), the Minneapolis mallrat writes:

So there's an election in Iraq soon, I understand. I haven't been writing about this here because I'm just taking the long, long view, and haven't the time or inclination to argue with people who think "No WMD!" is the argument equivalent of a spreading a full house on the green felt table. It may seem so, but unfortunately we're playing chess.

In the game of brinksmanship I think our president is actually more of a beer pong votary. And the analogy is all the more interesting considering the fact that we've already mated Iraq's king but the pawns just keep on blowing the hooves off our knights.

I wonder if Gary Kasparov ever considered declaring "Game over, I win," in the middle of a tournament and leaving the building before a coalition of fundamentalist bishops could take over the board? If he ever does, they will call it the Bush Gambit.

However the election goes will be one thing; how it's reported is another. The thing to watch is the position of the Damning But, the old DB. The DB will probably bob up in the first or second paragraphs of most dispatches. "The election went as planned in 95 percent of the country, but violence marred polling in the disputed Sunny D Triangle, where insurgents opposed to Tropicana Juice fired automatic weapons into an juice concentrate factory." That's one spin. "The election, long anticipated as a flashpoint for insurgent activity, went off with few delays. Despite sporadic gunfire marred the overall mood of success in several provinces, observers said that the process was "smooth as a Sade groove," adding that they were annoyed Sade had simply faded away instead of letting her career end with a tasteful layout in Playboy." See? No DB there. We'll see.

Now , it would be hypocritical of me to simply condemn James' glib reduction of an American induced urban apocalypse to the status of a pesky little Devil's Night. After all, I too have been known to revel in the abject suffering of others. But the comparison isn't fair. I need misery the way the Trix rabbit needs fruity flavors. Jim is merely whistling past the graveyard, and making a Wagnerian effort of it at that.

Considering the way the war has been going, with an average of two American lives lost every day for nearly two years, and quite a few more Iraqis, I'd say the "Damning But" to be expected will read more like: "Elections were held in Iraq today, which resulted in a respectable turnout of Shia and Kurdish Iraqis, but with a somewhat dispiriting dearth of Sunni voters, and an assload of suicide bombings."

Yes, we will see.

1/26/05
pant pant I'm not late! It's still Wednesday in my timezone!

God I hate having to work. Why can't my days be spent eating tufts of cotton candy and doodling cartoons that sell no matter how poor the market is for them? Why must I debase myself illustrating puzzles or rendering George Pataki's likeness in Prismacolor pen for my daily tuppence? Why can't a fortune in gold and jewels just fall from the sky into my lap for a change??

(Somewhere a Babylonian genie with an ironic sense of humor rubs his hands together).

Well, at least you are getting the goods this week. Last week was a mess. I hate not having my shit together, and though I can put the blame on my rush assignment, there is something else at work here.

Have a seat son.

It's like this: Daddy won't be drawing you a comic strip anymore.

(I will go get some flavor bursting snack chips while this sinks in.)

Okay, what the fuck am I thinking? Haven't you been fulfilling your end of the bargain, dutifully tuning in for years to enjoy the adventures of Beepo, Roadkill, Squints, Philip McDisney, The Boogie Bunneez...the list goes on and on (well, on).

Yes, you have, and I am more than grateful for it. So, Where do I get off just pulling the plug like this?

My New Year's Resolution was to begin making hard decisions, and the hardest ones to make are those that have to do with my art. But facts are facts. The website, the strip and the animations were all originally born to support the Deep Fried comic book. I've put out as much stuff on as regular a basis as I could in an effort to make this enterprise fly (hell, UPN can't even make Enterprise fly, but whoops! That's a pointless tangent), but now it's time to prune this tree. Everything I've done ancillary to the comic book has become it's own monolithic endeavor, and I need to take serious stock of where I want to take my career, such as it is.

Deep Fried Amalgamated, in its present state, is like Terri Schiavo. Its alive, but only so long as you keep a feeding tube down its throat. Its not hunting its own meals like it should be.

So, although it is killing me, something has to give, and the strip just isn't pulling its weight. Though it runs in two papers, the clients don't tend to pay me (that's the free press for you). And with Bush officially locked in for four more years, turning the Capitol into a non-stop OJ trial, my primary impetus for doing the strip is gone. Getting Deep Fried into more papers would be a Sisyphusian chore that I am not prepared to grapple with. Others can roast Dubya's giblets better than I can, and I have other ways of upsetting Unmerica's apple cart that I want to explore.

So, this week's strip is the final one. Hopefully you'll appreciate the way I tie up my three year effort. I wish my cartoon reflected the way things had really gone down last week. I have never seen a more depressingly ominous inauguration. You just know that we're in for a whole lotta trouble.

But I digress.

Alright, the good news. I'm sure you're wondering what the hell you'll be coming back for, if there is no strip to enjoy. Let me tell you a story.

I am at the mall recently, browsing Hot Topic for a pink and black Emily the Strange baby tee to give as a shower gift. when I spy T-shirts featuring the star of a stupid, shitty web toon that I will not link to (just in case you like it). No, not only T-shirts, but a fucking DVD too.

Friends, I strive to bring you only the finest comedy dregs. I agonize over every line I write, sometimes for days. I torture myself over the sight gags, scrutinize every pen stroke and have even been known to spellcheck. And now I see that this cartoon, which I have mocked many a time for the paucity of it's art and the drivel it passes off as humor, is being sold in a nationwide chain store.

Does not compute.

I have pledged many times to deliver a regular animated feature on this site, and many times my aforementioned obligations have derailed me. Now I see that with no Brando to measure web animation by, Netizens are settling for an Ashton Kucher. For the sake of all new media, I must deliver that cartoon!

You've heard me promise this before, of course. Well, as part of my overhaul I am determined to put that plan into action, and this time I mean it.

No, really.

No, really dammit!

Okay, I don't have a plan. That's the problem. This is why I am taking a hiatus from the website, to draw one up. I'm taking February off, to finish drawing the next issue of Deep Fried, plot my plots and scheme my schemes. When I return, I'll have a fresh new agenda for the site and for all things Deep Fried.

I SAID REALLY YOU SONSABITCHES!!!

So, hasta la vista, strippy. You've been a great vehicle for my rancor and I've been proud of you more than once. There will still be comix to read, which I will post from time to time, and the characters you have come to love will eventually be born anew with color and motion, so it's not really death for the strip. More like puberty!

Hey, I suddenly feel better!

You guys can help me out a lot by going to your comic shops and ordering Deep Fried #2 from this month's Diamond Previews catalog. Let's not forget what got all this started! The new issue comes out in March, and this one is bound to go down in history as the most toxic I've ever done. Order lots!

I still owe you a Touch of Ego, but all this typing has worn me out. I'll post that later in the week. This one has been building up for a while so it's going to be extra rancorous. Warm yourself up with Bush's latest press conference, though. Not only is the man a stealth fighter when it comes to evading questions, but in this appearance he is snippy to the point of genuine prickhood. Worth watching!

I'll do a quick update next week before signing off enjoy the strip and ZOGG.

By the way, lots of dead soldiers today. If I may lift a line from Art Buchwald, say a prayer for our guys over there. Although remember that it was religion that got us into this mess. That and complacency.

1/21/05
Oops! Looks like I'm a big, fat, Atkins-approved liar! My Internet was down for two days due either to the fact that A) the big Nor' Easter knocked out my DSL service or B) my phone cord needed a little jiggling. Pick the conclusion that you think Congress will come to.

Anyway, I'm just gonna blow off last week and give you everything I've got on Wednesday. Sound good? See you then!

1/19/05
Am I late this week? Is my cartoon sitting on my drawing table uninked? Is my blog still floating on my desktop in the form of a rambling, unedited Word document??

Yes, both of these are true! What of it? If the slops ain't ready then you'll just have to hang your jowly heads over the trough and wait a little longer for the bucket to arrive. I'm Farmer Brown, you are the livestock! Don't forget your place, piggies! And put down that copy of Das Kapital!

An obnoxious hunk of paying work is to blame for all this. Come back Saturday. Sunday at the latest.

1/12/05
I'm going to make this a very short blog, in anticipation of next week's protracted political rant that coincides with the inauguration of Dum Dum next week. Tune in for a sizzlingly angry upbraiding of the President and his idealogues, as well as my predictions for 2005.

This week's strip concludes the Snooter saga...for now! And next week's strip will also be the last before I take a month off from this site and its responsibilities. I have made many promises about new content for Whatisdepfried.com, and to do these things I must, ironically, withdraw behind my own 38th parallel and gather my wits. I vow not to make any more promises, or even hints at future reinventions, until I have taken stock of the situation and can begin to follow through on my big, fat exaggerations.

Before taking my lunch break, however, I will make sure to wow you with some laser-guided acrimony and a little hope for the coming Black Years of the second Bush term.

In the meanwhile, take a look at this picture of an awesomely repurposed AT-AT sent to me by my new #1 fan, Benjamin Hayden.

.......

If anyone else would like to pay me props by slapping a new coat of paint on an old toy, send me your pictures and see them enshrined right here. I'd appreciate it if you would, actually, since Ben has been seriously abusing his #1 fan status. He's been sleeping on my couch for the last five days, mooching my Fritos, and just try to get him to run a vaccuum cleaner! Please, someone knock Ben off his perch!

And now the sometimes hilarious responses to last week's caption contest!

1/05/05
How's your ol' lange syne feeling this week? The final holiday of 2004 was a sedate affair for me. A party at my friend's parents' house with my girlfriend, a few peers and a dozen middle-aged strangers. Booze, crackers, Dick Clark's New Year's Strokin' Eve and entertainment courtesy of Dance Dance Revolution and the world's most exfoliated Korean topped the bill. Not a line of coke in sight, however. I'm getting old.

Still, it beats how I spent the Millennium, locked in a root cellar with a twenty-year supply of canned peaches and Aquafina. And don't tell me that we're out of the woods yet. That Y2K bug is up to something, I just know it.

Nevermind all that. Say hello to my little friend!

This is Tony Stark's agonized pal Kevin. I pieced these panels together from an old issue of The Invincible Iron Man because I was so impressed with the man's range! I've read a lot of comics, but I've never seen inner torment captured as gut-wrenchingly as Kevin's performance here. Whether the Mandarin has just leveled Cincinnati with his dark matter ray or Kevin is just out of half & half, Iron Man's best O'friend is always ready to make you feel the laser-hot pain of his thousand daily crises.

In fact, Kevin's Shatnerian prowess has inspired me to create a caption contest this week. The sequence below shows Kevin reading for the role of Shamus Kilblarney, the lead in the new hot-dogging motorcycle thrill ride " Fast3r and Furious3r," which begins shooting in Malaysia next spring. Photoshop in the dialogue for Kevin and the film's producers and e-mail me your efforts. I'll tack them to the bulletin board next week for the entire class to laugh at. For extra realism, pick up some free comic book fonts here.



12/29
Okay, first things first. If you haven't already, dig deep for those people in Asia hit by the tsunami. Here's a list of links to reputable aid agencies.

There seems to be a rumor going around that, in response to this crisis, Americans have been a bit thrifty. We may have given this impression because our government's initial contribution to the relief effort, in relative dollars, was about as generous as tossing two coppers into the take-a-penny tray.

It seems that the President couldn't be troubled to interrupt his latest Crawford retreat to make a public statement about the tragedy, nor has he leapt at the opportunity to generate more than the minimum level of goodwill required of a hyperpower nation from the mostly Islamic victims of this event. Hey, it's not like we need to suck up to the Mooslims, right? Our Iraqi love-in is all the charity a Mohammedan could ever want!

I will say that it took me about fifteen repetitions of that story on the radio before I realized that I personally could shake a few shekels loose from my own pocket for the kids in Indonesia. Apparently our president needed the same lesson, although it doesn't seem likely that he'll be leading a procession of mourners to lay any wreaths at the embassies of the effected countries, as so many nations did for us on September 11th.

Consider: America loses 3,000 of her kin and the whole world sends flowers and casseroles. Asia loses 50,000+ and our chief concern remains soft Christmas sales of "Chicken Dance Elmo."

I'll say this much in our defense: why the hell should we have to pay for all those bowls of U.N. meal paste just because millions of pre-refugees didn't have the brains to emigrate from Sri Lanka?

Think back. How many times have the words "deadly flooding" preceded any news item you've ever seen about Sri Lanka? My guess: every single one. "Deadly flooding drenched the 125th annual Running of the Macaques in Colombo, Sri Lanka today..."; "Deadly flooding in Sri Lanka marred opening day festivities at the Museum of Deadly Floodings..."; and so on. That country spends so much time underwater they have Aquaman on their currency.

Speaking of watery death, I was listening to a bit of the "Savage Nation" radio show this evening. Toxic host Michael Savage was apparently on assignment drowning kittens, but his substitute was actually using precious radio spectrum to posit this question: what kind of God would allow events like the Asian tsunami to occur?

Caller after caller posited God's wrath against Muslims or took odds on the celestial destination of the unbaptized victims or spewed theologically contaminated atheism, all in an effort to prove that they, the GED educated brood of a midnight call-in program, had Einsteined the answer to the Universe's greatest head scratcher.

Can you believe that adults still wrangle with questions like this as if they were answerable, much less intelligent?

The worst part is, the show keeps you on hold forever!

12/22
I am home, tra la tra lay, from a visit to see my cutsey woogums Eva in her new home town of Scranton, PA.

Okay, I actually saw her plenty on the ride there, as it was she who drove up to Rochester to cart my no car-owning ass down to see her new pad, but that is immaterial to this conversation. And also, Eva lives in Dickson City, a borough of Scranton and not the city proper. And also...look, would you just let me tell this story??

Anyway: Scranton! Have you ever been? I shit thee not: If I live to be ten trillion I will never again see an uglier city. This post-industrial hellmouth would make a perfect subject for a maudlin 80s Springsteen dirge or the setting for a Stephen King novel; a tale about a town where tentacles emerge from the sewers and drag below anyone who even thinks the words "fresh coat of paint."

Just take a gander at this typical example of Scranton architecture:




Pugh! Can you believe Frank Lloyd Wright designed this??

There are more examples of this Soviet style habitat in Scranton than exists in Chernobyl's First Ward. Other noteworthy sites in Scranton include the winner of their annual "Up With Christmas" holiday display contest...




The mayor's mansion...



And of course, the theater district.



This one says it all. At night, Scranton's homes are illuminated with thousands of eager Christmas lights which only serve to emphasize the city's native dystopia. By day, the city's lawns are covered in the deflated corpses of their earnest and over compensatory holiday menageries.



It's like Christmas in Jonestown!
...

Today's New York Times includes an intriguing concession to reality, courtesy of William Saffire. In this Op-Ed, Saffire confesses:

I now admit to having expected the war in Iraq to be won in a matter of months, not years. Saddam's plan to disperse his forces and conduct a murderous insurgency, abetted by his terrorist allies, was a surprise.

As you can see just from this opening statement, Saffire's willingness to break ranks with the Right Wing is akin to a pubescent boy admitting to his friends that he fancies girls before a reproachful look has him quickly proclaim them to be sugar coated cootie mongers. Is Saddam conducting the insurgency from his jail cell somehow? I'm sure that Shia firebrand Muqtadr al Sadr and free agent Abu Musab al-Zarqoui would like to know where their checks are.

Al Saffire continues:

In return for today's grudging concession of tactical misjudgment, however, I claim this expectation: When and if we discover hidden supplies of germ weapons in Iraq or Syria, and as future confessions reveal the extent of connections between Al Qaeda and Saddam, the legion of war critics will forthrightly admit their certitude was misplaced.

Again we see the inability of Saffire, much like the President he worships, to divorce himself for even a moment from his movement's own fairy tales. The government's FINAL REPORT on Iraq's weapons concluded that

"Iraq unilaterally destroyed its undeclared chemical weapons stockpile in 1991...(there are) no credible indications that Baghdad resumed production."

and that, according to Saddam:

"The starting of any WMD program, conspicuous or otherwise, risked undoing the progress achieved in eroding sanctions and jeopardizing a political end to the embargo and international monitoring."

Okay? Are we clear now? All on the same page, Bill? No boo boo weapons! None! No germ labs! No Iron Giants! No weather dominators!

But yes, if Buddy Holly someday appears declaring the coming of the Lord while riding the Loch Ness monster down Fifth Avenue, I'm sure all liberals will obligingly admit that Saddam may have snookered us, and that our view of a heliocentric solar system may also be in question.

Saffire nonetheless sees plenty of hopeful signs in the Middle East, despite the Administration's unanticipated effect of hastening the Iranian nuclear program, to say nothing of the fact that not one action meant to quell the insurgency in Iraq, from killing Uday and Qusay to capturing Saddam to neutralizing al Sadr to crushing Fallujah, has delivered their declared goals of mitigating the violence by one particle.

Australians voted to remain our stalwart ally in Iraq. Afghanistan's voters took their lives in their hands to blaze their trail to a democratic government. Americans voted decisively to endorse our hopes rather than our fears in Iraq. Ukrainian voters refused to let a corrupt regime backed by the power of Russia's Putin deny them their democratic rights; they will most likely assert their independence this weekend.

That will mark four straight victories for those we Wilsonian idealists consider the good guys, with two to go next month in Palestine and in Iraq. One election may be sensibly peaceful and the other bloodily courageous, but our Iraqi commitment has strengthened the trend.

It takes a bargeful of hubris to claim Bush's election victory as "decisive" simply because he finally pulled a slim majority vote out of his hat. Most presidents in history have easily accomplished on their first effort what it took Bush four years of struggle to achieve.

As for our "stalwart ally" down under, pumping one's fist over Australia's whopping 920 troops can't help but be seen as a sign of desperation. Claiming the democracy protests in Ukraine and the pending elections in Palestine as by-blows of our war with Iraq, however, can only be chalked up to mushrooms. Saffire seems not to recall that Bush has been an unabashed water carrier for both Putin and Sharon.

Saffire's editorial dribbles on about America paving the way for the freedom of all sentient life on earth. This is indeed the Messianic Democracy of Woodrow Wilson, though Bush outdoes the man in both pigheadedness and his evangelistic view of the White Man's Burden.

Unlike Wilson, however, whose idealism was the leading edge of a practical agenda which embraced internationalism, disdained colonialism and gave rise to the League of Nations, the neo-conservative movement rallies to the standard of unipolarity. Neo-cons disparage allies and the UN at every turn, muddying their pretense of freedom and justice with naked ambition for vital resources and, most importantly, betraying an ineptness at the art of war which is directly circumventing all their proclaimed goals.

William Saffire's next grudging concession may be that Iraq will have to be surrendered to Islamic fundamentalists. Let's hope he doesn't ask us to believe in unicorns while he's doing it.

12/15
I ended my hermitage from the news yesterday, and eagerly raced to CNN.com (they should call themselves FBI.com for all the spyware they dump onto your hard drive) to see which scandals, celebrity marriages and beheadings I had missed over the past fortnight.

I was a bit disappointed at the lack of major stories sizzling in the pan. The only fallout my Geiger counter detected from any bombs that have dropped in the last two weeks was from Rumsfeld calling that guardsman who complained about being underequipped a "fucking cocktard."

Okay, actually I think he just muttered that under his breath. I'm sure, however, that Rumball won't shed any water from his surgically-sealed tear ducts if sooner rather than later a machine is signing his name on a letter of condolence to that man's family.

Apparently Dubya hasn't said anything flabbergastingly stupid while I was in news rehab, though I see that his cabinet continues to fall like dominoes and the attrition rate now matches that of Nixon's second term (as does so much of Bush's tenure.)

The latest addition to Team America is slated to be Bernard Kerik for the coveted ceremonial plum of Homeland Security Meteorologist. Dub called Kerik, a former NYC police commissioner, a "dedicated, innovative reformer who insists on getting results." Sweet Jesus, do we already need a housecleaning at DHS? The department still has its momma's titty milk on its breath! How fucked up could it be?

I have learned what is really behind this shuffle, however. Sources in the know say that Bush is crazy for fuscha, calling it "the new orange," and wants to see it added to the Terror Rainbow. This move was balked at by Tom Ridge, whose appreciation of simple, primary color palettes owes more to Mondrian than Warhol.

Kerik, however, comes to the position with a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and a portfolio which, according to William F. Buckley, "has set bow ties spinning at State and Justice and is a welcome break from Ridge's neo-plasticism."

Moving on! Picture this: You are a triumphant second termer operating on lame duck time and with a pocketful of political capital to spend and no appearances at soldier's funerals in your Palm Pilot. What do you do?

Why, hold a medal ceremony for the guys who count most in any war, of course: the men who fly the desks!

Today George Bush awaded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, to Tommy Franks, Paul Bremmer and George Tenet, each in their own way a contributor to Bush's election victory, even if their actions have tended to prevent victory for our nation.

Tommy Franks comes closest naturally, having directed the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. Losing Osama at Tora Bora is a bit of a frowny face on the ol' report card, of course. And you've never heard Tommy ask Rumsfeld why his soldiers are picking used armor plating out of garbage dumps or bluntly pointing out the sleaziness of "stop loss" either. That's for the landscape architect on his second rotation to do, not the guy with the book deal.

Paul Bremmer should get six medals for all the good work he's done, from pouring gasoline on the insurgency early on by mishandling Muqtada al Sadr to ramming his dong up our soldiers' keesters by disbanding the Iraqi army. I'm surprised he wasn't tapped for Secretary of State!

And of course there's Tenent, the Mr. Magoo of the spy world. Where would we be today if his sixteen magic words hadn't found their way into Dubya's 2003 State of the Union address? My guess: not Iraq.

Heroes all! And if George Bush treating this award—traditionally reserved for the likes of astronauts, Nobel Prize winners, popes and civil rights martyrs—as a kind of gold pocket watch for his ideological crotch sniffers still hasn't caused the scales to drop from the eyes of his faithful...

Well, maybe they'll wake up when they're pouring the foundation for Cheney's pyramid.

12/7
l have been boycotting the news for the last week. I have no idea what is going on in the world. None. It's bliss! And I could sure use some, as my back continues it's de-evolutionary metamorphosis in an attempt to get me on all fours for the good of the species (upside: better belly and genital protection. Downside: constant reminders of my indifference to vacuuming).

So, without up to the minute action ticker coverage of breaking world crises I can only assume that the Red/Blue divide has patched itself up, Iraqi presidential candidates are conducting whistlestop campaign tours unimpeded through the Triangle of Death and George Bush had an allergic reaction to a buckwheat pancake while touring Edmonton's scenic maple syrup regions and is now confined to an oxygen tent at Walter Reed.

News seclusion is actually very therapeutic, coming as we are off of an exhausting four year election season. There really is no news worth discussing anymore. We've already seen Dubya in his prime, so there can't be any noteworthy rabbits left in his hat. Just brown jellybeans. Until the bombs start falling on Tehran I expect things will be dull in Washington for a while. The Fourth Estate seems otherwise preccupied with scrounging up the next razzle dazzle murder spectacular and topless shenanigans on the Apprentice. Call me when there are UFO's over St. Louis, guys.

Here's some real news: the new issue of Deep Fried should be back from the printer any day now and, if the proof is any proof, it's gonna look damn fine. Regular visitors to this site take note: I log all my traffic, and those who do not buy the new, winterfresh edition of Deep Fried can expect many posts made in your names to the public urination fetishists forum on Bladderspritz.com. And hey, see the "Santa Sack" offer above? Thassagooddeal right there! Come on people, don't make me beg. Or hold another Nanathon.

Nanathon! Yes! The second installment of the cartoon IS long overdue, but I have been working on it for several days straight and will have it ready by Christmas, honest Native American.

Oh, and some of you may have noticed that I am a tad late on my promised Deep Fried animated series, which I pledged would start in...ahem. August. Well, the thing about that is...

RunRunRunRunRunDoorslamScreechingtires.

Okay, the truth is that these cartoons just take too fluggin' long to do. BUT, along with my renewed attention to my comic book comes a rejuvenated interest in getting you more of those nutty cartoons you love. I will be working like the dickens to start producing one a month, starting with Nanathon Reloaded, then a smart new Beepo and Roadkill gasser, a new News Beat after that and so on.

So get off my ass.

Anyway, with no headline to bitch about there is really no way to end this update except awkwardly. So I bid...

11/30
I journeyed back to Buffalo last week for my family's traditional feast of yams, stuffing and a roasted Seneca Indian (I hear that some families choose turkey, but we prefer the ways our pilgrim forefathers). It was great seeing aunts, uncles and cousins that I haven't broken bread with in nearly a year and catching up on the Queen City's latest financial boondoggles (the county exec wants to shut down all the libraries—ALL of them—even as the city prepares to shell out $40 million dollars to fund a new sporting goods complex. Buffalo: the city Willy Lowman would have built.)

There was some disappointment in that neither of my brothers came in from out of state, and I had really wanted to see my little nephew, but those are minor gripes. No, what will always set Thanksgiving '04 apart in my memory will be that it was the Thanksgiving I hurt my back fuckrageously bad just by sleeping on my mother's couch.

I do not know why that couch, with whom I have enjoyed an amicable, stain-free relationship for years, should suddenly have turned on me. I greatly suspect that my mom hid the bumper to a Buick Thunderbird under the cushions and forgot to tell me. Regardless, it is now almost a week later and it would be easier for Stephen Hawking to win a dance-off with Michael Flatley than it would be for me touch my toes at this moment.

Lower back pain is truly unique among this Universe's aggravations. You can experience two extremes of agony at once. First, the seizing, railroad tie stiffness of muscles defying their God given duty to flex. This is suddenly replaced by the wrenching warning of complete systems failure that comes when you twist just the wrong way and your vertebrae declare their intentions to topple like a stack of poker chips.

I am developing a stoop over this. An honest to God stoop. While I'm at it I should be fitted for a pair of Kelly green slippers and a robe with pockets big enough for my TV Guide and biscuits for the dog. My recliner suddenly seems like the hip place to be.

Despite having gone to bed depressed over these and other matters the other night, I enjoyed an energized and optimistic day when I awoke. This surprised me, as I usually do not bounce back from my funks so robustly. My concerns over money and business, which had clung to me like burrs to a wool sweater the night before, had been replaced by a jazzed, sunshiney outlook that really had me wondering if there wasn't something special in the coffee beans that morning.

I'm not fooling. As a pessimist I never slough off my depression that completely after just one night's sleep. But there it was, a readiness to take on life that I could only chalk up to a natural high. I was pretty pleased to have dumped, for once, my usual despair for the world and its inconsequential vicissitudes. I wondered if this might not be the beginning of my new life as a morning person.

It wouldn't be until the evening that I remembered the Vicodin I had popped that morning for my crippling back pain.

It was okay. I had more.

11/23
Back in February I pondered how long it would take the Rochester Insider, one of the weekly papers that runs my strip, to Stern me based on the prickliness of local X-tians. The answer: nine months.

Wegmans, a local supermarket chain that carries the paper, apparently received muchos bitching from some customers about this strip because of the use of my ca ca poo poo language in conjunction with the Holy Trinity. This resulted in the paper yanking my strip for good, and only a few scant weeks after I was their cover story, too.

I can't deny it: I will miss the money. The exposure and—dare I say it?—the pride were also perks. I shan't miss the near-weekly jousting with my editor over content, however, and frankly it is a weight off not to have to whittle away at my humor to accommodate the Kim Jong Il sensibilities of that brightly colored birdcage liner.

Bitter? Nah. I always thought it sucked. The Insider is a thickly padded, youth targeted McPaper owned by Gannett and stuffed with listings, cutesy-wootsy pop news and only the thinnest gruel of local interest coverage. I was always surprised that this paper, the official factsheet of Care-a-lot, carried me at all, what with my known stockpiles of F-bombs. In the end it was my dissent enrichment program that brought down the axe.

Fug it. Dust to dust. I bid you all a gravy-licious Turkey Day. Give thanks for family, freedom and foment, the soldiers and not the Prez, and I will see you all next week with a surprise goody!

11/17
So let's see: The President's lawyer is to be the new Attorney General, a Right Wing hatchet man is conducting a Night of the Long Knives at the CIA and the President's brownnosing mistress is on deck to become our nation's top diplomat.

Know what? I'm feeling pretty good about the next four years.

Having sworn off conservative radio like a repentant alky (but oh man, what I wouldn't give for one last sip of Rush) I decided to see what the Alex P. Keatons of the world are scribbling about these days in their columns. So, off I clicked to National Review Online.

Amidst the ads for books the Clintons don't want you to read and Reagan-deifying T-shirts that co-opt Che Guevara, lay a Piccadilly Circus of tiumphalism and flights of political fancy that J.M .Barrie could have authored if he'd had a mind to cast Peter Pan as a surly, bow tied Ned Flanders.

The torrent of glib sanctimony issuing forth from every nauseating column inch could dissolve the smaller of Mars' moons like it was an aspirin. And if it's any reflection on the level of smugness and claw-sharpening taking place on the air these days, I'd expect the AM band to stay at Chernobyl levels of radioactivity for some time to come .

Okay, so Right won't dance with Left. As revelations go that falls a little short of Man's Oneness with God. But Bush's victory has propelled these wordsmiths into a near oxygen-free atmosphere where all ideology falling to the left of feudalism has been utterly refuted. All that remains is to march off a cliff those remaining Dems who have not already sealed themselves in their garages with a running Honda Hybrid.

The conservative cup runneth over with fresh validation for total mandate based on a rather stingy margin of victory. Did you know that eleven percent of blacks voted for Bush nationwide? That's a three percent increase from the last election! According to injection molded National Review editor Rich Lowry, it could only mean that an anti-gay marriage amendment has been given Martin and Malcom's celestial imprimatur!

"For understandable historical reasons, blacks have long kept their social conservatism separate from politics, voting for liberal Democrats. If a significant number of blacks now join their fellow moral traditionalists in Red America in voting for the GOP, they will experience the sort of elite scorn heaped on all other opponents of social liberalism. Blacks will be the new "bigots." Their consolation will be having a seat at the table of the nation's new majority party."

Yes, it is understandable for blacks to feel that historically, they could not stand shoulder to shoulder with their conservative white brothers, especially on polarizing issues such as water fountain access. But if blacks suddenly start packing U-Hauls and making tracks for the interior of Redtopia, well, that will be a lucky day for Alabama I guess. Here's hoping they can have a seat at the majority party's lunch counters too.

I mean, sweet fucking Jesus! A single digit increase in support from a voting bloc the Republicans will scarcely touch with metal tongs and their balls swell like a startled blowfish! Think that gay marriage is the lever that will move African America, Rich? Try prison populations.

And if the above quote wasn't clear enough, the conservatives LOVE the Red/Blue shit! Nearly every article on NRO trumpets Red's victory in the Chromatic Wars and hints at legislation to remove Blue from the visible spectrum. Somewhere in NBC's graphics department there is a little man with thick glasses rubbing his hands together, the entire nation now in his thrall.

Consider these thoughts from contributing NRO editor Mackubin Thomas Owens (no, don't stop to ponder which race of Middle Earth can lay claim to a man named Mackubin) who posits a Blue secessionist movement:

"Blue-staters frequently dismiss those who serve in the U.S. military as ignorant bumpkins who can't make it in civilian life. One of the big lies of the Vietnam era was that the anti-war protestors didn't blame the soldiers who fought the war. I'm here to tell you that that's a crock. And it doesn't look like it's gotten any better over the years."

Too true. So often nowadays I'll catch a glimpse of one of our returned heroes skulking like John Merrick through the aisles of a Wal-Mart, hiding his proud, rugged features behind a potato sack lest he catch a face full of phlegm from a mob of Phish heads. Macgoober continues:

"So when a red-state soldier or Marine is putting down the blue-state rebellion, what is he going to think of this exchange from the aforementioned Bill Maher website? "You do realize that over 80 percent of our troops support Bush, don't you?" "Yes darling — I do.... That's only fair isn't it? Why should decent people die in your bogus war you murdering hun. I hope the whole lot of them are decapitated...but getting their butts blown off will suffice."

What will he think? He won't think shit about it, because he'll still be in Iraq trying to put down their rebellion and wondering why he has only about half as many comrades as he needs to get it done.

And anyway, using a doltish post on an Internet forum to indict all Blues is like me using Macnugget's histrionics to condemn all the halflings of the Shire.

Then there's this, from mad as h-e-double hockey sticks Stephen Moore, who hopes for a peaceful mass exodus to Canada:

"It looks like the Left is finally going to leave us all alone. If everything goes according to plan, blue-state Democrats are going to let us keep our guns and our money and our kids and our faith — and all the other things that government keeps trying to wrest from us...When you get a fanny-whupping like the Left got on Election Day — when every one of your core values (tax hikes on the rich, abortion on demand, government-run health care, reparation payments for slavery, one-world government, polygamy) has been rejected by your bigoted and narrow-minded fellow citizens — it's cowardly to stick around.

Now, I don't recall slave reparations cropping up as an issue at all during the campaign (though it may have. I've been tuning out Al Sharpton since Tawana Brawley), but it's clear that Stephen's attitude is going to be an impediment to getting them niggers on board the Republican choo-choo. And polygamy? One world government? What the hell is this murdering Hun talking about?

Not all NRO contributors see the cultural divide as a Crayola conflict, however. Steven Vincent has a refreshingly novel view: someone has to shut down those smock-wearing, truffle-eating, artistic elites who condemn the mainstream from their ivory lofts!

Vincent finds the New York art scene crammed with myopic, predictable, jejune (God, who doesn't love a chance to work that word into a critique?) hacks whose political reflections are barely more than Simpsonesque caricatures of what Capital City's SoHo district would produce.

"Just east of Times Square is a smallish, but well-respected, museum called the International Center for Photography. Running until the end of November is an exhibition of 17 of the now-infamous images of abuse and humiliation at Abu Ghraib prison. According to ICP literature, this display of downloaded photos highlights how new forms of photography 'contradict the studied heroics of 20th century war photography' and demonstrate how war is 'systematic cruelty enforced at the level of everyday torture." A worthy theme. Except that the show — which bears the accusing title 'Inconvenient Evidence' — omits any reference to Nicholas Berg, Paul Johnson, or the other captives whom terrorists beheaded in front of video cameras recording the deeds."

A just criticism, until one considers how conservative patriots react to any suggestion that our soldiers have anything in common with our enemy. Regardless, artists do not owe their audience both points of view. They owe the world a perspective they don't expect and are rarely encouraged to pursue or believe. You don't go to a gallery to see a civics lesson meant to soothe fans of The Simple Life.

"Few of us, I wager, care what Colin Powell or Alan Greenspan thinks about contemporary art — why should we care what artists think about Iraq or the economy? I'll gladly pay attention to someone with the genius of Goya — whose "Disasters of War" prints are the gold standard for anti-war imagery — but to the majority of today's artists, I'd say (to paraphrase Laura Ingraham), Shut up and paint."

Well, at least he tips his wig to Goya, the "gold standard." And who ever needs more than one man in three generations to remind us of war's yuckiness? No offense to the maestro, but Goya's prints don't seem to be holding the hounds of hell at bay.

Anyway, giving a thumbs-up to an established genius is a good way to pussy out of your own parochialism, If Vince had critiqued a Goya installation in its own day he would have deep-sixed it for not including a fair and balanced canvas depicting why Saturn's children deserved to be eaten.

Vince is right about the art scene, of course. Plenty of crap out there. There was a fair share on display at a gallery show of political artwork I went to on election night. Paraffin coated dictionaries stuck on spikes or transformed to resemble giant cartwheel pasta stuck to a wall. Interesting, and I didn't get it. There was also a room featuring the talents of local illustrators, some of whom were gifted, some of whom had the political chops of a special needs child.

But one exhibit stood out; a room of television sets, each showing a different low budget documentary on silly topics the Left likes to get worked up about. Things like media bias towards the military, the murder of Oscar Romero,..and something a little surprising. Something I am not usually encouraged to believe happens.

Hidden camera footage of Israeli soldiers, breaking the arms of handcuffed Palestinians by hammering them with rocks.

Well, it was just a documentary, done by some Blue stater most likely. And anyway, it didn't show any Palestinians causing trouble first.

Then it would have been art.

11/16

Gromble gremble. I was all set to bang out a bang-up blog Tuesday evening when matters of national taste demanded I produce another comic strip to satisfy one of my countless clients. So, enjoy two strips this week (eyes right), and I will get to the blog a bit later.

And now if you will excuse me; cause and effect...I drahnk too much whan, I moost take ay peez.


11/11
Ever have the feeling that they are just making up the news as they go along? This morning I awoke to NPR declaring that viles of vile Sarin gas had been discovered in Fallujah, but no other news organization has picked up on it. Has anyone else heard anything about this? E-mail me if you have. The story seems to have vaporized.

11/10
Bush won.

Yes, Bush.

No, really! Last week!

No, I am not kidding! Yes, even with the PATRIOT Act and Halliburton.

Yes, even with the insurgency too.

YES, even with Abu Ghraib! Jesus, will you get over it already?!

Am I bummed by the election results? Not immensely. First, I have the advantage of having poured everything I had into getting Bush out. I've still got post-election petite morte.

Also, to be honest, I had a hunch it was going to be Bush in the end. When a race is as close as this one was even in the closing days, with the President managing to eke out a lead despite having an unfathomable record of flops to run on, and with his opponent chewing on every bit of bad news from Iraq with his mouth open instead of proving he's got the chops to do the job right...

Well, let's face it: the candidates both sucked, and better the devil you know.

Kerry was hopelessly hamstrung by the fact that he could not articulate a better strategy for Iraq than Dubya's. After all, Bush was the yodeling cowboy who had taken down the desperado who was America's number one Black Hat for twelve years. Kerry held the dubious honor of trying to explain why this was a bad thing.

The Swift Boat attacks denouncing Kerry's testimony against Vietnam atrocities prevented incidents like Abu Ghraib and the murder of captives in Afghanistan from being addressed as demonstrable failures of leadership by Bush. You could just hear Dubya's retort the moment Kerry dared broach the subject. "What kind of Comman'r 'n Chief denounces our troops over a harmless game of naked human Jenga? Atrocity? Sounds more like an EX-AJ-ER-AY-SHUN to me!"

Bottom line, Kerry is a dove, and America would rather be fighting and losing than not fighting at all. Why we're fighting is too complex an issue for most people. You can't argue with a hard-on.

Anyway, President Humungus is more fun to draw than John Gumby. And now the fun really begins, because now we get to see where Bush's sensibilities lie when he no longer has to worry about pleasing his base.

There may yet be hope. I can't fault shitcanning Ashcroft or Rummy. Of course, if Wolfowitz becomes the next Secretary of Preemption I'd recommend investing heavily in the yellow ribbon sector.

My prediction for the coming term: we will finally learn if Bush knows a tactical boo-boo when he's made one, or if he has a legitimate Napoleon complex. All will depend on whether or not he begins floating the idea of a pullout from Iraq not long after the "elections."

Common sense says this is the best way to secure his legacy. Saddam is out, great. No WMD's? Shoulder shrug. But a protracted insurgency? Too much drama. Security and democracy always sells when our leaders want to take us to war, but it's easy to see that this country has no stomach for bringing it about. Pulling out and letting Iraq disintegrate would be just our style, so expect Operation Who Needs This Shit to commence within two years.

This should actually please liberals since it will prevent the more ambitious schemes of the Bush/Cheney/Trilateral Commission conspiracy from being enacted, vis-á-vis draining Iraq's oil like a skeeter. Self-determination for Iraq! That's what we want, right? And ten or fifteen years of civil war is just the fresh start they need after 3000 years of Saddam-Ra the Ever Living.

If Bush follows this course then the onus will be on the Left to pick up the standard of peace and freedom that both we and the Middle East have been sodomized with and somehow force our country to make good on our debt to Iraq. But the Democrats' ideological midsection is even flabbier than the Right's, and it will take a mighty force of will to convince the country that more time and money, not less, is owed the region after we abandon ship.

If Bush insists on staying the course however, look out. Any further attempts to Disnefy Babylon and turn it into a beachhead for Up With People would be as blood-soaked as they would be futile. De-Baathification may yet turn out to be a bigger calamity than knocking off Saddam and promoting some underling in his place. Pulling up stakes and letting Iraq chart her own course—which will either result in a new, terror-friendly Afghanistan in the region or a Shiite-dominated friend for Iran—does not bode well for our interests. But let's face it, those motherfuckers really, REALLY don't want us there. We've learned that much at least, haven't we? Surely a President who fought in America's last ideologically-based conflict will know when to...

Waitamint...Bush?

...

Enough politics. Look who's famous!



That's yours truly on the cover of the Rochester INSIDER, one of the many fine newspapers that runs me. "Local artists in 'toon with us." So clever.

This issue (now two weeks old, curse my tardiness) featured a story on myself and another cartoonist the paper runs, Nicholas Gurewitch. A terrible, terrible, not as good as me cartoonist. Go see his terrible cartoon, the Perry Bible Fellowship, so you can see that I am not exaggerating or bitter.

11/7

If you have come here at any time in the last couple days you have gotten quite a treat! I accidentally uploaded my homepage with a string of incoherent notes towards next week's blog. The fact that I've had no one e-mail me to ask "what the hell?" makes me wonder if I should even bother with diction or punctuation anymore.

Ah, you pro'ly thought I was just paying homage to the winnah of the national election, or as I call it, "the number one reason to hate Ohio after Drew Carrey."

Five days into Episode III of of the Bush trilogy (HW's term being the original). Sigh. I try to be philosophical and say that the schmucks who reelected Il Douche will get what they deserve, but unfortunately we will all get what they deserve.

Anyway, come back Wednesday for a proper post-game wrap-up of The Day All The World's Puppies Cried As One.

11/2

At last.The day.

And with it comes my last bead of political sweat. Enjoy, and remember to vote often!

10/30
Swing voter alert! Before you battlegrounders depart for your polling place cavity searches, don't forget to read Deep Fried's official endorsement for President!

10/29
Once again my HDCB (high definition crystal ball) has brought me a sharp, 1200 dpi view of the future. Contrast this week's strip to this story, hot off the presses.

By the way, look at the photo that accompanies the article. Eat any canaries lately, Mr. O'Reilly?

10/27

His Humungusness may be starting to show a little sweat on the ol' upper lip.

While barreling through Wisconsin yesterday the President offered an olive branch to the party whose members he can no longer even shake hands with lest it result in an antimatter explosion. Said he:

"Many Democrats in this country do not recognize their party anymore. And today I want to speak to every one of them. If you believe America should lead with strength, and purpose, and confidence and resolve , I'd be honored to have your support and I'm asking for your vote."

Jesus! Has this guy been sipping Zell Miller's bong water? Of course Democrats recognize their party! (it's the one with the horsy mascot, right?) But I'm sure they would all like to thank the President for underscoring, for perhaps the eightieth time this month, how dangerously out of touch with reality he is.

Because really: after personally excavating a political chasm in this country that could file for National Park status, a continental divide which has Civil War reenactors discreetly chambering live rounds into their muskets, George Bush, architect of the four blackest years in presidential history, actually wants to float the theory that it is the Democrats who have lost the Buddha dharma?

Not since Caligula has there been such an epic level of executive disconnect.

...

Bush's Wisconsin plea (in the movies it would have been delivered by Michael Douglas as a Hans Zimmer score started to swell) was the latest example of a—pattern— that has emerged in the President's stump speeches. "Strength", "confidence", "resolve"...hmm. Either the man is trying to highlight his infallible moral compass or he's reading for an antiperspirant ad.

Yes, steadfast determination is an admirable quality in a leader. For instance, I think we would all agree that a determination to keep weapons of mass destruction out of the hands of terrorists is a noble pursuit and might even be worthy of basing a reelection campaign on. But surely a man with that mission as his lodestar would never take his eyes off the prize and let a jihadist insurgency make off with hundreds of tons of atom-smashing explosives!!!!

But wait: false alarm? According to the White House, maybe the boom powder was missing when we got there! They're not sure though! THEY'RE NOT SURE!

Maybe it was moved by Saddam, or maybe it was being looted while our boys were about the all important task of tearing down statues for the benefit of the paparazzi. Who can tell?? The government's source is—no, not on the ground intelligence, not satellite photography or even a celebrity exile that Wolfowitz split a Cobb salad with at the Vineyard last week. Their source that MAYBE the explosives got up and walked away by themselves is the skilled weapons detecting eye of...an embedded NBC reporter!

WHO SAYS THEY'RE WRONG!!

How does Bush do it? How does he manage to turn victory into defeat and defeat into dog shit again and again and again??

More to the point, can he do it one more time on November 2nd?

10/20
So here's an unexpected blackhead on the President's campaign. Pat Robertson has now said that he warned Dubya in advance of the Iraq war that he had severe misgivings about the coming conflict. He said that George should prepare the country for heavy casualties, to which George allegedly replied, "Oh no, we're not going to have any casualties."

Despite this obvious misunderestimation of how war usually operates (one for Jesus, one for Allah; two for Jesus, one, two for Allah...) Robertson nevertheless believes that where the Prez is concerned, "I just think God's blessing is on him."

Though I suspect all Evangelicals secretly toke up on dried butterfly wings at their prayer breakfasts, I doubt that Pat Robertson could be so high that he didn't realize that claiming the President did not expect any casualties in Iraq could hurt Bush in these waning days of the campaign. For Robertson to go public with that now is akin to Abraham Lincoln's stovepipe hat hissing "Psst! Over here!" to John Wilkes Booth.

So whatsamatter, Pat? Apocalypse not going your way?

10/15
Okay, okay, so I'm two days late because I couldn't afford to be a dollar short. Sue me! I promise to make up for being tardy with extra bitterness.

But first, a moment of silence.



Man, if someone could just spin the world backwards now.

...

It was with a jaded heart that I tuned into the last round of KVB ("Whoever wins, we lose"). I was not expecting anything more than the unrealized promise that the previous debates had prepared me for. At this point the tactics of both sides are well known: charge at the viewers like Street Fighter's M. Bison, barrage the voters with bullet point after bullet point while they squat and block, helpless as Chun Li, hoping to hold out until that red light on the podium starts blinking. Bush and Kerry are so polished at this rhetorical pummeling that during the last debate I found my thumbs involuntarily manipulating an invisible control pad in a frenzied attempt to break their combos.

What I was not prepared for was the abject mockery both candidates made of the entire process in the final debate by coming out on stage...wearing matching outfits.

Yessir, It's official! Coke and Pepsi, Kang and Kodos... choose your pop metaphor! The Visitors have peeled away their faces cuz dammit, it just doesn't matter anymore!

This is what happens when two parties cohabitate for a long period of time. Their menstrual cycles synchronize and their ties start to match.

Oh Nader, this would so have been your year to shine if you hadn't spent the intervening years between now and the last election doing ...what? Painting island women in Fiji? Developing a line of pasta sauces? What??

Those years sure weren't spent putting together a credible bid for the White House.

There were no knock out punches in the final debate (it's hard to knock someone out when even directly addressing your opponent will get you sent to your corner.) Nor were there any notable zings, those great substitutes for actual interaction that we have come to crave in these bouts of intellectual poverty. Bush, however, seemed mighty pleased with himself when he thought he had scored one. Upon being quoted by Kerry as not being concerned about Osama bin Laden's whereabouts, Bush replied:

"Gosh, I just don't think I ever said I'm not worried about Osama bin Laden. It's kind of one of those exaggerations." (emphasis his).

Bush snertled and leaned forward like a Borscht Belt comic delivering a timed dud and waiting for his rim shot. You just know he prepared that one the night before and drove Laura crazy coming up with it.

W: "How 'bout this one hon: 'John, you're like a Big Mouth Billy Bass, cuz your facts sure sound fishy!'"
Laura: "George, you're not allowed to talk directly to him."
W:" And then while they're all laughing I could start singing "Don't Worry, Be Happy,' 'like the fish duz!"
Laura:" That's funny, George."
W: "But is it 'There you go again' funny?"
Laura: "Sweetie, it's three in the effin' morning."
W:" Well I'm gonna go practice the song. Where'd you put my Big Mouth Billy Bass?"
Laura:" It's hanging in the Green Room, dear."

One: Where the hell does George hail from? Mayberry? What kind of president says "gosh?"

Two: George was lying through his teeth. In a March 13th press conference, when asked about Osama's whereabouts Sheriff Andy responded:

"Well, as I say, we haven't heard much from him. And I wouldn't necessarily say he's at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don't know where he is. I -- I'll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him."

Deceit from the President?? Someone ought to look into this!

By the way, read that transcript and see how many times the word "concerned" came up. Apparently Osama is the only thing about the Middle East that doesn't concern George Bush.

The debate also featured a prominent low note for Kerry (besides him setting the stage for a return to the image of Democrats as out of control spenders). On a question about gay marriage, Kerry took the opportunity, as John Edwards did in his VP debate, to draw attention to the homosexual leanings of Dick Cheney's son, Mary Cheney.



I think for Kerry/Edwards to keep dragging Dick's kid into this campaign is uncalled for. Yes, it shines the light of hypocrisy on the Right wing, but it is a petty and obvious bit of knife twisting, and it makes me think of the ticket as a pair of snickering assholes.

On the other hand, the fact that Cheney skipped Vietnam to breed his Indigo girl while Kerry was putting his money where Dick's Cold Warrior mouth would later be does make me smile inside.

...

From time to time I like to pick on Republican columnist Jim Lileks. For one, he is the only humorous conservative to ever be successfully decanted in the GOP's sixty year effort to clone one. Also, because he bravely dares to stake out reasonable positions in a political party that has been hijacked by the Bible and banjo set.

Despite this, his logic often bears the flaws now endemic to his species, and it falls to me to point out how even the moderate patriots have been subliminally programmed to kill us all.

In Jim's heated October 11 column he points out how the left-leaning public's take on our former War on Terror (now fully and completely the War in Iraq) and their comparisons of Bush to Hitler doth rankle him. I will deconstruct a few of his choicer comments, just for the sake of karmic balance.

Jim states:

Ah, but don't we have the Big Lie? The WMD debacle? This is one of those things that makes me just turn off the radio or TV or hit the back button or whatever it takes to decamp. Let me run them down.

Alienated our allies. I tune right out. I have no interest in anything that follows. The speaker either doesn't know what France was up to, or knows but thinks I don't. Which makes them ignorant or a manipulating dissembler. Please, don't give me the "We Are All Americans" headline. What that meant, I suspect, is that we are all guilty, and the sooner we realize it the sooner we can develop the requisite calluses on our knees that will make our obsequious posture more comfortable.

Anti-Francism, regrettably, does not make me tune out, although it is so prevalent among neo-cons that it really ought. Whenever I am asked to demonize France for its coveting of cheap Husseini crude but not Russia and that corpse-faced Vladimir Putin, Eurasia's Eddie Haskell, for wanting exactly the same thing, I must wonder: did France decide to break with us over the war because they are genuinely a nation of snotty ingrates, or is it because they learned a lesson in Vietnam that we still refuse to?

Lied about WMD. This also takes the form of "misled." Again, I tune right out, because the speaker assumes I haven't been paying attention, that I wasn't around in the 90s, haven't read any histories, and regarded Iraq as this amusingly benign country run by a comical rogue of diminished significance.

Oh, do. Do tune that one out. By all means, when the most clear and irrefutable argument ever to justify a special prosecutor rears its ugly head and demands an accounting of how one man--armed with Christ's prescient eye and the best evidence ever forged--could declare a tottering, toothless yet surprisingly petroleum abundant nation to be the new Wehrmacht and lead America into exactly the sort of blood-soaked imbroglio we wisely skirted in Afghanistan, please TUNE THAT FUCKING IDEA OUT.

(Incidentally, assuming that voices on the radio are speaking directly to you is more an indictment of one's lucidity than their intelligence.)

Next, we have Nuisancegate. Now, even I knew that when John Kerry called for a more "sensitive" War on Terror that he was going to be put through the meat grinder for it. A potential president cannot afford to use anything but the manliest words in these chest-beating times. And now John Kerry has put his foot in it again. In a New York Times interview, Kerry stated that he would like for terrorism to eventually be reduced to the level of mere "nuisance", implying to the weak-livered dunces of the world that terrorism itself is not a movement, but a tactic, and that only the number of people practicing it can actually be reduced.

But Republicans, whose colors never run, realized that line for what it was: a declaration of surrender authored by Michael Moore and delivered to him through Ouija board by none other than Judas Iscariot himself!!

Jim Lileks' red rage on the matter is the anger of all patriots throughout time:

A nuisance? I don't want the definition of success of terrorism to be "it isn't on the rise." I want the definition of success to be "free democratic states in the Middle East and the cessation of support of those governments and fascist states we haven't gotten around to kicking in the ass yet."

And I'd like horses to shit cut sapphires. You do realize that in the end we'll suck almost any dick that has a vital resource coming out of it, don't you? While you are daydreaming, wish to wake up in a nation that doesn't offer tacit approval for coups against elected governments in Venezuela, too.

I want the definition of success to mean a free Lebanon and free Iran and a Saudi Arabia that realizes there's no point in funding the fundies. An Egypt that stops pouring out the Jew-hatred as a form of political novocaine to keep the citizens from turning their ire on their own government.

Hmm. Distract the nation from problems at home with an enemy abroad? Interesting tact.

By the way, Notice that an Israel no longer inching towards apartheid isn't a priority in Jim's vision of Middle Eastern pluralism.

I want the definition of success to mean that Europe takes a stand against the Islamicist radicals in their midst before the Wahabbi poison is the only acceptable strain on the continent. Mosquito bites are a nuisance. Cable outages are a nuisance. Someone shooting up a school in Montana or California or Maine on behalf of the brave martyrs of Fallujah isn't a nuisance. It's war.

Way to predict the future, Jim! The man was definitely in the camp that predicted America's occupation in Iraq would lead to flower garlands and waves of Iraqi babies named "George", but now he's shaken off his freedom goggles and a correct picture of what we've gotten ourselves into is beginning to emerge.

Yes, we're inspiring them Jim! Iraq was a swamp full of mosquitoes until we rowed in, sure that our love of freedom and sugar would be DEET enough to keep the little bloodsuckers off us. But now they've grown into a horde of for-gosh-sakes Draculas! And yes, eventually some of them are going to fly the crypt and kill some of us back home in the name of the fallen sons of Fallujah, and Najaf, and Baghdad, and Basra, and Kirkuk, and dozens of other Iraqi hamlets. Cuz guess what Jim? Someone forgot to tell the President: just because they hate Saddam doesn't mean they don't hate us too!

What do you think the political spin will be on the day the first liberated Iraqi terrorist hits our shores with a backpack bomb and stars in his eyes?

It will never occur to the Big Stick Republicans that they've been had. It makes no sense to them not to see Iraq as a natural extension of 9/11.

They can't see what has happened. You will never be able to show them the truth, that given our minimal military commitment in Afghanistan, the lack of any other nation hosting Al Qaeda training camps and the general discombobulation of that network, combined with an absolute absence of discussion about the need or value of any further armed incursions onto foreign soil to route Al Qaeda (outside of international law enforcement and the occasional Predator drone assassination), and finally the President's own admission that Osama bin Ladin is not a priority target, that this makes Iraq a distraction from a simple reality:

The War on Terror is over.

10/13
I am going to skip the blog update today and go right to my post debate coverage tomorrow. Tune in then!

10/6
Like Highlander 2: The Quickening, yesterday's Veep debate had the perverse effect of making me root for the wrong guy.

Don't get me wrong, I didn't root for anyone in that movie. I think all persons associated with the production of Highlander 2 should spend fifteen minutes buried alive in a landfill with Carol Channing for the crime of having participated in it (wait...is Carol Channing herself alive?)

However, in any pairing up of Sean Connery and Christopher Lambert, one instinctively wants Sean to be given as much face time as possible so he may make love to your eardrums with that Scottish burr of his (please baby baby, say "buckeroo" one more time!) just as one also hopes that someone will travel back in time and kill Christopher Lambert's father before he meets his mother so he won't even be in the fucking film.

Not so Highlander 2. Lambert's performance is the only forgivable sin in that 90 minute colonoscopy. The man has a direct to video soul and one can't fault him for accepting any role, even one that forever blemishes his only worthwhile acting feat--starring in the original Highlander--like a face full of acne scars.

But Connery? His appearance in the film is like your father turning up drunk on your wedding day after a Hallmark worthy catharsis at Mom's grave only the night before. It's as if he wants you to hate him for it, and minus an explanation involving a sick child and the Make A Wish foundation, I always will.

Likewise, as I watched the debate, I found myself oddly more sympathetic to Legion of Doom founding member Dick Cheney-who came across as fatherly and on the ball with his snarly lip sedated-than to John Edwards, who seemed slick and over-rehearsed.

This despite the fact that neither of them drifted more than an inch from the boilerplate we've had shoveled down our throats all summer like that guy in Super Size Me. Nexus of terror, the transforming power of freedom, no foreign veto over our next global police action, blahhhhhhhhhhhh. All made possible by friction free, off the shelf Wiffle balls served up by moderator Gwen Ifill.

As with Highlander 2, I blame the man I should despise least for the triteness of the exchange. John Edwards came packing his best hot lead, and he put a cap in Cheney's ass right out of the gate. "Mister Vice President," he said making actual eye contact, "you are still not being straight with the American people."

But before he could define why this was, he was facing the camera again, speaking earnestly to you and I with his thumb about the need for greater global straightness.

Were this an actual debate instead of an exercise in sloganeering, Edwards would have illustrated the canard that the Iraq/WMD threat always was. He would have said bluntly that the explicit mission of this Administration had always been a war in the Middle East, pointed to Cheney's role in the Project for a New American Century and their statement of principles that all but precluded peace in our times. He would have said plainly that deceiving the public into a war based on outright bogus intelligence, first rate exaggeration and the kind of starry-eyed optimism about Third World conflict that could only come from a guy who had never served in one should at the very least be grounds for the President's impeachment. He might have pointed out that a Kerry/Edwards administration would never invent a plastic concept like the War on Terror that could enfold as many new enemies as the President saw fit while excluding existing ones like Osama bin Ladin. He might even have drawn attention to the comedy of the terror alert system and stated bluntly that it would be the first thing to be jettisoned by a Democratic White House, replaced instead by frequent updates on the real status of US law enforcement actions against al Qaeda and a genuine assessment of how robust that network is.

None of these issues or ideas were raised of course. When Cheney spoke of free elections in Iraq in January, Edwards did not quiz him on the names of the candidates or which pony the CIA was backing. Nor, when Edwards sidestepped the question of whether or not a President Kerry would have left Saddam untouched, did Cheney ask what they would have done about the crumbling sanctions regime and a corrupt oil for food program.

This is, of course, the reason why the candidates prefer this style of "dueling press conference" debates. No one has their intellect challenged by their peer, and the moderator can only afford to bring up the most well recognized topics or lose the audience.

Can you imagine Edwards and Cheney or Dubya and Kerry discussing between themselves anything as nuanced as, I don't know...interest rates? The impact of the war on OPEC production levels? The relative merits of the airline bailout?

Religion?

Maybe those questions are what the candidates are writing on those legal pads that have been in such prominent use during these debates.

Oh man, thinks Cheney, thrice underlining the words " light rail cost overruns," What I wouldn't give to shoot this one between Smiley's eyes. Whoops, camera's back on me. Better turn down my lip.

9/30
Thirty-three at last. Yep, it's my birthday. One year older, one year closer to that rendezvous with the Grim Reaper, the occurrence of which is the central preoccupation of the entire human race. Hey, as long as he looks like TV Reaper Mandy Patinkin (and God looks like George Burns and Heaven looks like Lot B at Universal Studios) I'll shuffle off this mortal coil content, albeit with some screaming and pulling out of IV tubes.

In-between the long gulfs of non-existence which bookend our lives, however, we humans do get up to some cool things. I once again draw your attention to Space Ship One, the first commercially owned manned spacecraft to ever achieve space flight. Take a look at this thing:


Is that slick or what?? My first impression is that it could easily be a publicity still from Episode III: Revenge of the Revolted Faithful, but my roomie Kevin claims it evokes the sci-fi forerunner of all that has come since: Buck Rogers. And indeed, the .45 caliber fuselage combined with the Hasbro design team wings does put one in mind of one of Buck's deco-licious cruisers from the vintage era serials, though not the F-14-inspired war Pontiacs of the 80s TV program.

Anyway, it's nice to know that there is now another potential escape route off this planet if Bush wins in November.

...

Recently my primary source for conservative vitriol, WROC 950 AM in Rochester, altered it's content in a near Orwellian midstream reversal of format (And yes, I realize that when I invoke prophet-of-the-age George Orwell I reveal the abject poverty of my literary vocabulary. Hey, it's not my fault that Aldous Huxley's Brave New World didn't emerge as the more traumatizing canary in the political coal mine.)

So, after years of serving as a spitvalve for the Right wing saliva propelled by Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly Mike Gallagher and other of those human bamboo splints I willingly jab under my fingernails daily, WROC has suddenly reinvented itself as a "sharp Left turn on the dial." Their airwaves now belong to Al Franken, Randi Rhodes and a slate of other Air Americans, as well as a blustery Dem named Ed Shultz who apes the present day Rush Limbaugh with his stylistic brand of cherubic rancor, and mid-90's Rush through his robust girth.

It is certainly a welcome switch to have a station devoted to the polar opposite of the usual talk format, although it doesn't take long to realize that the level of discourse is only marginally improved when their are liberals behind the mic. You still get hot air in amounts equal to Godzilla's lung capacity, and the sanctimonious rhetoric proffered by Laura Ingraham sounds only vaguely less snotty coming out of Randi Rhodes gob. Only the lexicon has changed. Replace "chickenhawk," with "flip-flopper" and much of Air America could pass verbatim for EIB.

Franken is a standout, being both pointedly funny, smart and sage. No question as to why Al's Lex Luthor, Bill O'Reilly, can't stand him. Bill's porcelane pride, his constructed identity as the hard-hitting cultural watchdog for Whites-With-Black-Friends, is too brittle to endure the popularity of the schmucky Franken. Scratch Bill once and his fingers are forever drifting towards the scab.

This radio reinvention has, for the moment, resurrected my interest in the medium, but it's waning fast. After the election I do not think I will be able to stomach this diet of hostility any longer. If Bush wins it will be futile to shake my fist at those rabid dogs of Westwood One, and if Kerry wins I will have no desire to sit through a four year radio campaign by liberals to get him re-elected, especially since it will have to involve Republican style tactics of painting a happy face on this shitty war. We might get fooled again, but I sure as hell don't have to tip my hat.

...


Ready for tonight's bowl game? Before you break out your face paint and big foam fingers, don't forget that this evening's debate will serve to put a fine point on John Kerry's campaign to be the most indistinguishable opposition candidate ever in a time of American crisis. Read this top ten list and write me to explain to me why I should vote for a guy who would even participate in this farce.

Here's hoping for a wardrobe malfunction.

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