Remember the "Dean Scream," the celebratory whoop that ended Howard Dean's presidential ambitions? Does that not seem like nothing compared to the vein-popping whackadoodlery coming out of Republican congressmen? And yet somehow, their careers do not end.

So far, the most popular aspect of this strip is the hue of John Boehner. A couple readers have suggested that he needs to be more orange. My response is that Photoshop unfortunately doesn't come with fluorescent colors. I think we should just start calling him John the Orange, or simply His Orangeness.

Longtime reader James sent me this photo from his friend Lara, taken in Missouri.


Apparently it has been up since at least November, according to this site.

Lately I've noticed a number of progressives throwing around the term "Obamacare" as a synonym for health insurance reform in a casual, non-critical way. Seems to me that "Obamacare" originated on the right, as a way of invoking the failed "Hillarycare" of the '90s. At least, I saw it used a lot in hacktacular anti-reform editorial cartoons. I even addressed its usage in Slowpoke a few months ago:


Personally, I find constructions like "Obamacare" and "Hillarycare" implicitly derogatory. They invoke the dreaded "nanny state" meme, and also suggest the absurdity that the politician himself or herself is hubristically prescribing medical care instead of increasing people's access to doctors. Also, the term "Obamacare" is getting sort of tired, like a really unfunny SNL catchphrase that won't go away. So don't be a chump! Drop the "Obamacare" cliché and, even better, start describing our current system as "F#@kYouCare."

One thing that drives me nuts about the health care debate is that the teabaggers make this big manly-man show of standing up for ordinary Americans when they're really fighting for the rights of insurance companies to bone us all. If you look at their websites, they're full of wannabe-heroic chest-puffing -- like these guys have watched too many action movies and now need some revolutionary battle to fill an existential void in their lives. All this uproar, so health insurance CEOs can freely plunge their giant death phalli into the public body! It's masochism at its most ironic.

Anyway, it was nice to see Obama return to pre-election form, at last, these past few weeks. More of that, please. As much as I wanted a public option, I would urge progressives to rejoice rather than carp about what could have been. Ending the cruelty towards people with pre-existing conditions is a big deal. Also remember that a significant number of Democrats are DINOs. And, of course, we're not exactly living in the most enlightened times.

Go have a look at the memo being faxed to Washington state congresspeople by an anti-health care reform group in Utah. It's like the ramblings of some wild-eyed cult leader. It meshes a bit with what I saw on TPM earlier today about a Virginia woman declaring civil war would break out if reform passed.

If you want to see something really messed up, go to the link mentioned at the bottom of the memo. That's all I'm sayin'.

This one came about when an ad for "Food Wars" popped up on this very website. Even before "Food Wars," I'd been amazed at the number of "Iron Chef" knockoffs. I can't even keep track of the Extreme Cooking shows anymore -- a reader just informed me that there's one called "Conviction Kitchen" with teams of convicts as chefs. I didn't even know about that!

I'd like to dedicate the zombies in this cartoon to Brian McFadden. (I think he knows why.)

I've been invited to speak at Ohio State University's 2010 Festival of Cartoon Art, which will take place October 14-17. Some of my favorite cartoonists are among the presenters:
There will also be a special panel on the late Jay Kennedy of King Features Syndicate, featuring Groening, Bill Griffith, Brendan Burford, and Patrick McDonnell. I'm pretty stoked to be included among such cartoonin' luminaries! Hoping to meet Roz Chast, after I missed her when she came through Charlottesville a little while ago.

Apropos of our ongoing theme of nutballery, I thought I would share my memories of the very first time I encountered Glenn Beck. It was the summer of 2006, and Mr. Slowpoke and I were driving to the Outer Banks of North Carolina for a week at the beach. We stopped for dinner at a pizzeria just shy of the coast. The place had multiple TVs blaring CNN Headline News. As we sat there, I noticed the talking head -- some guy with a buzzcut -- was ranting about how scandalous it was that prisoners were being given ice cream. We had no choice but to listen to the man's unhinged diatribes throughout our meal. I can't remember everything else he said, but I do recall leaving the pizza joint feeling strange that everyone had just sat through that like it was normal. Mr. Slowpoke and I couldn't stop talking about it as we finished our drive. "Who was that thug?" we wondered. And now we know.

We're currently at 399 Slowpoke fans on Facebook. Won't you be the one who pushes us into the 400 club?

You can also find out about things like my frustrations with frozen broccoli if you follow me on Twitter.

[UPDATE: Thanks to Steve and Justin for rising to the cause!]

If only the teabaggers would channel their anger into punk, the world might be a better place.



Be sure to wait for the chainsaw! I do feel sorry for the guitar, though.

I pretty much blogged about this cartoon last week in my post about the country going crazy. In a sense, this is Part Two of the "Suspicious Minds" strip about global warming deniers included in that post.

One thing that struck me about that NYT article about tea partiers was the strangeness of this very sweet-sounding retired woman embracing a movement tinged with the threat of armed rebellion. The wholesome-looking woman in the snowman sweater is an attempt to show this disconnect.

Reader Gerard points out the uncanny resemblance between House Minority dipwad John Boehner and Taylor Negron, a.k.a. the pizza guy from "Fast Times at Ridgemont High," and more recently one of the comedians in "The Aristocrats." When the docudrama of this era of political folly is made, Mr. Negron should be a shoo-in for the role.

Maybe I gave that title to my second book a little too soon. A number of things I've read lately have me convinced we're becoming a nation of cultists, and the future doesn't look pretty. The global warming "hoaxers" think that climate change is a giant conspiracy (see related cartoon at left). Meanwhile, things are actually getting worse than people thought. Creationists are seizing on this public mistrust of scientists to advance their decades-old battle against the teaching of evolution. The Tea Party movement has channeled legitimate frustrations with the economy into a bizarre tangle of conspiracies against the federal government. And as Frank Rich put it, the most significant -- and ominous -- political event of February was Joseph Stack flying his plane into an IRS building, killing an employee, and being lionized in some quarters as a hero. All of this, of course, is goaded on by hyperspecialized political media that convinces people of their own reality bubble, and the incendiary rhetoric of pundits like Glenn Beck.

We truly do seem to be entering a new Dark Age, even worse than the morass of the Bush years. The country is deeply confused and heavily armed. Throw in several more years of economic failure, and you've got a recipe for disaster. Not to be a downer or anything.

The Democrats have been courting the Republicans like a lovelorn suitor who just won't give up. It seems like more effort is being put into appearing "bipartisan" than into actually selling the health care bill. Note to Dems: people don't give a flying Froot Loop about bipartisanship -- they're worried about their jobs and the crushing cost of health care. Just do something already, and let Repubzel call you a meanie. All she really respects is power anyway.