Q: Can a person live on human flesh?
A: Here’s what Wikipedia says: “Wacky Packages are a series of trading cards featuring parodies of American consumer products. The cards were produced by the Topps Company beginning in 1967, usually in a sticker format. The original series sold for two years, and the concept proved popular enough that it has been revived every few years since. Per trader legend, at one time the product outsold Topps baseball cards.”
Q: What the hell happened to my retirement money?
A: Thank God Social Security wasn’t privatized! What’s that? IRAs ARE privatized Social Security? Oh. Oops. My bad. It’s a good thing nobody I know has saved a penny.
I have to say, when I noticed big companies going private last year, I was puzzled. Why give up the limited liability and the rights that come with incorporation?
Oh, yeah. This is why.
Q: I’m a Philadelphia sports fan. I’ve been waiting for a championship since 1983. PLEASE tell me that society won’t collapse until after the Worlds Series!
A: You’re a Philadelphia sports fan and you care about the Phillies? Unlikely. E-A-G-L-E-S!
Q: What do I need to look for? What’s the first sign that I should start hoarding Vitamin Water and porn?
A:
It’s pretty obvious that we’re heading for a revolution in the next few months. But what will the new revolutionary government look like? I have a few guesses.
1-The most likely series of events is President Bush declaring himself emporer as American soldiers keep freedom fighters at bay. I see McCain as Brutus in this scenario. I truly believe he’d try to save the republic, even though his “country first” would have been a great slogan for Hitler.
Sadly, I’m guessing the republic wouldn’t last long in this scenario. America’s Augustus will be Sarah Palin. Don’t you think? It really will be a lot like the America we have now. But with less abortions, more hunting, and concentration camps for liberals. No hippies, at least.
2- Less likely would be a true communist takeover. I picture a junta led by Bernie Sanders, and featuring various NGO heads. Bernie would nationalize the banks and heavy industry, and round up rich people for re-education. Within weeks, fear and misery would be utterly destroyed. All Americans would have a good, interesting job. And it would mean something.
I’m rooting hard for this one.
3- The last scenario imagines that the state is simply smashed, and we’re left with an utter vacuum. Imagine Ron Paul and his crazy followers storming the capital and “liberating” everyone. They’d burn down the capitol and remove all trappings of government. This is sort of a worst case scenario. Nast, brutish, and short.
But hey, at least you’d feel ALIVE for a while!
And now: comics.
Here’s my solution to the economic crisis:
1. National debt amnesty. All mortgage, credit card, student loan, and payroll loan debt is forgiven immediately. Immediatey implement single-payer national health care by extending medicare to everyone who wants it for free. Instruct GM to run 3 shifts a day in every plant to build plug-in electric cars to be distributed for free to any American who wants one. Build enough free apartments for every American who doesn’t own a home.
2. Pass an immediate radically graduated income tax to pay for #1. Millionaires pay 90%. Billionaires pay 99.9%. Party’s over.
3. If rich people have a problem with #2, buy guillotines.
4. Pay for #3 and #1 with new 100% estate taxes for millionaires.
See? Not so hard. Everybody wins. Except rich people. But they’ve been winning for too long.
I’m experimenting with brightness and contrast. Does this make it harder or easier to read?
You may or may not know that For Better or For Worse has “rebooted” to the beginning of the Patterson story. Originally it was going to simply be reruns. Lynn Johnston, the creator of the foobiverse, was going to retire and travel the world with the real life John Patterson. Sadly, The real Mr. Johnston left Lynn/Elly for a MUCH younger woman. For worse! And, he’s gone! To me that title always represented a sticking-it-out. Apparently not. It’s interesting to read the old comics through that lens.
