Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau for June 24, 2010

I don’t know. I kinda like the idea of submerging NYC and LA.

Radish — Try looking up the term “cognitive dissonance”.

Remember the satire, people. This is what right-wingers have been saying about this strip for decades.

Boswell said it well: Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.

Samuel Johnson, on the other hand, said a patriot “has, for himself, neither hope nor fear, neither kindness nor resentment, but refers every thing to the common interest.”

Hmmm.

I think I love Boswell and Johnson … And wasn’t it H. L. Mencken who said, “Never underestimate the stupidity of the American People?”

I think I love Boswell and Johnson … And wasn’t it H. L. Mencken who said, “Never underestimate the stupidity of the American People?”

Edcole, not for decades. GT used to be the Trey Parker of comics, lampooning foolishness wherever he found it. Only in the past few years has he transformed into Bill Maher…. who did the same thing, actually.

IT depends which rag you’re reading, My local rag in a purple state is 75% rightie.

Nemesys, G.B. Trudeau has gotten slightly less progressive over the decades, as he himself admits and as he explored with the right-turn made by his alter ego, Mike Doonesbury. Ever since 1973, the regressives have complained that his strip was simply leftwing hogwash. The strip is over forty years old, and the plaints of the regressives are almost that old, too. Thank goodness he keeps writing & drawing. Even when weak, his strip is more worth reading than 90% of the strips published. No one has a more interesting cast of characters, shown sympathetically, no matter what their politics or ethics.

I hope that Sam reads the editorials. It’s time.

You’re lucky. Here in Oklahoma City, the only surviving rag is 120% right wingnut.

I stopped worrying last night after watching a show on the Universe that said the last red dwarf sun would extinguish 100 trillion years from now so we are all going to die anyway.

I have written to my liberal rag many times and notice they only print my weakest. Good reason to read opposing papers. The right and the left have something to say. Unless you’re a loyal, My Party Right (left) , never wrong. Then you ask “So you’re pro-abortion and anti-Death Penalty?” Interesting platform.

BrianCrook gets it pretty much right. I’ve been reading Doonesbury since before it was syndicated. GBT has “progressed” from being a liberal who thought the only good “use” for a conservative was as the butt of a joke to a “progressive” who understands that conservatives want what’s best for the country, and just often disagree on what that is, and usually on how to get there.

At my dinner table, we usually have people who are strongly conservative and strongly liberal. We have great discussions, because we understand we all want things to get better, and we understand that the other folks are just as smart as we are, just with a different perspective. Also, when we listen, we realize we agree on more than we disagree on. It’s called acting like a grown-up.

The reason why GBT’s treatment of the military is so universally well-regarded is precisely because he can acknowledge their honor, intelligence, hard work, and dedication, while he disagrees about lots of other things.

One reason why people like reading GBT these days is that he’s one of the very few, on either side, who acts like a grown-up. Peggy Noonan is another, and usually George Will. It’s probably no co-incidence that they are all three way above the average age of a “pundit.”

jeffiekins – thanks for an interesting and intelligent comment.

In the once liberal Philadelphia Inquirer, we get columns from such great “liberal” thinkers as Charles Krauthammer and John Yoo. Sickens my soul.

Mallard gets it right.

http://tinyurl.com/2bjckz2

There’s a reason MSNBC has such microscopic ratings.

Lew, your only complaint with the HARTFORD COURANT is that they don’t print your “best” letters?? My god, man, you are a whiner of the first water, as my mother would say. They actually have no responsibility to print ANY of your letters, particularly if your political thinking remains at the level of “pro-abortion & anti-Death Penalty”. Wow. I can find ten-year-olds who can knock down that argument.

Thanks, Jeffie, and I would love to join your dinner table some time. I must disagree with you about George Will & Peggy Noonan. I listen to Will on THIS WEEK, and I respect what he says, but he is very clever with his use of facts. I have not found Noonan to be more than a typical Republican mouthpiece. May I recommend Paul Krugman & Patricia Williams as two more pundits who write & think like grown-ups?

It sickens me, WaitingMan, to think that John Yoo has a syndicated column, when he should be writing from prison.

I always read the first section of the newspapers, the headlines on first page and then, I read through each section of the whole newspapers. :-) Enjoy reading the newspapers!

I dunno about Paul Krugman thinking like a grown-up, but he does write like one. He seems way too opportunistic in his opinions to accuse him of thinking like a grown-up. There’s a reason why I said “acting” like a grown-up. That’s pretty much the best I can hope for in a political opinion piece.

A week or two ago, for example, he wrote that no-one believes something that he himself had written in an economics textbook. Recently. Wish I had the time to research it, but work is … work.

Of course, that’s roughly the same thing, I think, that you just said about George Will. And, BTW, while Peggy Noonan may make the same points that Rush and Sean do, she generally does it in a way that’s respectful to those she disagrees with.

It’s the difference between saying “the other side is completely, tragically wrong, and here’s why I believe so,” and saying “the other side is wrong; they’re evil idiots.” You have to assume EVERYONE will cherry-pick their facts. Can you think of anyone who doesn’t?

I’ll have to look at Patricia Williams.

Take a look at (or listen to) Dennis Prager some time. He does spend a percentage (10%?) of his time on a moral high horse. (These days, who doesn’t?) When he gets off it, he is only respectful to those he disagrees with, no matter how wrong or even immoral he thinks their position is.

Especially these days, the only ones who mostly THINK like grown-ups seem to be the libertarians, but they hardly ever ACT like grown-ups. (We’re all 75% libertarians, right? Don’t like drugs? Don’t use ‘em. Don’t like abortion? Don’t have one. Don’t like working? Don’t make me pay for you not to. Don’t attack the U.S., we’ll keep our troops home.) Like I said, 75%.

“If it werent for us libs … The air would be 10% carbon dioxide and 1% carbon monoxide.”

Do “libs” really absorb oxides of carbon ?

What about petroleum sludge?

My Back Pages

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdNdMOQnY2M

Here’s another quotation (I know lots of them), I believe was said by Nathan Hale?:

“My country, right or wrong - if wrong, to make it right - if right, to keep it right.”

People tend to quote the first part only, thinking it means that whatever my country does, since it’s my country doing it, that in itself means it must be the right thing to do. However, it doesn’t mean that at all. It means that a citizen has the responsibility (that dread word) to ensure that his/her country behaves properly.

People don’t like responsibility nowadays, do they. It makes them break out in hives, or something.

The liberals write for the newspapers, the conservatives who can’t read or write talk on the radio.

Seventy-five percent libertarian, Jeffie? No. Fifty percent, at best. I am with you about drugs & abortion. When it comes to “don’t like working”, I know no one who simply refuses work to live off welfare. That is a bourgeois myth. Indeed, vast numbers of people with jobs STILL need some societal help, because we live in a society that has, for most of the last fifty years made life easier for the wealthy & harder for the middle-class, the working-class, & the disadvantaged.

In addition, we sent our troops in reaction to those who most recently attacked the U.S., namely al-Qaeda, but got almost nothing for our pains except the concomitant slaughter of Afghans. Bush-Dick mishandled September 11th from before it happened to the end of his term. I am glad, however, to see that you are against the occupation of Iraq.

When libertarians stick to individual liberty, they are at their best. When they fall to their knees in the worship of private property, then their train goes way off the tracks.

On other matters, I agree that Peggy Noonan speaks & writes much more reasonably & respectfully than do Rush Limbaugh & Sean Hannity, but in that comparison, we are setting the bar pretty low. I can find children who speak & write more reasonably than do Limbaugh & Hannity.

In re Paul Krugman: When you have a minute to find where he contradicted himself, please send the link my way. Thanks. I will look for Dennis Prager. Take a look, also, at Cynthia Tucker: very smart.

Chikuku, there are PLENTY of conservative columnists. Charles Krauthammer is not bad. I love finding places where I can agree with him, to wit, the gas tax to be used for alternative energy.

@RinaFarina I prefer this:

“I don’t believe in ‘My country right or wrong’. My country wrong needs my help.”

— Peter Halsten Thorkelson

I have to agree with RinaFarina on the original quote, though. Too many people think of just “My country, right or wrong”. Good one, RinaF.

JEFFIEKINS Thought your post the most fair and insightful today . BRIAN Rush is a DJ who was a college drop out. Why do you worry what that moron says? He represents nobody.

As for being pro-abortion and anti-death penalty, I thought liberals were the bleeding hearts who stood up for the innocent.. Kill a baby but spare a rapist/murderer? Gotta love that compassion. I know, those killers were misunderstood victims of a bad environment while babies are vicious future humans..

Wow, cdward – sounds like socialism or something scary like that!!

Johnson/Boswell/Mencken – all good quotes but good old P. T. Barnum had a handle on it, too!

Lew, considering that you could not read either my remarks or Jeffie’s, I am amazed that THE HARTFORD COURANT prints any of your letters. Jeffie first mentioned Rush Limbaugh, and neither of us said anything good about him. I am glad that you agree that he should be ignored. Tell your fellow Republicans that.

We established that “pro-abortion & anti-death penalty” describes no one, so I do not see your reason for repeating it like a parrot. No one wants to kill babies, excepting your beloved Bush-Dick who has the blood of thousands on his hands. It’s interesting that you have, many times, shrieked about how people called you a baby-killer in the 1970s but you slaver for the opportunity to pin the label on others.

Yep. Libs are good for the environment. Go live in Bejing or Chernobyl.

Or any beach along the Gulf of Mexico.

…oh, wait. That was Obama’s fault. Never mind.