It's beginning to look a lot like warfare

Stick with me through the grim stuff and then we'll lighten up. In the aftermath of the GOP debate, I wondered if anyone else had heard the parts I heard, because the punitry seemed to focus on refugees and terrorism, while chuckling over Trump's ignorance of a technical term a president should probably know and Christie's ignorance of who has been King of Jordan for the past 17 years.

I was more concerned with their promises that, if elected, they would attack Russia, and Stuart Carlson picks up neatly on this bizarre development.

Dan Wasserman also comments on it, and I nearly made this a Juxtaposition of the Day, but I'm not really comfortable with Wasserman's comedic touch, because I think he diminishes the implications a bit, ridiculing the proposals rather than, as Carlson does, emphasizing the "Anything To Win" aspect.

Here's my concern: The Whole World Is Watching.

And given that our flag-worshipping chickenhawks are quick to leap upon extremist political rhetoric from Iranian mullahs as if it were serious, official government policy, I would expect them to consider the way Vladimir Putin will capitalize on their irresponsible saber-rattling idiocy.

I suppose that, if they're happy to assist ISIS recruiting with their hostile, ignorant, bigoted statements about Islam, they probably don't mind helping Putin gain the upper hand over any moderate voices in his country.

Still, they should at least recognize the astonishing foolishness of -- if you're really going to wage war on a major nuclear power -- giving your enemy at least 13 months warning.

I'm not going to go into details about their shocking display of blowhard ignorance, but I'd like to see more discussion of the degree to which they threaten national security with remarks more suited for drunken barroom buffoons than serious political candidates.

And nobody old enough to vote should assume that any candidate, no matter how disconnected from reality he may seem, is unelectable.

Remember this "unelectable" guy?

 

T'is the season blahblahblahblahblah

Most Christmas-based cartoons are, at best, familiar and flat. Here are some that made me chuckle:

Fortunately, I don't get sucked into the gift-giving Sargasso and my largess is confined to family, whom I do like and whose tastes I have some sense of, but Retail cracked me up anyway.

A number of years ago, I was kind of in this place, because I had five sibs who had kids and things got down to the "token crap from the dollar store" level until we instituted first a lottery and then dispensed with the annual drawing and just put it on a schedule.

And now that I work at home, I don't have the joyful experience of receiving generic gifts at the office party that then sit around until summer yard sale season.

Plus not having any friends helps cut things down.

 

But if I did have friends, I'd want one of them to be Trout, who is not only a good sidekick for Agnes in all their adventures but deals the sardonic, plausibly-deniable punchlines that only the grown-ups will get.

There's a lot of Lucy Ricardo in Agnes, and Trout is like a mash-up of Ethel's loyalty and Fred's cynicism. There's a great deal more to her than that, however: While a lot of strips have a resident wiseass, there is a sorrow behind the things Trout knows about life, and shouldn't, that elevates her way, way above the throng.

Merry Christmas, kid.

 

Though You Damn Kid is also a strip about kids who know more about life than they ought to, the Poz is a different kind of friend. He's the disrupter that every thinking youngster should have in his life.

When you talk about people who learn from their own experiences and people who are able to learn from other people's experiences, the Poz is one of the other people from whose experiences you should learn. 

He's also the sort who will lead you into merry adventures in which you may get a chance to learn An Important Lesson or, if you're lucky, you'll have the adventure and get off without learning anything.

YDK's "12 Damn Days of Christmas" starts here. If you read it and laugh, you will go to Hell, but that's okay: The Poz will be there, and he's a blast.

 

Finally, Dave Blazek connects with this bases-clearing Loose Parts gag that comes out of nowhere.

I like to imagine him thinking of this in May and then having to squirrel it away for a few months and hope he remembers it then.

By the way, he did use my blurb in his book, which is all the more reason you should buy it. Plus he'll doodle and sign it, and if you go to his website right now you'll still have a shot at giving it to someone at Christmas.

This particular gag busted me up because my eldest son became a magic buff in his early teens, though he wasn't this obnoxious about it.

He was 10 times worse, because he was working for a magic clown who ran a store and, since he was underage, he was paid in tricks and gags, and, mostly, in tutoring and in priceless wisdom.

One of the things Zeezo taught him was to sprinkle funny insults into your patter, because people who get a little pissed while everyone else is laughing are highly motivated to make just the "I'll show him!" snap judgments you're counting on.

I do not believe the boy has entirely confined that strategic tip to the performance of magic tricks.

 

Now here's your moment of zen:

 

Hat Tip to Mike Lynch for this delightful bit of holiday nostalgia. He also has some delightfully off-color cartoons on his site, and, if laughing at "The 12 Damn Days of Christmas" didn't get you sent straight to Hell, looking at these should probably do it.

 

Comments

[Uncle Jed]

So go ahead and put out your hand...no your clean hand...oh, that WAS your clean hand...okay, take these two coins...

[Mary in Ohio]

Thanks for the Christmas notes from CBS - now they would have to expand it to a full half hour to make room for the commercials.