Sticks #01

I made a comic strip.  Enjoy!

A Slight Concern…

I’m just as excited as the next person for Obama’s inauguration this week.  It’s more than just the appointment of a new president; it is really a cultural event.  It is a good thing that we now have a leader that we can trust in, however there is a fine line between “trust” and “blind devotion”.  As much as I didn’t like the man, one good thing about the Bush administration was that there was a constant stream of skepticism around any action it pursued.  My concern is that, with the shift to Obama, this skepticism will vanish and any decision his administration makes will be met with universal praise.  Even worse, I fear that the devotion some have towards Obama will lead to a sense of mistrust towards those who do question him, in a sense making it taboo to question the government.  While these fears may be groundless, I do urge any of my fellow Obama supporters to celebrate a job well done this upcoming week, but also to keep your eyes on the news in the future and make sure he’s doing what YOU elected him to do.  After all, he is YOUR president, he got where he is today because of YOU, and now it is up to YOU to ensure he keeps his promises.

Always The Same Story

Some kid who shot his parents, killing his mom and injuring his dad, because they were limiting his “Halo 3″ play time was convicted of murder today. Now before anyone tries to blame this on the video game itself let’s look at the bigger picture. First of all, despite having been wounded by the kid, the father still ended up supporting him in court. Talk about giving your kids everything they want! This guy even let his little angel get away with the murder of his spouse. Next, we see that the kid had been planning the attack for weeks (which is why he was ultimately convicted) even though the lawyers claim he “had no idea… they would be dead forever.” It seems odd to me that not at some point during the scheming process did this kid ever think that maybe killing someone in the real world is different than killing someone in a video game. And if he really was THAT distanced from reality, don’t blame the video game, blame whatever it was that alienated him so greatly from the rest of society. Finally, millions of people own and regularly play “Halo 3″ and they’re all fine, so obviously this was merely a freak incident. A lot of people try to blame the media (games, TV, movies, etc.) when shit like this happens, but if they dare look a little closer it’s easy to see that the fault is actually with the family and/or society itself. But, of course, nobody wants to feel like they’re a bad parent, bad neighbor, bad citizen, or whatver, so they channel all their self-loathing into an easy scapegoat, “Halo 3″ in this case.

http://www.gamespot.com/news/blogs/sidebar/909182374/26745240/so-called-halo-3-killer-convicted-of-murdering-mom.html

Give Him The Boot

George W. Bush’s eight-year reign of terror comes to a close next week, yet he still seems delusionally optimistic that future generations will look back on him as a halfway decent president. While fessing up to a select few of his administration’s catalogue of embarrassments, he still can’t come to terms with his more epic failures such as the ironically titled “Operation Iraqi Freedom” and the sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina. None too surprising, his last days in the White House will be spent giving “legacy speeches” to try and convince the general public that his presidency wasn’t that bad, or that he did the best that he could. The only question is whether the public will judge him based on the quality of these speeches, or the quality in which he left the country. Supposing they do the latter, it looks Nixon will lose his title of worst president ever.

http://news.aol.com/article/bush-defends-record-in-exit-interview/301964

Out With The Old…

I wish the world would finally come to the realization that a “2-state plan” for Gaza simply isn’t going to work. They’ve been fighting over this tiny strip of land for millenia and still haven’t accomplished a damn thing. It does make me wonder what’s so special about this baron little patch of desert and the only thing I can conceive of is nothing. I say the Jews let the Arabs take over and then relocate somewhere a little nicer. I’ll bet there are some more scenic areas in South America or Southeast Asia that wouldn’t put up much of a fight. And, while the Zionists claim that it’s their birthright to inhabit Israel, it’s really akin to inheriting that ugly set of china from Aunt Gloria. Sell off your old shit and use it to buy yourself something nice.