For Worse

The best final installment of a popular comic strip appeared in January, 1996. Calvin and Hobbes hopped on their toboggan to discuss life’s possibilities and headed down the slope into a blank canvass of snow. Eloquent, understated, and poetic. Clearly Bill Watterson had other projects waiting for him on his easel, but he ended his ground-breaking strip with the dignity and respect it deserved.

Charles Schulz wrote a simple thank you to Peanuts fans that appeared the day after he died. The timing was accidental, yet fitting for a man who had devoted 50 years to the strip and his entire life to comics. Sadly, the syndicate continues to run the strip like a zombie cow from which it squeezes undead milk.

Berkely Breathed ended Bloom County on a sad, bitter note. Familiar locations such as Milo’s Meadow showed none of the strip’s popular characters, only a cold wind blowing through. In the final panel, toting a suitcase and donning his flower hat, Opus walked off into the sunset. Of course, Opus came back — not only once, but twice. Breathed has revived a few old faces, most notably Bill the Cat and Steve Dallas. Some characters stay with their creators, demanding new life and speaking with their unique voices on the world as it carries on. Sometimes a creator discovers new reasons to return to beloved characters.

That said, I don’t know what to make of this Sunday’s installment of For Better or For Worse. While I patiently await Josh Fruhlinger‘s acerbic assessment, I’ll do my best. It’s a mess. A giant, unattractive, wordy mess. As anyone who has been following the strip in the papers (or through Josh’s curmudgeonly lense), the wedding scene is no surprise. If I had been reading Lynn Johnston’s website, with it’s long-winded character profiles and even blogs from the characters themselves (sure, Achewood does it, but then Achewood is a creature of the InterNetz), maybe I would have been better prepared for panel after panel of “future lives” for each one of Johnston’s increasingly tedious characters.

There was a time — a long time ago — when I enjoyed FOOB. The kids were funny, the humor was grounded in real life, at least insofar as suburbanites experience it. Gentle, yet realistic, Johnston’s humor was grounded in human folly. And as she allowed her characters to age — a bold move, even after Gasoline Alley — they grew more complex and her humor more nuanced. There was plenty of cornball slapstick and schmaltz, but even these were informed by real life. Johnston’s most controversial story line, the coming out of Lawrence, was daring, respectful, and truthful in its depiction of the conflicting emotions families and friends go through when forced to confront their own homophobia.

Somewhere down the line, the strip jumped a shark. I don’t know if it started with the creepy relationship between Liz and Anthony, but I remember the strip slipped into melodrama around the time Johnston killed off the family dog, then replaced it with a nearly identical model. Then Liz got too old to be the cute little one anymore, so Johnston brought in April. It was as if Johnston retreated to the cute kid antics for a breath of saccharine “reality” while the soap opera lives of her adult characters spun into the absurd. Better minds than mine have dissected the self-loathing and misogyny of Johnston’s later writing. I’ll only add that for all of Johnston’s overworked puns, the strip stopped being amusing just as it stopped being realistic.

Well, it’s dead. But, wait, no it’s not! “Please join me on Monday as the story begins again,” Johnston invites. “Looking back looks wonderful!” So it’s the worst of both worlds: a zombie strip — like Peanuts — that it’s creator won’t stop tinkering with — like Breathed, only lacking the nostalgia of the former nor the creativity and relevance of the latter. Switching media, it’s more like George Lucas adding unnecessary scenes and background clutter to Star Wars. Yet even he managed to move on and create new characters and new stories; crappy characters and stories, true, but still new!

Johnston requires a therapist. The comics require new talent, but not until someone finally and completely slays the undead roaming the funny pages.

Tags: LynnJohnston, For Better or For Worse, comics, comic strips, cartoons

New Orleans Will Be (Has Already Been) Politicized

Straight from the floor of the GOP convention in St. Paul CNN is breathlessly reporting (do they know any other mode?) the evacuation of New Orleans as Hurricane Gustav. Could Republican strategists be any happier?

Sure, you may think that Republicans would not want to remind American voters of the BushAdmin’s oblivious response to the destruction wrought by Hurricane Katrina, the incompetence of FEMA, the cronyism that put Michael Brown as head of the organization, and the continued failure of the federal government to save a major urban touchstone of American culture.

But look at this image.

(Hat tip to Brad Delong.)

Taken as Katrina surged over the levy walls and thousands suffered in the Superdome, this picture documents a happy celebration of President Bush’s birthday. Dig in, boys!

This is the image that John McCain must counteract with new images: John McCain monitoring preparations in Mississippi; John McCain comforting evacuees; John McCain touring areas devastated by Gustav; John McCain delivering boxes of food and medicine for hurricane victims. If by the end of the week there is not a widely circulated photo of McCain handing a water bottle to a child in a hurricane shelter, then I have overestimated the semiotic talents of his campaign.

“But,” the naive will say, “that’s politicizing a tragedy!” Of course it is. Why do you think John Edwards launched (and closed) his campaign from New Orleans? It is an inherently political situation. The federal government (not to mention state and local governments) has consistently failed to protect, to care for and to revive the city. Instead the free-marketeers have been turned loose, privatizing the hospitals and the schools and whatever else is lying around. Blackwater mercenaries roam the streets. Most Americans view this tragedy as a colossal failure. Combined with the string of lies and fuckups in Iraq, Hurricane Katrina is the main reason Bush is the most hated President since Nixon — even more than Nixon some days.

The Democrats had a remarkably successful convention. Barack Obama’s acceptance speech drew a stadium packed with 80,000 people and a TV audience of 38 million viewers. McCain followed up with the worst pick for Vice President since Dan Quayle.

None of that may matter should McCain demonstrate through “presidential” actions of engagement and compassion that in moments of national security or disaster he is no callously indifferent bumbler like George Bush. Or, as Wolf “Conventional Wisdom (sic)” Blitzer has just put it, “Have they learned the lessons of Katrina?” The GOP will be arguing the affirmative.

Tags: Gustav, John McCain, George Bush, presidential politics, politics, hurricane

Random Impressions: Obama Speech, DNC, Sarah Palin

Firstly, I thought Obama’s speech was just dandy. John Dickerson sums it up nicely, while his Slate buddy Mickey Kaus seems to have watched a different speech than I did. Obama would have been criticized for not offering the “laundry list” of plans had he stayed on the “soaring rhetoric” plane; if anything, had he done as Kaus expected, the venue — a stadium packed with Obama-worshippers tearing up and even proposing to each other — would have underscored the criticism that Obama makes great speeches but offers no substance. Within the constraints of political speech-making, Obama countered that charge with a hefty serving of “meat and potatoes.” I still don’t see how a “line-by-line” scrutiny of the federal budget to eliminate waste will pay for all the things Obama said he wants to do, but I imagine it might be a tad more fiscally responsible than, say, waging unnecessary wars. Just sayin’.

Other than oblique references from Gov. Bill Richardson and Sen. Joe Biden to “upholding the Constitution — and actually doing it!”, I agree with Glenn Greenwald:

First, there is almost no mention of, let alone focus on, the sheer radicalism and extremism of the last eight years. During that time, our Government has systematically tortured people using sadistic techniques ordered by the White House; illegally and secretly spied on its own citizens; broken more laws than can be counted based on the twisted theory that the President has that power; asserted the authority to arrest and detain even U.S. citizens on U.S. soil and hold them for years without charges; abolished habeas corpus; created secret prisons in Eastern Europe and a black hole of lawlessness in Guantanamo; and explicitly abandoned and destroyed virtually every political value the U.S. has long claimed to embrace.

Other than a fleeting reference to such matters by John Kerry in a (surprisingly effective) speech which most networks did not broadcast, one would not know, listening to the Democratic Convention, that any of those things have happened. Even our unprovoked and indescribably destructive attack on Iraq, based on purely false pretenses, has received little attention. Those things simply don’t exist, even as part of the itemized laundry list of Democratic grievances about the Bush administration. The overriding impression one has is that the only things really wrong during the last eight years in this country are that gas prices are high and not everyone has health insurance. Those are obviously very significant problems, but they are garden-variety political issues which don’t begin to capture the extremism that has predominated in this country under GOP rule, and don’t remotely approach conveying the crises on numerous fronts the country faces.

Perhaps it is because too many Democrats have been complicit and carrying the water for this administration. Again…just sayin’.

As for Gov. Sarah Palin? I’m with August.

Tags: barackobama, democratic national convention, glenn greenwald, obama speech, john mccain, sarah palin

Some Minor Music Criticism of the DNC

The kids are watching Spongebob, which is significantly more edifying that the live feed from the CNN website of the Democratic National Convention that my addiction to politics compels me to watch.

Admittedly I was moved by the comments from the Midwestern factory worker who lost his job and watched as the Republican-led national government gave him the finger. So he returned the favor and signed upwith Obama.

But the sight of the huge crowds of delegates and lay folk thronging Mile High Stadium as they wave American flags to the beat of Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” is, well, disturbing. It was weird when Reagan did it, but then I doubt the old fucker ever listend to the lyrics. I guess I assumed that Democrats were more familiar with Springsteen’s protest against social indifference to Viet Nam War vets. Seeing the crowd shake their hips as Springsteen sings “Sent me off to a foreign land/ To go and kill the yellow man” — looks like I guessed wrong.

They’ve moved on to John Lennon’s “Power to the People.” Bit more “on message” I suppose. What, not “John Sinclair” or “Woman is the N—-r of the World”? Yeeeahh…probably not.

Tags: BarackObama, Democratic Convention

Where Are the Damn Cartoons?

You may be wondering. After all, it’s Thursday, and so far we’re 0 for 3. No Wanderlost update, no new In Contempt strips. I mean, what did I do, fall down a well? Break my hand? Get another bout of back pain or carpal tunnel syndrome? Go on a bender and wrap my car around a tree?

Nope.

It’s late August. That’s what. Something happens to me in the last couple weeks of August. I get lethargic, listless, feckless, aimless and lots of other lesses. A brief burnout. It’s not lack of material. I have the scripts all written. I have Wanderlost written to the end, and I think it’s pretty good. The In Contempt strips for this week were your usual jaundiced appraisal of politics — perhaps even more so, as the Democratic conventions tend to depress me more than lift me up. I have reactions to all that. Just haven’t drawn them.

So it’s a funk. Maybe this is why people go on vacations in August.

I’ll be better next week. Don’t fear. I’ll post my cartoon responses to the DNC on Tuesday, and go after the RNC on Thursday. Word has it that McCain has made his Veep pick and will announce it the moment Obama stops talking. I really hope it’s Romney. Not cuz I like the shit-eater; I love drawing him, mocking him, and watching him try to out-do everyone else on stage. “I’ll double Guantanamo! I’ll hunt every day! I’ll waterboard my children! I’ll show those Muslim theocracies — America will be the most Christian nation ever!”

Tags: cartooning, the blahs, Mitt Romney

The Clinton Speech

I am not really sure what more Hillary Clinton could possibly say or do beyond tonight’s speech to convince her supporters to rally around Barack Obama’s candidacy for President. It was such a powerful speech, in fact, it could have —with a little tweaking for context— served her well as an acceptance speech for the nomination. It had to be powerful, of course, but both Obama and Joe Biden have their work cut out for them to maintain the momentum — or, optimally, surpass it.

Naturally, shortly afterwards the John McCain campaign ran its ad quoting Clinton’s criticisms of Obama. This raises the headache-inducing possibility that the Obama and McCain campaigns could run dueling ads featuring Clinton praising and criticizing Obama. I hope not.

Yet CNN has managed to find Democratic delegates still unmoved, still unconvinced by Clinton’s argument to support her former rival. I just saw one woman weep as she considered the possibility that she might not vote at all.

All of which makes me feel like an atheist observing a Methodist and a Baptist argue over issues of doctrine. Which, well, I am … er … when the issue comes up. It’s not that I don’t see the differences, but compared to the similarities they seem quite minimal. The challenge for Democrats comes during the general election to convince undecided and independent voters — not to mention recalcitrant Clinton supporters — that the differences between Obama and McCain are more cavernous than might be evident as the two candidates compete for the Sacred Middle.

Tags: barackobama, hillary clinton, john mccain, presidential politics

Hometown Signs of DNC Lovefest

If you are looking for some indication that the Democratic National Convention will be a giant healing ceremony for a party riven by the primary contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, my hometown newspaper The Buffalo News throws you a bone. Watch CNN or FOXNews and you will get the impression that Clintonistas are so disgruntled and petulant (a stereotype the John McCain campaign is counting on) that Obama has no chance of winning them over. By contrast, The News reports differently:

The Obama forces have gone out of the way to make Clinton delegates feel welcome, said Erie County Clerk Kathleen C. Hochul.

“I’ve gotten a lot of calls from the Obama people, wanting to make sure that I’m comfortable and have what I need and inviting me to go to some events,” Hochul said. “We’re clearly coming together.”

There certainly are plenty of events to attend. In addition to the traditional New York delegation breakfasts, there will be a plethora of parties each day, and a who’s who of New York politics will be here to witness it all.

Mind that “coming together” phrase. They use it a lot.

I find this significant for a few reasons. As Senator, Clinton has impressed Western New Yorkers by consistently sending their way federal funding and programming aimed at relieving the economic stagnation that has afflicted the area since the late 70′s. As the article notes, local politicos from the entrenched Democratic Party machinery expected that a second President Clinton would be an intimate ear and share the largess. Also, WNY is chock full of those blue collar white people whom Obama has reportedly had trouble recruiting — the Reagan Democrats and Clinton supporters that might vote for McCain and against their self interests (economic, reproductive, etc.)

Mind you, it’s not overwhelmingly significant. Voters might buck the machines of party and labor unions. And the various resentments of white workers against both affirmative action and the rise of the black middle class continue to obscure the mutual interests workers of all colors share. Code words like “unqualified” and “arrogant” persist, especially connected to the argument that Clinton was “more experienced” or “deserving.” And the News article focuses only on local area leaders, party members with a personal stake in working with whatever Democratic administration might come to bear upon their political futures. Far be it from Jerry Zremski, the reporter to point that out or raise the question or exhibit any of the skepticism one might expect of a journalist, a Washington Bureau Chief.

FWIW, the News article is evidence that the Obama campaign has spent most of the Summer trying to make nice-nice with Clinton delegates. Hopefully the convention will get that over with so it can focus on winning the election.

Tags: BarackObama, Hillary Clinton, Western New York, blue collar whites, racism, Democrats

Literacy INCLUDES Knitting

A youth group of knitters, ages 6-10 years old, were kicked out of an eastern Ontario library. Here’s the rationale:

Pamela Haley, manager of library services for the united counties of Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry, said the ban on crafts was put on place because the municipality is revamping its 18 library branches in an effort to attract more people and needs to be more literacy-focused to achieve that end.

She said the library’s new fall lineup includes teen book clubs and Scrabble nights. The library will also be holding some events not focused on literacy, such as video game nights, to attract a younger crowd.

But under the new plan, there will no longer be a space for Kingston Currie and the other girls, aged six to 10, who used to sit around a table teasing yarn into organized patterns and items with crochet hooks and pairs of needles.

Yes, it’s not like there are any books on knitting that young people could read to improve their skills and learn new patterns. It’s not like knitting is some huge fad that has attracted people from all ages. Its not like knitting groups put these folks together to share new techniques in a strong example of cross-generational communication and learning. It’s not like such a ban might alienate older patrons and thus provoke a backlash against the library and providing services to young people.

Snark over. Hat-tip from my wife who knits and reads ravelry.com — an international social networking community of knitters!

Argh. Gnash. Head-slap.

Tags: literacy, libraries, youth services, knitting

In Contempt (8/21/2008): Up the Wrong Tree

Enlarge to become enraged!

Is “Douchebag” Sexist?

From Ann at Feministing:

It’s pretty easy to see why this evolved as an insult. Douchebag is funny because it’s anachronistic. It was a device once promoted for health reasons, but as science has marched on, douching is generally just thought of as an embarrassing (and definitely not-talked-about) product for women who are paranoid about good old-fashioned vagina smells. If we’re honest, we also laugh at it because it grosses us out. (Call it the bro-ish side of some feminists, myself included.) Like Dodai at Jezebel, I’m not calling for a ban on the word. Just asking feminists to think about it a bit more before saying it. To consider whether using “douchebag” as an insult is just another way of saying “everything associated with vaginas is icky!”

No, it’s saying that some things associated with vaginas are icky. Some things associated with just about every part of the human body in general and male or female bodies in particular are icky. Smegma, anyone? Spooge? I don’t think there is anything misogynist in acknowledging that some of the fluids emitted from the female body can be a little gross. Genuinely gross. And as such they form a legitimate basis for insulting someone.

“Douchebag” is funny not only because it’s icky, but because it sounds funny. Take care of the sound, the sound will take care of the sense, as Lewis Carroll once said. Not always true, but in cases like this, it works. How about “ass-hat”? Does anyone really know what that means? No! But it sounds funny. Dickhead, butthead, shithead, and my son’s favorite, poopyhead — a lot more sound is at work than sense.

Does the word’s relationship to female anatomy or to anachronistic female hygiene put it off limits*? Ann provides a thoughtful discussion of the history of the douching practice and how social attitudes varied depending on the marital status of the woman performing it. Shorter version: it’s okay if you’re married, but single women who do it are sluts. Pretty reprehensible stuff — but, sadly, just about anything a single woman did was viewed as having slut potential. “Naughty” nurses and secretaries, especially; teachers and librarians, not as often, but they pop up even now as part of sexual fantasy. Personally, I deplore the slut-shaming as much as the sexist assumptions regarding single women. But I don’t think “douchebag” inherently connotes either of these stupid ideas. Moreover, I feel there is a risk made in the opposite direction: by putting female bodies or anything associated with them completely out of bounds as the basis of ridicule, would we not be putting them on a pedestal, idealizing them beyond their human qualities.

Human beings are funny. Their bodies are funny. And gross. And weird. And awkward. Zits, farts, dangly bits, hairs, snot, phlegm — as biological beings, we contend with these strange, uncomfortable aspects of our bodies. We have developed lotions, cleansers, trimmers, and other methods to manage them, if not completely eliminate or hide them (and in the process making some people very rich.) The same holds true for those things unique to female and male bodies: pricks, tits, twats, balls and all the wonderful fluids they bring forth. They all serve important functions, but they can be quite embarrassing. And embarrassment, discomfort, inconvenience, grossness — these are the basis of humor. Not the most sophisticated variety, to be sure, but unless you are a total snob (and thus likely trying to distance yourself from your body and all its problems), you should recognize the value of humor derived from our most intimate experiences. Nothing especially “bro-ish” about that.

* Yes, Ann states that she is not trying to ban the word. And the discussion is certainly worth having — hence, my engaging in it. But for some folks it’s a short step from raising the question to calling for a ban, so I feel it’s necessary to address that possibility. Back to whence ye came

Tags: language, sexism, misogyny, douchebag