TT: STATE OF EMERGENCY

 

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Okay, first off let’s get this out of the way: yes I know that you were probably expecting the fourth panel to incorporate Sparky somehow! But the setup just didn’t work for me, using him rather than generic penguins. Don’t worry, current events will be impacting Sparky in some terrible fashion sometime soon. He probably wasn’t born in America, so I imagine he’s here on a green card. If he even bothered to go through proper channels, and you can guess how much respect he has for those. I think we’ll eventually find out how well that works out for him.

In the meantime … hoo boy, this was some kind of week. We are fully in “mad king” territory now. And I don’t know about you, but I for one am beginning to wonder if President Businessman is *quite* as savvy as we’ve been led to believe. If, you have a 401K, well, I feel your pain. And share it.

There were some bright spots this week though, and we have to celebrate our wins when we can. The Cory Booker sort-of filibuster, and of course the Wisconsin Supreme Court election, in which Elon’s candidate was thoroughly trounced. (I literally just had to google that to make sure both of those were actually this week, because ... a lot happened this week.) And there were the massive protests across the country on Saturday. As I’m writing this, I just got back from the march in New York City, which filled Fifth Avenue sidewalk to sidewalk for at least a mile. New Yorker writer Philip Gourevitch said he asked a high ranking police officer why there were so few police around, and was told: “We did not expect anything like this.”

Every time I go to a thing like this I kick myself for not having a decent pro-level camera. My father was a photographer and I always had a good 35mm SLR (a Nikkormat, for the photography buffs), and for awhile I had what was at the time a decent digital Nikon SLR, but that camera and more importantly, the lenses, went missing in the post-divorce chaos. I'd like to get back into it but I honestly don't know where to start, and this seems like the worst possible time to be investing in imported consumer electronics. Sigh. Anyway here are some phone pics!

Also, this was kind of fun, a couple of readers sent pics of themselves wearing my shirts at the rallies. Here's Chris H. in York PA representing with the "current state of affairs is not to my liking” shirt. I'm also told that there was at least one “currently clean on opsec!” shirt out there.

And then there was this sign, from @susanmct.bsky.social on Bluesky. (Yes, I see the typo, these things happen!)



(LAST MINUTE EDIT): As long as I'm sharing pics of TT stuff out in the wild, a friend texted me this last night -- a bartender in Brooklyn wearing the Sparky shirt! Something I myself have never run across outside of my own events. I've blurred out his face because I have no way of getting his permission to show it. I know and like the bar, I'm going to have to make a point of getting out there again sometime. And on the off chance he's a subscriber: Hi!!



The newsletter is long on pics and short on text this week, because it has been one hell of a week, and Saturday is/was (depending on whether you are me writing this, or you reading it) my birthday. I think most of this new cartoon is self-explanatory, but a couple notes on the final panel(s). The guy who “just wanted to use the ‘r’ slur” was inspired by a passage from this New York magazine article from last January:

And, in case you missed it, Trump did in fact take a long golf weekend after the big tariff announcement, but not before consulting with far-right crazy person and apparent presidential special friend Laura Loomer to discuss who he should fire from the National Security Council.

Finally, wishlist thanks to Susan R. And in the immortal words of our philosopher businessman president — HANK TOUGH!

Until next time,

Dan

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