Tag Archives: webcomic

The Wolf Is Not at the Door

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Seriously, though. The call…it’s coming from inside the house.

Yesterday, immediately after the confirmation of the frighteningly unqualified Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, Congressman Thomas Massie introduced a bill that reads, in its entirety, “The Department of Education shall terminate on December 31, 2018.” Around the same time, Senator Elizabeth Warren  was told and then forced to sit down and shut up for impugning the character of the nominee for Attorney General, Senator Jeff Sessions, a man who was rejected for federal judgement over 30 years ago because his character was widely known to be impugnable.

From where I sit, the wolf is not at the door. The wolf is in the kitchen. And the oven is already lit.

It’s Not the End of the World. Yet.

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The end of the world won’t hurt at all. The end of the world won’t feel like anything.

At the Women’s March last month, packed, unmoving in the park because 15,000 people showed up when they expected 2,000, I overheard an old leftie explaining to her companion, “Every time we won a battle, there was always another battle. There will always be another battle.” I don’t know if the arc of the moral universe bends toward justice or not, but I do know everything always changes all the time. Wheel of Fortune. Tides of history. No kingdom lasts forever, nor any joy, nor any suffering. And if the end of the world ever does come, it won’t worry anyone. If it’s really and truly over, there will be nothing to worry about, and no one left to worry.

Or, as Edgar says in King Lear,  “The worst is not/So long as we can say ‘This is the worst.'” So rejoice! You’ve lived to fight for your life another day. Rise up and give thanks for the opportunity.

It’s a testament to the power of the human ability to heal from trauma and go on going on that I drew that little corner of the Twin Towers in panel 1. The last time I referenced 9/11 in QvD, it required a screen grab cut and paste because there was no way I could bring myself to draw it.

Panel 2 is the second time I’ve referenced King Lear. King Lear never gets stale.

Life is trauma. Over and over. You just keep getting up and going on because if you don’t, you’re not alive.

Seriously, though, I’m feeling burned out already.

Know Your Federally-Sanctioned Deities

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As television taught me as a child, the more you know…

I can’t take credit for “School (TM),” which is, of course, from M. T. Anderson’s dark future YA novel, Feed. At “School (TM),” the protagonist and his friends learn valuable lessons in consumerism, primarily concerning how to get the best deals online and buy more things. The phrase “make a little birdhouse in your soul” is from They Might Be Giants album, Flood.

There can be no doubt now that, with the exception of a few holdouts, the federal government’s agenda is to pillage and plunder the country, extracting non-renewable resources for personal gain while also appropriating public funds into their own coffers and charging the American people to spread their own narrow worldview. And unless you have a couple million to spare, you are going to find yourself crushed under the gouty foot of their insatiable greed. If you don’t understand, I recommend a Dr. Seuss’s seminal treatise on the results of unchecked growth in business without some sort of agency for the protection of the environment.

And speaking of money, let me do my civic duty by reminding readers that they can participate in the national past time of capitalism AND support a struggling artist by buying my book, shopping in my online store, or donating directly to my Patreon. If you enjoy my content, believe in freedom of speech, and have a job, please vote with your wallet and kick a few dollars my way. I’m not too greedy, but I could use new socks and underwear, and would like a pair of jeans with no holes.

Notes from the Age of Enlightenment

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If your official position is that your neighbor’s made a deal with the devil in order to cause your sheep to have a weird looking baby, you probably aren’t interested in reason or enlightenment.

Clearly, there’s no point in quoting John Adams: “The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.” Or James Madison: “The civil government functions with complete success by the total separation of the Church from the State.” Or Noah Webster: “[E]very preference given to any religious denomination, is so far slavery and bigotry.” Or any one of the men who dreamed of democracy in America during the American Revolution. The people who believe that their religious prejudices should influence federal policy don’t care that imposing your religious beliefs on others is wholly unAmerican.

Yesterday, the Owl asked me to try to contact the junior senator from Arizona, Jeff Flake, because she had heard that he was persuadable in the matter of Betsy DeVos’s confirmation. I had not heard that, and I could not get through to any of his offices, or even his voice mailbox, presumably because everyone else in the state was trying to beg him not to confirm her. But he did tweet “Lest there be any doubt about how I’m voting on Betsy DeVos she had me at ‘school choice’ years ago… ” The last I looked, the vote was tied 50-50, and, as you know, in the event of a tie in the Senate, the Vice President gets to cast the deciding vote. Something tells me Mike Pence will be happy to install a Secretary of Education who believes that the purpose of schools is to “advance God’s kingdom.”

Please, instead, let’s make the function of school to advance the ability of our population to think critically. Or, if you insist on a regressive government, let’s go back all the way to the best intentions of the Enlightenment, when faith was a private mystery and reason a guiding light.

All Apologies, My Bad

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This is a true story, which happened in the mid-’90s when people still wrote letters.

Nothing is funny and nothing ever will be funny again. With the announcement of Neil Gorsuch, a man who seems to believe that human beings only have value if they own large corporations, as Supreme Court nominee, a man who, as a Supreme Court judge, would likely continue his pattern giving businesses free reign to stomp on human rights in the name of profit, I just don’t see how anyone can pretend that this administration’s sole aim isn’t to screw the American people hard from behind, take the money, and run away laughing while we’re still wondering where they came from.

I don’t have compassion fatigue, or activism fatigue, or outrage fatigue. I have stupidity fatigue. I think Ani DiFranco put it best when she sang, “If you’re not angry, you’re just stupid; you don’t care.” Unless you are a large corporation, you are the one who is going to get stomped on while these thieves line their pockets with the natural resources that are your children’s inheritance. You’re the one who’s going to be paying $5 for a gallon of water that Nestlé’s pumped out of your back yard without even reimbursing you. If you don’t die of your totally treatable pre-existing condition first.

At the rate they’re dismantling democracy, I won’t be alive to see any of that, because they’re probably going to start rounding up dissenters in a year or so. Maybe I’ll care then, but it’s hard to care now. I don’t want to live anywhere but America, and I don’t want to live in this America. I love that so many people are so passionately opposing each egregious abuse, but I hate that so many people are just rolling over and taking it. Remember checks and balances? Where are the people whose jobs are to prevent the federal government from executing a coup? Everyone’s talking about the 2018 election. How do we know there’s even going to be a 2018 election? Our new corporate overlords don’t seem to respect any other aspect of American government. Why would they bother letting us vote?

Sorry. I’m just pessimistic. And I keep wondering what we could have done differently. And I really did used to make that joke about offering Trump free therapy all the time in the mid-’90s. And, in hindsight, it’s not funny at all.

Hail Hydra.

Welcome to Bizarro White House

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Don’t even get we started on we’s intention to destroy the environment and decimate civil rights.

What is going on? Why does Congress not put a stop to this? Are we waiting for a military coup or something? It’s been a week and a 1/2 of Bizarro World, where everything is opposite of the real world. The president’s job is to crush the human spirit and line his own pockets. The cabinet’s job is to dismantle the systems they oversee. Corporations have rights. People are inexpensive manufactured-in-China plastic cogs. And I’m placing my hope in John McCain. John. Freaking. McCain. Maybe he can swoop in and defeat Bizarro President. Who knows? Maybe Sarah Palin will swoop in and save Melania. The most backwardest things happen in Bizarro World.

Originally I thought to just have Bannon sort of smirking in the background, but a smart guy I know was suggesting that webcomics draw something illustrating a more direct connection and then I found the image of Bizarro Superman as a puppeteer so, you know. Layers.

Four more years of this? How?

 

A Brief Treatise on Nazi Punching

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I’m not saying that anyone deserves to be punched, but you have to admit, with all that hatred hanging out right where everyone can see, they’re kind of asking for it.

Sorry. I’m an angry person. I’ve always been an angry person. Since I was socialized female, I got to suppress my rage instead of learning to express it in healthy ways. And I do believe in non-violence , but I learned in yoga teacher training that non-violence includes non-violence to the self, which means that sometimes you have to defend yourself rather than acquiescing to immediate threats. And sometimes, the best defense is a good offense.

The Rabbit says, “People tell you who they are.” If someone tells you that they share Adolf Hitler’s beliefs, you should believe them and act accordingly. For example, you could take action to prevent them from annexing Sudetenland and committing genocide. And no, punching Richard Spencer in the face is not the only solution, but you can’t deny that it is an action, or that it makes an impact.

Comic Book Villains

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And allow me to add that, if my demands are not met in 3 days, I will release this paralyzing neurotoxin into Gotham City’s water supply. Bwoo-ha-ha-ha.

Adequate funding and educational success rates correlate pretty strongly in any type of school, but this genius, Betsy DeVos, parochial school cheerleader, believes the solution to failing schools is to cut funding. To punish them, you know, until they behave. Like strangling your child when they melt down in the grocery story until they learn their lesson. Or stop breathing. Whichever happens first. But really, she just wants to abolish the public school system and force all children to receive Christian “education.” Like if the First Amendment didn’t exist and we lived in country where separation of church and state wasn’t specifically guaranteed.

I had another insomnia night last night, totaling 0 minutes of sleep over the last 36 hours, but I couldn’t think of an Insomnia Comic. All I could think about was this woman’s terrifying smile, which, to me, says, “I know I’m a fraud but I really think I’m getting away with it.” It’s the smile of a missionary promising eternal happiness in the next life, in exchange for your embrace of physical and mental servitude in this one. The longer I’m awake, the more the incoming administration remind me of Batman villains. Their plots are so insane as to strain credulity. I don’t think I’m the first to make the Dolores Umbridge connection, either. Betsy DeVos creeps me out. I wouldn’t want her around my kids. I believe children should receive straight answers. Especially where it concerns education.

Maybe tomorrow I should do Trump as the Penguin.

Sorry I’m not terribly funny right now.

Bwoo-ha-ha-ha, indeed.

Random Animal Facts

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La la la I can’t hear you and if I can’t hear it it doesn’t exist.

It just gets worse and worse, and although the Rabbit reassures us all that everything will turn out fine, it’s still hard to hear. Today was not in the least a funny day. I made the observation on Facebook that we’ve moved through Orwellian to Kafkaesque. There isn’t actually an evil order behind events. There is a complete lack of order whatsoever. Nightmare chaos despair insanity stubborn pernicious confusion. Reason no longer exists in American current affairs and we citizens can expect no better existence than the lives of despised giant bugs and no reward greater than the release offered by death.

Ha ha! Just kidding! Or am I?

Random animal facts have greater meaning than the news. Just read an article on a new book about octopus intelligence in The Atlantic, even though I already know a lot about octopuses. Did you know that octopuses have 3 hearts? And, in effect, they have 9 brains: 1 big one in their big squishy heads, like us, and 8 nerve bundles, one for each arm, that are big enough to be analogous to little brains, in my opinion. Even the longest-lived octopus species only live a few years. The males become senescent almost immediately after they mate and then die shortly thereafter. The female waits until her eggs hatch and then she achieves senescence and dies.

Octopuses seem pretty smart. Maybe they have the right idea.

Dreams of Sushi

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It’s just a matter of motivation. It’s hard to made decisions on an empty stomach.

A fish dinner is a fish dinner, but if you start messing around with wishes, you might end up with nothing, which is less than a fish dinner. When I was a little kid I made wishes all the time: on the evening star, on dandelions, on birthday candles. Not on coins thrown in fountains, though. My mother did not condone the throwing of currency into pools, or anywhere else. But I noticed a trend, which is that my wishes pretty much never came true. I’ve had the same wish for decades and even with concerted effort, I can’t make it come true. Maybe in another 20 years I’ll make some progress.

Although I feel like I failed to complete any of the things I set out to accomplish today, I did draw a comic. And I guess I did some other, possibly meaningful things that were not on my list.

If I had wishes, I probably wouldn’t use them on personal things that I really want. In the long run, I think we’d all be better off wishing for peace, for people to be less greedy and more empathetic, for equality and liberty and justice and safety.