Not even the Funny Pages are sacred anymore...

I don't know about you, but I love to read the funnies in the daily newspaper.  Between the economy, politics and the stresses of everyday life, it can be good to unwind with a little humor.  The packaging is great too- three or four frames, a pun or two and a 10 second investment of time.  A good comic strip can uplift your whole day.  

That is, until the line is blurred between escapism and politics.  Granted, you can argue that comics have been used as political tools since Methuselah was an kid, but political cartoons are generally (as they should be) confined to pages dedicated to editorials and politics.  Now that it is en vogue for celebrities to spout their idiotic political views, ie. Sean Penn (Jeff Spicoli from “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”), I guess comic strip geniuses feel like they have artistic license to do the same.

Just check out these three comics strips from today’s Charlotte Observer.  That's right, 3 pro-Obama cartoons in the same newspaper on the same day.  Can you guess how many comics were pro-McCain?  That's right, kids.  Zero.  Nada. Zilch.  As you know, I'm no McCain cheerleader, but the lack of equal coverage is blatant.  And it's the DEMOCRATS who want "the Fairness Doctrine" passed!  For those of you who don't know what the Fairness Doctrine is, it is basically a left wing idea designed to bring down conservative talk radio and other such media outlets under the guise of equalizing time for political speech.  Bottom line, if Liberal talk radio had a market, it wouldn't be teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.  Google "Air America Radio" for more details...

Back to the topic at hand...

Let’s take a look at “Get Fuzzy” first.  This is one of my fav strips.  The interchange between the guy (Rob) and the cat (Bucky Katt) is usually hilarious.  Note the shirt on Rob this morning.  He’s been wearing an Obama T-shirt all week.  Many of the recent strips have been about lambasting Bucky’s “uber-conservative nut-job ideals”.  Feel free to look it up.  I have to admit that they’re funny.

Next, let’s examine “Jump Start”.  This is not a comic that I read very often.  Happened to check it out today and lookie what I found.  I’ll have to monitor this one a little more closely to see if all the strips are as worshipful to the Obamessiah as this one.

 

Last is “Doonesbury”.  Admittedly, Doonesbury has always been a leftist political cartoon.  The past two day’s strips have featured a Barbie-like Sarah Palin doll, complete with a push-button nose that squeaks out supposed GOP talking points.  A little trivia for you here- the artist of the Doonesbury comic strip is Garry Trudeau.  His wife?  Television journalist Jane Pauley, formerly of NBC’s “Today” show and “Dateline NBC”.  So much for preserving journalistic integrity, huh?

Again, I have no problem with satirical political cartoons.  They are as much a part of the fabric of Americana as apple pie.  I just wish that they’d stick to the editorial pages, regardless of political affiliation.

Deviation from the norm...

All three of you who read my blog know that it has morphed into a protracted political diatribe.  I'm going to take a little break from that tonight.  First of all, you will notice from the time stamp on this post that it is about 2:30 in the morning.  I've got this weird ear infection/vertigo thing that is extremely painful and gives me the bedspins (See end of post for a definition of "the bedspins").  So, for the past three or four nights, I have been unable to sleep.  What have I been doing with this blessed nocturnal time you ask?  I have discovered Facebook.  I initially went to the site just to poke around and see what it was all about, having heard many of my blogger friends mention their "Facebook Pages" with an air of cyber-superiority.  What a wonderful resource it has turned out to be!  I feel like a kid in a candy store.  I have been able to track down long lost high school and mission friends that I thought I'd never hear from again.  It's fun to see all the receding hairlines and paunches that have developed, as well as the beautiful faces of little ones that have come to people that I befriended years ago.  

It is interesting to me to see how the lives of the people I knew in high school have evolved.  You can find Facebook groups that pertain to your school for a specific class- in most cases, my former high school classmates are doing well.  Some have gone on to do tremendous things (surprisingly so for some- I knew these people when they were teenagers).  

I have also reconnected with some old missionary companions, and this has been especially precious to me.  I find it amazing that while my missionary experience was only a short two year period, I am connected to them in a way that is indescribable.  There are bonds created through service that can be as deep as blood and as profound as scripture.  I can imagine that it is similar to the bond between war buddies.  The mission experience is really a microcosm of life.  You are "born" as a new missionary- thrust into a new world to which you are inevitably ill-prepared.  You learn and grow, forgetting yourself and relying on a higher power and your companion to serve those over whom you are called to labor.  As time goes (flies) by, you train other missionaries and watch them progress and mature as they serve.  Pretty soon, you're at the end of your two years and your missionary life-cycle ends.  All you take home are the friendships you cultivated when you were there.  It's a shared event that can't be duplicated anywhere else.  One of my favorite movies is Stand By Me, based upon a Stephen King novella.  At the end of the movie, the writer says, "I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve."  Well, that guy never served a mission.

Sorry to wax nostalgic like that.  It's gotta be the insomnia talking.  I'm going to try and get some sleep now since the girls are going to be up in a few hours.  Before I go, I promised you a definition of "the bedspins".  For the uninitiated, bedspins occur when you lie face-up in bed and you feel that the room is rotating around your stationary bed.  It is an unpleasant sensation that leads to a feeling of nausea.  For most, this phenomenon is brought upon them through the over-indulgence of certain beverages.  Not so in my case.

Game Changer

I gotta say that I was NOT PLEASED to hear that McCain chose a complete unknown in Sarah Palin for the VP slot. After cooling off a little and listening to her last night, I feel much better about it. She had some great one-liners, and since politics today seems to orbit around sound bites, I'll give you a few. You'll find that most of these revolve around Barack Obama. Some will make better sense if you actually heard the speech. If not, it's worth the forty minutes.

"A Mayor is a community organizer but with actual responsibilities"
"I put the jet on eBay"
"Obama has penned two memoirs, but never a major piece of legislation"
"After the styrofoam greek columns have been returned, after he has turned back the waters and saved the planet..." THIS LINE ALONE WAS WORTH STAYING UP PAST MY BEDTIME
"The American Presidency is not a journey of self discovery"

My initial reaction to her selection was that she took away McCain's best argument against Obama- the one about experience. Having heard Palin last night, that debate is back in play. We'll have to see how she does against Biden (I can't wait) and in a one-on-one situation when she has to defend her record.

It is a shame that her family life has taken center stage in the case against her. I don't think that her daughter's pregnancy has any bearing on her ability to lead. Hopefully we can have a substantive debate on the issues moving forward...