Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for February 27, 2010

The USO chopper?!? Oh, better and better.

Does this mean that Jimmy Thudpucker might be dead? It’s been a while since GBT has killed off an established character, and Jimmy goes waaaaaayyyy back.

Nice twist.

Jeff used to seem to be level-headed and have some grasp of reality. Of course, that may just have been relative, as he was rooming with Zipper.

@ Susan, I seriously doubt Mr Trudeau will use that as a story line. What is Mr Robertson giving as the reason for this unleashing of God’s wrath upon these people? Hawaii may be in the path of a tsunami also.

The USO tour chopper threw me for a loop de loop.

ignore Haiti - no, just did not make a ‘toon out of absolute tragedy. Some real events just are not cartoon items.

The world watched MASH, but i doubt a 10 year sitcom will be made of Haiti or Chili.

SueB1863: never underestimate the power of the recessive gene.

Lots of people are hammering Jeff Redfern for this, but with “leadership” of the calibre Havoc is providing, ANYONE would be a failure. He’s constantly being set up to fail, take the blame or get fragged. He has absolutely no positive role model to look up to or emulate. From Havoc he gets no support, no guidance, and nowhere to go but down.

Why do people think that their cause is necessarily that of (insert name here). Is it because they share a common view of one issue or even several issues? Goals are different from cause of the day, tho, and certainly, GBT has goals that differ as widely from mine as anyone’s here. You can criticize or praise him for what he does with his strip, but it is unfair to aim that criticism (or praise) against him for what he doesn’t cover. Why doesn’t he cover pro-choice/anti-abortion? Why doesn’t he cover spousal abuse? (Maybe he has, I’m not so much an aficionado that I’d know.) Why doesn’t he cover the fact that my Wired magazine didn’t arrive in time for me to take it on my flight last week? Maybe he doesn’t care. Or maybe his goals for the strip are different than mine and yours, different than what you think they should be.

I wonder if they’ll handle this storyline like the Bush Admin handled PAt Tilman’s death?

I wonder who was wrestling with the wheel, who was racing to the door and who was jingling for help?

I was in Bosnia when the helicopter carrying Sec. Treasury Ron Brown crashed into a mountain killing everyone aboard. I was attached to the aviation unit that was flying him and his group. He had just given our First Sergeant a challenge coin (a sort of commerative gift) about 30 minutes before they left. It really messed up the 1st Sergeant when he found out what had happened. Those sorts of visits really do help morale.

I am pretty sure Melissa’s MOS is helicopter crew chief. I expect her to somehow be involved in the upcoming story line. notbugme wondered earlier if there might be an upcoming death. If there is I hope it’s not Melissa. But I have misgivings….

I doubt it’s Melissa’s bird. The dialogue in the mess hall seemed to indicate she hadn’t seen the USO group before. (and aren’t they just the right level of celebrity to be on a USO tour like this?)

”Friendly fire” !

Incoming fire is never friendly regardless of who is pulling the trigger.

*Chrisnp said, 44 minutes ago

I doubt it’s Melissa’s bird.*

Oh, but she’s going to have to come and fix it – that’s how she and Jeff will get together.

Well said, micalk.

Uh … excuse me … but about the helicopter shown in the previous two day’s strips. After being fired upon, from all appearances the chopper looked like it was about to go into attack mode and shoot up the wedding party. But actually it’s a USO helicopter carrying dignitaries (such as they are)?

Did I miss something?

Well, the pilot said something cocky about them wanting to play - a couple of alternative explanations come to mind. One is that they call in the location where from where they were taking fire, while the pilot tries to fly his passengers out danger. In the meantime - either artillery, rockets, an armed drone, a gun ship or maybe even some fast burners are on their way to make things miserable for the wedding party.

Perhaps all of the above - that colonel isn’t too happy!

The way I see this strip, Garry Trudeau satirizes as much as he can of the American issues. If he tries to go into really serious situations (abortion, Haiti), then he has to be careful in case some newspapers stop carrying the strip (this has happened). Not saying that he’ll never try these subjects.

Does anybody remember when Andy, who was gay, was dying of AIDS, and he kept making jokes? (A long time ago, when Joanie was in law school.) Many newspapers said this was disrespectful, and cut out a whole week of strips. So, many gay people wrote in and said they didn’t find this disrespectful, Andy was trying to deal with the fact that he was dying, and humour can relieve a lot of stress.

In my city, where the local daily paper pulled the strips, our friendly independent (free) weekly paper printed all the missing strips together, in one issue. And you could see that these strips would only be offensive if you had a narrow mind and no imagination.

I think Doonesbury shocks many people, but that isn’t the reason Trudeau writes it. I think he wants us to think in new ways about old subjects. And new subjects.

Why is everyone so sure that Jeff and Melissa will get together?? I sure hope not…..

Also another point we miss is the lead time of these strips. Trudeau probably submitted 6 weeks worth so if there is a story line about Chile we’d have to wait a few weeks for it.

I agree. There are plenty of cartoonists that try to make a name for themselves by being shocking. I wouldn’t count Trudeau as one of them. He’s just not afraid to tackle controversial issues. For several years he was banned to the editorial page of our paper before they woke up and moved him back to the comics.

As to Haiti. Trudeau could have done something. Perhaps he could have done a one panel condolence, but so many other editorial cartoonists were doing exactly that, that I think he probably would not have contributed anything that had been unsaid. I hardly blame him for not using his strip to add to the outpouring of sympathy, and I don’t know what contributions he may have made in his private life.

Here, here Chrisnp

It is a pleasure to read the comments on Trudeau’s comic. Most comments read like a dog fight between contesting ideologues. Somehow, nearly all comments reguarding Doonesbury are sane, thoughtful and interesting.

Quite insightful, ransomdstone, Clearly a man of considerable intellect.

Dypak- Ron Brown was not Treaury Secretary- he was Commerce Secretary. He was killed in a plane crash, not a helicopter crash. Any other parts of your story you would like to change?

I was thinking the same thing, DeltaEagle.

http://www.aaregistry.com/detail.php?id=832

I guess Hillary isn’t the only one to make up stories about Bosnia.