Monthly Archives: September 2001

One more correction to my foreword in the just-released Volume 1 of The Blackhawk Archives.  The little bio of me says I've collaborated with Sergio Aragonés on more than "60" issues of Groo the Wanderer.  That should be 160.  And, hey, wasn't this a great time to be bringing out a reprint collection of comics about the days before the U.S. entered World War II?

As you may have noted, we've done another facelift of this site's design…last one for a while, I promise, I hope.  (If you want to see one of the best-designed websites around, go to George Harrison's allthingsmustpass.com.  See what you can do when you have enough money to get Terry Gilliam to design your page.)

• Perils of the Blame Game by Joshua Micah Marshall, New York Post
• Crushing a Contrarian by Jill Stewart, San Francisco Weekly
• Democracy Held Hostage by David Talbot, Salon
• Eulogy In Honor of Mark Bingham by Senator John McCain, R-Arizona
• Racial Profiling at the Airport by Michael Kinsley, Slate
• Falwell Should Have Listened to the Feminists by Robert Scheer, Los Angeles Times

And let's note that a prediction made here a week or so ago has already come true: Folks are finding ways to link Osama bin Laden to George W. Bush's oil deals.  Here's a link to an article that may or may not be true.  And here's a link to a Judicial Watch press release which, since it's Larry Klayman and Judicial Watch, probably isn't.

My long-time friend Joe Brancatelli has been writing important articles about the airline industry for years, and they were (note the past-tense) available at www.biztravel.com.  But don't click there to go read any since that on-line travel agency went under last week.  Joe's fine pieces are now available at his own website.

And now, remember what you paid to get in, as we present more musings on what's been happening…

• The current in-the-stratosphere popularity ratings for George W. Bush are interesting because, of course, they have little to do with George W. Bush or anything he's done.  He's read a few speeches well and ad-libbed poorly, but does anyone really know, let alone approve of, the White House strategy for coping with Osama bin Laden and his merry band of suicidal terrorists?  That Americans would rally around their President at such a time is unsurprising — though I have to wonder if President Al Gore, doing and saying the exact same things, would have the same support.  Seems to me we'd be hearing a lot of complaints that it's been more than two weeks and we haven't bombed anyone into oblivion.  Just as Nixon could go to Red China without arousing the ire of Conservatives and Bill Clinton could trim welfare without a lot of Liberal outrage, a Republican prez can take his time about charging into military action.
• Bill Maher may wind up being the poster boy for a frightening disease that is seeping through our still-reeling population.  It has to do with labeling as "unpatriotic," not only any criticism of our military but, in some cases, any facet of the Executive branch of government, as well.  I have never been a big fan of flag-waving, not because there's anything wrong with singing "God Bless America" but because it too often accompanies a kind of jingoistic, unreal form of denial.  As others have noted, saying "I love my country" is pretty much the least one can do, and a real patriot does things for his or her country that require a little more sacrifice than putting a $6.95 flag on one's car.  A solution to the current crisis may begin with that kind of thing but if it ends there, nothing will get fixed.
• Right now, a lot of the conservative press seems to be railing against what it calls the "Blame America First" crowd, and those who are opposing our President.  Trouble is, there doesn't seem to be much of a crowd there.  The examples they cite are trivial and inconsequential, and there are so many straw men being erected, Ray Bolger's estate should be getting royalties.  I can only surmise that the self-proclaimed "Real Americans" are getting in practice because they know that a lot more criticism is possible, if not probable.  What we've seen to date is something of a preemptive strike.
• In the meantime, the travel industry is in chaos.  I'm getting e-mails from Vegas hotels offering me rooms for nothing or next-to-nothing, and National Airlines — which was already in bankruptcy — is offering tickets for $25-$50.  Here, however, is the problem: I have no fear of flying but it's now become understandably inconvenient.  If I have to get to LAX two hours before my one-hour flight to Las Vegas, I might as well drive.  That way, I don't have to worry about being searched and probed to see if I'm carrying nail clippers.  (But the truth is that I probably won't go at all.  Vegas doesn't sound like a lot of fun these days…)
• I fear we're in for a tasteless spate of movies, TV shows and even comic books that fictionalize the events in and around the World Trade Center disaster, all seeking to make coin or poach on the emotions but hiding behind the moral cover of "tribute."  Even though some of the authors may have the best of intentions, I wonder if the greatest tribute is not to leave the whole, tragic event in its grim reality.  It will be especially easy for super-hero comic books to make this mistake.  For years, disasters of this sort (or worse) have occurred or been prevented about five times a week in the nation's funnybooks.  The whole notions of cataclysm and heroism, as they relate to the world in which you and I reside, are wildly out of skew in a mythos where whole universes get eradicated and thousands of people can fly and tear down brick walls.  Comics can pay Lip Service to the victims or, more likely, the "real super-heroes," (i.e., rescue workers) and that may impress those who cream when their super-hero comics connect at all with Real Life.  But I'll bet most of it will be morally indistinguishable from jacking up the prices on American flags these days.

Back in the days of silent comedy, it was not uncommon for cartoonists to write gags for films, or even to get in front of the camera and perform them.  The great Harry Langdon once drew cartoons for a living and so did Larry Semon and several others who worked only as gagmen.  One of the behind-the-camera gents was Ernie Bushmiller, who wrote for a number of comedians — most notably, Harold Lloyd — before settling down to this life's work.  That life's work involved writing and drawing a comic strip that we now know as Nancy.

He did not start the strip; not exactly.  In 1922, a cartoonist named Larry Worthington launched Fritzi Ritz, which was about a flapper (i.e., a single, fun-loving lady of the twenties).  In 1925, Bushmiller began writing and drawing it and, a few years later, introduced the into the feature, Fritzi's frizzy-haired niece.  As Elzie Segar found when his squint-eyed sailor character began crowding all others off the stage of his Thimble Theater, a great supporting player has a way of taking over.  Increasingly, the jokes in Fritzi Ritz were about the niece and, by 1938, the quiet takeover was complete.  Just as Segar's strip became Popeye, Ms. Ritz's feature was renamed for its new star.

Bushmiller produced his strip until his death in 1982, although the last few years were a morass of recycled or reprinted gags, many of them redrawn by ghosts.  Al Plastino drew it for two years imitating Bushmiller, then it was handed off to Mark Lasky and Jerry Scott and from them, to its present proprietors, Guy and Brad Gilchrist.  I like the work of the latter two regimes but something is missing…some core simplicity that made Bushmiller's Nancy a favorite, especially of the very young.  Elsewhere on this site, Charles Schulz is quoted as saying:

Something amazing happens every time a newspaper tries to drop Nancy.  Readers don't just get angry…they get militant.  When a paper drops Li'l Abner or Brenda Starr or Dick Tracy, they get a lot of complaints.  No matter what the strip is, it's someone's favorite and they complain.  But when a paper drops Nancy, they don't get complaints.  They get death threats.  People get so upset, the paper has to put it back immediately.  That strip is such a part of people's lives…their childhoods.  For a lot of them, it was the first strip they were ever able to read.  It's like your old playground.  You may not want to go back to it and swing on the swings or climb on the monkey bars…but you like the idea that it's still there.  Everything in this world changes so much it's nice when something doesn't…

I believe that.  It was, in a very odd way, a great strip…and it also makes for a great game.  My pal, the prolific Scott McCloud, has a great website at — where else? — www.scottmccloud.com.  Somewhere in there, and I'll let you find it for yourself 'cause everything there's worth a browse, he has the rules for Five Card Nancy, a card game that uses Nancy panels to build non sequitur (or sometimes even sequitur) continuities.  I've played it and it's really quite fun…though once, I played against a fellow who cheated.  He had a couple of Sluggos up his sleeve.

If reading Scott's explanation makes you eager to get into a game, Dave White has invented an online solitaire version.  You can get to it by clicking right here.  It's not as good as playing with actual clipped panels but it's a lot cheaper and less sacrilegious than cutting up old Nancy comic books.

Here's a mystery that perhaps some fellow animation buff out there can help me solve.  It involves the 1949 Tex Avery cartoon, The House of Tomorrow.  The film is narrated by Frank Graham — all but for one short gag for which the narrator momentarily turns into Don Messick.  Then, when they get to the next bit, he's back to being Graham again.  If one studies the music and art style, one concludes that the Messick-narrated segment was done later — probably years later.  There's an abrupt jump in the music, suggesting that the bit was inserted after the cartoon was completely scored.  (Also, Messick and Daws Butler both always agreed that Don got his first cartoon job, which was with Tex, after Daws was already working for the director.  House of Tomorrow was made some time before Daws's first work in the field.  Graham died in 1950.)

Anyway, the inescapable deduction here is that the cartoon was completely filmed and perhaps even released…and then, years later, someone — probably not even Tex; probably Hanna and Barbera — went in and replaced one joke with a different one.  This may have been done for a re-release.  And the inescapable questions are, assuming all this is true, what was replaced and when and by whom?

I have a couple of corrections and an apology to make here.  This week, DC Comics brought out Volume 1 of The Blackhawk Archives, a collection of early stories of what was just about the first — and for many years, most popular — war strip.  I did the foreword and because I was rushed, I made two dumb mistakes in it.  One is that I identified Chuck Cuidera, who drew the early Blackhawk comics, as the creator of the super-hero character, The Blue Beetle.  Chuck claimed that at times but his claim is arguable, at best, and I should not have repeated it the way I did.  There are other claimants, some of whom seem to have at least as much evidence on their side, if not more.  So I take no position on who created The Blue Beetle.

The other mistake involves an apology to Dan Thompson, who operates The Unofficial Blackhawk Comics Website, which you can reach by clicking on that name.  Rushing my deadline, I grabbed a quote off his website (with his okay) but in my hurry, I edited it badly and…well, here's a note Dan sent me that explains it all:

I just picked up my copy of the Blackhawk Archive. Naturally, I read the forward immediately since you had mentioned that you were quoting me about the Skyrocket. Boy, I sure wish I'd had a chance to read that before it was published. You took my statement out of context and completely changed the intent and meaning. It sounds like you did not actually read the entire article about the Skyrocket on my website. If you did, I don't see how you could have missed the fact that I was arguing that the "common knowledge" that the Skyrocket was a poor aircraft was completely wrong. The Navy did not adopt it because it was a poor performer but because of logistics concerns and the Navy's outdated ideas of the proper size for a carrier plane. This is what my website says about the Skyrocket:

It is common knowledge in the comics community that the F5F-1 was a failure but it was used for the Blackhawks because it looked cool. It does have a unique look, but it was not the failure commonly believed. The F5F-1's test pilot, "Connie" Converse, in 1980 recalled "the flying qualities for the XF5F-1 were good overall. The counter-rotating props were a nice feature, virtually eliminating the torque effect on takeoff … single-engine performance was good, rudder forces tended to be high in single engine configuration. Spin recovery was positive but elevator forces required for recovery were unusually high. All acrobatics were easily performed, and of course forward visibility was excellent." In 1941, Navy pilots tested the Skyrocket in a fly-off against the Spitfire, Hurricane, P-40, P-39, XFL-1 Airabonita, XF4U, F4F, and F2A. LDCR Crommelin, in charge of the test, stated in a 1985 letter to George Skurla, Grumman president, "for instance, I remember testing the XF5F against the XF4U on climb to the 10.000 foot level. I pulled away from the Corsair so fast I thought he was having engine trouble. The F5F was a carrier pilot's dream, as opposite rotating propellers eliminated all torque and you had no large engine up front to look around to see the LSO (landing signal officer) … The analysis of all the data definitely favored the F5F, and the Spitfire came in a distant second…ADM Towers told me that securing spare parts…and other particulars which compounded the difficulty of building the twin-engine fighter, had ruled out the Skyrocket and that the Bureau had settled on the Wildcat for mass production." It is true that the Skyrocket had some developmental problems, but no more than any other aircraft of similar radical design. The Navy was also concerned that the F5F was overweight, but this was more a problem of their expectations than reality. The Navy was used to comparatively small, light biplanes. The newer, high performance monoplanes were all overweight by that standard. The F4U Corsair weighed more than the F5F, even though it had a single engine compared to the Skyrocket's two.

The purpose of the whole paragraph is to show that the "common knowledge" described in the first sentence, the one you quoted, is not true. I'm afraid this has diminished some of the enjoyment I anticipated in seeing this book. I guess the only good thing is that I do have the website as a forum to explain that I was seriously misrepresented and point out the real story. Of course, it will only be seen by a small percentage of the people who read this book, but it's the best I can do.

This is M.E. again: Having been misquoted and mis-excerpted myself on many occasions, I am embarrassed that I accidentally did it to Dan.  So I'm posting the correction here and I'm going to run it in my Comics Buyer's Guide column.  And if anyone can think of any other way I can bring it to the attention of those who purchase what is a very fine book, by the way, please suggest it.  And again, Dan, my apologies.

This evening, I attended a screening of the 1979 Bob Fosse film All That Jazz at the Motion Picture Academy.  A brand-new, restored print — in stereo, which the original release was not — was followed by a brief panel with some of those involved in the film's creation.  Unfortunately, the movie was preceded by a long, condescending speech by some U.S.C. film professor who didn't seem to realize we weren't there to hear him explain the film to us…and badly, at that.

After about ten minutes of him telling us what was in this movie we were about to see, the house was getting audibly restless.  You could hear muttered remarks and, pretty soon, everyone began applauding every time he came to the end of a sentence, hoping he'd get the hint and stop.  On and on, he went, oblivious to the fact that he had long since worn out his welcome at the mike.  Finally, he said, "Lastly…" and there was a huge burst of cheers and applause — but still he soldiered on, concluding only moments before we would (don't ask me how) have gotten our hands on tar and feathers.  Unfortunately, since he consumed so much time at the outset, the panel at the end was truncated, and most people left before it started, anyway.

In-between, we saw the film, which I discussed in an article here on this site.  Seeing it with an audience, as I haven't done since its initial release, I'd forgotten how funny so much of it is…and how so many wonderful moments occur just because of the slightest look or reaction on Roy Scheider's face.  It was really a film meant to be seen on a big screen and with a big audience and, viewing it that way, I found myself enjoying it much more than I ever have on home video.  I still have mixed feelings about the basic propriety of Fosse's portrayals of himself and those around him…but it really is an amazingly effective film.  One of these days, I hope to write a really long article about it.  If I do, I promise not to try and read it to a theater-full of filmgoers waiting for the movie to start.

Of all the late night comedy hosts who made heartfelt, moving speeches upon their return to the airwaves, one moved me more than any other.  Letterman and Leno were fine, but if you tuned in The Daily Show With Jon Stewart, you saw Mr. Stewart give a wonderful, from-the-gut summation of what he was feeling and what it all meant — certainly one of the most eloquent things I've seen on TV in the time since the towers fell.

If you missed it, the text is currently up on the Comedy Central website and, yes, I'll provide you a link to it.  However, if it's still available when you go there, I would suggest clicking the video link on the same page, because Stewart's emotional delivery is half the eloquence.  It's long — about eight minutes — and it may moisten your eyes.  But at a point in my week where I felt I was starting to get numb to talk of the tragedy, it renewed the chills.

I'm trying not to think a lot about you-know-what but every now and then, I browse Ye Olde Internet for interesting comments and facts, and here are some more pieces I found interesting…

• The Enemy Hates What We Are by Joshua Micah Marshall, New York Post
• No Time For Partisan Pleaders by E. J. Dionne, Washington Post
• Hijackers Targeted Pentagon, Data Shows by Don Phillips, Washington Post
• No Taxation Without Reregulation by Joe Brancatelli, BizTravel.Com

The cover above is from a combination comic book and military fact magazine that Dell Publishing issued in 1941.  No, I don't know who wrote or drew it or anything else about its publishing history.  It just seemed like a good time to post it here.  And here we have a few more links to articles that I thought said something that needed to be said about the tragedies of the other day and what might happen next, even if I don't agree with every word of them…

• Right, Left and Just Wrong by Joe Conason, New York Observer
• Has Everything Changed? by Michael Kinsley, Slate
• bin Laden Seeks Islamic Uprising by John Diamond and Mike Dorning, Chicago Tribune
• Truth or Consequences by William Saletan, Slate
• Where Were the Lobbyists for the Public Good? by Arianna Huffington, Los Angeles Times Syndicate
• Invoking God's Thunder by William F. Buckley

Here are some more random thoughts from me which I offer here for whatever they may be worth…

• There's an old saying that I just made up and it goes like this: The insufferable thing about Conservatives is that they always act like they have an exclusive on faith and patriotism.  The insufferable thing about Liberals is that they always act like they have an exclusive on intellect and compassion.  In the coming days, we shall see my just-invented old adage proven, time and again.
• Since I got started "reviewing" the late night shows' returns, I might as well finish up: I thought Jay Leno's first show was quite good and admired his not-unsuccessful attempt to offer up a monologue the second night.  I have a casual acquaintance with Jay and, for what it's worth, find him to be a much smarter and more sincere person than the straw man with a big chin that some of his detractors have erected.  I wish though that, instead of rolling out one of his motorcycles to auction for a charity auction, Jay had found a non-self-serving way to remind us that he and his wife have been donating and raising money to fight the oppression of the Taliban for years now…and that maybe, if more folks had, the problems America now faces would be a little less acute.  But perhaps there was no way to say that.
• Conan O'Brien, whom I usually think is terrific, is doing fine now but he disappointed me with a shallow, nervous opening talk his first night back.  Like Craig Kilborn the previous night, he seemed to think that the most pressing problem confronting America today is how to resume doing a late night comedy show.  I don't think any of these guys have to apologize for being back on the air, or to alibi that the President asked them to go back on.  They're back because that's what they do and an increasing percentage of America wants to try and normalize their lives.
• Which is as it should be.  We have an unfortunate tendency in this country to feel like, when someone close to us dies, we have to sick ourselves up with mourning to prove that the deceased was important to us.  It's like, "If I can go on without him or her, it trivializes the loss."  No, it doesn't.  What happened last week is depressing but you can only cry so much before you begin extending the damage.  Broadway shows are closing prematurely because, The Producers aside, no one's going.  Businesses of all kinds are suffering in other ways.  We can't undo what happened to the World Trade Center but we can prevent, or at least minimize, further destruction of the restaurant down the street by going out for dinner.  It sure beats sitting home, watching (a) people on the news talking about their lost loved ones and (b) political point-men trying to spin this thing to their advantage.
• About the latter: I have a little directory in my Internet Explorer of websites that embrace extreme, opposing political opinions.  Like, I have one bookmarked that is maniacally for Gun Control and one that is just as adamantly against.  I have one for abortion rights, one against, and so on.  There are about fifteen corresponding pairs and I often find their blindness fascinating…though usually not in a good way.
• Tuesday morn, when the buildings were crumbling and we were all still trying to figure out what was happening, I was trying to get to a news site but I blundered into the wrong directory and got one of those web pages…either the pro-gun or anti-gun, I forget which.  (They're more alike than their operators would ever agree.)  I don't think the second tower had even collapsed and there were already messages up, trying to say, "Well, this proves conclusively that our cause is right."  Before the day was out, every single site in that directory would be trying to turn the tragedies to their advantage, essentially demanding unconditional surrender from those who had ever argued against them. (I once visited a site whereupon people debated who was the better dancer — Gene Kelly or Fred Astaire.  It doesn't seem to be online anymore but if it were, there'd be someone saying, "The tragedies of 9/11/01 are the responsibility of all you morons who refused to accept that Fred could out-dance Gene any day of the week…")
• Therein, I believe, lies one of the dangers ahead for America: Our inability to settle or even suspend emotional, unresolvable arguments.  Jerry Falwell tried to use the occasion to bash gays and the A.C.L.U., and had to back off and apologize.  Unfortunately, most will not get called on it when they try to score similar, contemptuous points.  I even came across one ultra-conservative site that was demanding that, in the name of patriotism, everyone who ever said George W. Bush was dumb should admit they were wrong and apologize.  (Fifty bucks says this person would not be faulting those who, in the corresponding situation, criticized President Gore.)
• Frankly, speaking just for me, I think it's going to be a long time before I'd be secure in any opinion of President Bush.  Certainly, an awful lot of things that his predecessors did now look smarter or dumber than they did at the time, and Bush is so far being evaluated, not on results but on photo-ops and speeches.  I think those things and all the stuff about his garbled vocabulary are trivia.  If the executive branch winds up doing the right thing, vis-a-vis the terrorist situation, he'll deserve to be hailed as a good or even great president.  If he doesn't, he doesn't.  Ultimately, the words will pale in significance compared to the results.  I'd like it if he seemed more able to inspire confidence but, in the long run, I don't think any politician's public image is as important as what he or she actually does.

That's all that occurs to me at the moment.  The next time I update this page, I'm going to try and talk more about comics and animation, less about people dying.  Let's see if I make it.

Lastly: Understandably lost in recent news was the passing of Fred DeCordova, of natural causes, at age 90.  Producing and directing The Jack Benny Show and Burns and Allen for TV, and producing The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson were only a few notches in an incredible career that also included motion pictures and the Broadway stage.  For a time, Mr. Carson was firing producers — among them, a couple of his closest friends — at a brisk clip.  When DeCordova stepped into the post, folks were probably betting on how many weeks he'd last, but Fred fooled 'em all.  He lasted more than twenty years in what they called the hottest seat — excepting, perhaps, Johnny's — in all of show biz.

Fred was a strange, frenetic man, capable of both great charm and killer instinct in the same conversation.  He produced a show that introduced some of America's top comedians but seemed to have little talent for spotting comic talent.  Almost every stand-up who succeeded on the show during those years has a tale of DeCordova trying to "improve" perfectly good acts and/or predicting they would bomb.  Still, he never got in their way.  He was mired in "old" show biz and, had he been solely in charge of booking the show, Johnny might never have talked to anyone younger than Jimmy Stewart.  Still, newer stars made it to the couch.  He had a non-charming way of lording his high salary over the poorest-paid members of the staff but, at the same time, he kept the operation operational…though not quite to the end.  Late in his tenure, Fred lost favor with Johnny and was reduced to figurehead stature while others (Peter Lassally, primarily) did the actual producing.  I believe he went unmentioned on Carson's last show.

I sometimes ran into him over at NBC, and he was always willing — even, eager — to chat about his days working with George Burns or Bob Cummings, and he practically worshipped Jack Benny.  Jay Leno retained him as a consultant for a time — in part, I suspect, because Fred had nothing else to do.  "All my friends are dead," he often sighed.  It would be nice to believe they're all, at last, reunited.

I stole the above cartoon from the website of my great and brilliant friend, Mike Peters.  And I posted it here because it's the first thing I've seen, in print or anywhere, that made me laugh out loud since last Tuesday.  (Mike's site, where you can see more of his cleverness, is www.grimmy.com)

And here are still more links to articles I've found on the Internet that I thought said something that needed to be said.  As before, I don't agree with every word of them but I respect the attempt to say something constructive.

• CIA's Tracks Lead in Disastrous Circle by Robert Scheer, Los Angeles Times
• The Day Before Tuesday by Frank Rich, New York Times
• Did We Handcuff the CIA? by David Corn, Slate
• David Letterman's Opening Remarks September 17, 2001
  Video Link (requires Real Player)

In the meantime, I have some additional thoughts, which I offer here for whatever they may be worth…

• What does it say about our leaders and reporters that, if you do a search for articles about oppression in Afghanistan and the evil of the Taliban — articles written before 9/11/01, that is — the leading name you'll find speaking out on this issue is that of Mavis (Mrs. Jay) Leno?
• Speaking of late night hosts: David Letterman's first broadcast back, which included a teary-eyed Dan Rather and an almost-sufferable Regis Philbin, was terrific.  It was clearly a difficult hour and the fact that they didn't pretend it wasn't was the kind of honest, human connection we need at this time.  On the other hand, I can't recall seeing a professional broadcaster less at ease than Craig Kilborn, attempting to talk without a TelePrompter and smug jokes.  It was mostly about him and the problems of figuring out what to do on his show now, and reminded me of what Al Franken was parodying with his "Al Franken Decade" routines.
• Bill Maher took a more strident approach, insisting that the time for "political correctness" is past and that it's time to ask hard questions.  It may be…but I'm not sure that his format, with its frequent commercial breaks and tendency to change topics after each, is conducive to answering such questions.  Still, Maher certainly asked one that needs to be addressed when he asked about the logic of airport police busting a TV producer for possession of drugs while, obviously, certain other kinds of, uh, "travellers" are a little more dangerous to society.  (Note: "needs to be addressed" does not imply that it will be, or that anyone will modify their policies if it is.)
• How long is it going to be before someone tries to link Osama bin Laden to one of George W. Bush's — or, more likely, Dick Cheney's — oil deals?  I'm not for a moment suggesting that there is such a link; merely that someone someplace will claim to have found one and we'll spend a lot of time debating over the propriety of such talk.  The way our public discourse seems to run, we're going to hear every conceivable conspiracy theory, up to and including the notion that Lee Harvey Oswald was piloting one of the planes.  (And has anyone noticed that the press seems to have delayed the release of the big Florida vote recount?  It was supposed to be last Monday…not a good time to be unveiling even arguable evidence that our Commander-in-Chief didn't come to the job via a clean election.)
• ABC News has reportedly declared a moratorium of replaying the footage of the World Trade Center towers being hit, burning, collapsing, etc.  If for no other reason, when I watch news the next few days, my dial's going straight for ABC.
• My current favorite political writer, Joshua Micah Marshall, makes an interesting catch over on his excellent website, Talking Points.  It's that Jonathan Turley, the former "impeachment expert" with no credentials in that area has now started appearing in the media as a "terrorism expert" with, of course, no more claim to the title.  But the cable news shows have a lot of hours to fill so he'll, no doubt, be turning up all over.

As usual, I'll post more of these as they occur to me.  (I'm not writing these for you, by the way; I'm writing them for me.  You're welcome to listen in, however…)

Here are some more links to articles I've found on the Internet that I thought said something about the 9/11 tragedies that needed to be said.  I don't agree with every word of them but I respect the thought processes and the attempt to do something constructive.

• Don't Go Overboard by Joe Conason, Salon
• An Afghan-American Speaks by Tamim Ansary, Salon
• Bush's Faustian Deal With the Taliban by Robert Scheer, Los Angeles Times (Note the date on this: 5/22/2001)
• Paying the Price by Paul Krugman, New York Times
• How Terror Could Break Through by Gilbert M. Gaul, James V. Grimaldi, and Joby Warrick, Washington Post
• A Wake-Up Call for the Media Oligarchy? by Arianna Huffington, Los Angeles Times Syndicate

I would also recommend keeping an eye on Slate, which has had some truly brilliant articles, and Joshua Micah Marshall's Talking Points.  In his latest outing, he makes a point that no one else reporting bin Laden's denials is noting…mainly, that the man is not saying he had nothing to do with the attacks; he's merely saying he didn't plan them.

In the meantime, I have some additional thoughts, which I offer here for whatever they may be worth…

• There's something strangely comforting about Jerry Falwell saying something really stupid and hate-filled.  It reminds us that, even in times of tragedy, some things never change.
• I understand why everyone from Ed Koch to Donald Trump is saying that the World Trade Center must be rebuilt.  And as long as it's important to the American spirit to not admit weakness, they will and should continue to say it.  But here, on a website where it doesn't matter, let's admit that it probably won't be.  Would you lease a suite in such a place?  More to the point, if you were the head of a large company, would you assume the responsibility of moving all your employees into such a place?  Could you get any kind of insurance?  The trend towards home officing — folks working at home and sending it in via e-mail — already promised to make structures like the W.T.C. obsolete to some extent and this will probably hasten the trend.  I think folks should go on saying that the complex will rise again and perhaps something with the name "World Trade Center" will.  But I doubt we'll see Mr. Trump put any of his own money into an attempt to build anything as large and expensive as what was there before Tuesday morn.
• Inasmuch as I have had great reservations about the experience, integrity and legitimacy of George W. Bush, I am not thrilled to find him even technically in command at this time.  Nevertheless, I think we have to pray for his success and not spread negatives over silly things like bad public syntax and the route he took back to Washington.  On the other hand, I think that to question the patriotism of those who do criticize our leaders is even worse.  We are all "real Americans" and it is an act of hatred to try and say that another American is not one, just because you don't like the opinions being expressed.
• I have long had mixed feelings about New York mayor Rudy Giuliani.  I think he's done some wonderful things to make Manhattan safer and saner, while also infringing on civil liberties and waging childish wars against his critics.  However, in this disaster, he has written the book about how a public official should act in time of crisis.  And I don't say that, as some do, just to imply that Mr. Bush has not.
• A prediction: The first three TV-movies about the disasters will be — not necessarily in this order — the tale of the passengers of Flight 93, the story of some person who led the evacuations of one tower of the World Trade Center, and a portrait (with John Wayne-style sensibilities) of the fire fighters or rescue crews.  I also predict that within two weeks, one or more of the tabloids will find some ex-C.I.A. yahoo who will swear that our government knew in advance, every detail of the attacks on the World Trade Center, though probably not those on Washington.  And within a month, someone will find some stupid-ass way to connect the disasters to O.J. Simpson and/or The Kennedy Assassination.

I have absolutely nothing to report or recommend in the worlds of comic books, animation, TV, any of that.  When I do, you'll see it here.  I can hardly wait.

The last few days, the Internet has brought us all the latest information (with a few bloopers) and some wonderful words of insight and opinion (with, of course, a few idiots).  Before I tell you what's on my mind, I would like to recommend almost any article this week on Slate but especially the following pieces, there and elsewhere.  I don't necessarily agree with everything they say, but I believe they are contributing to a responsible national dialogue.

• Smoking or Non-Smoking by Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times
• Human Terror by William Saletan, Slate
• The Problem With Retaliation by Robert Wright, Slate
• Unthinkable, Unstoppable by William Saletan, Slate
• Bush is No Giuliani; He Shouldn't Even Try by Mickey Kaus, Kausfiles (via Slate)
• Mike's Message by Michael Moore
• Among Experts, bin Laden a Mystery by Joshua Micah Marshall, Salon
• What I Saw at the Devastation by Peggy Noonan, Walt Street Journal
• What Does Osama bin Laden Want? by David Plotz, Slate
• The Brancatelli File by Joe Brancatelli, BizTravel.Com

Read what these folks have to say.  If, after you do, you aren't thoroughly sick of the topic, come back here and read the following piece which I just sent off for The Comics Buyer's Guide for the issue which goes off to press on Monday…

As I write this, crews are poking through the remnants of what were once the twin towers of the World Trade Center, looking for bodies.  It will take a week to ten days for this publication to reach you, at which time crews will still be digging through that rubble, looking for bodies.  Even if it takes two months for your copy to arrive, crews will still be pouring through the debris.

Some facets of our lives will be returning to normal.  We may occasionally go an hour or two without thinking of the thousands killed by the terrorist attacks of 9/11/01.  But, at best, the thoughts will never fully go away.  And things will never be "normal" again.

I don't know how I could have written about comic books or cartoon shows this week.  Four commercial airliners were hijacked, everyone aboard was killed and three of the planes plowed into buildings, murdering thousands more…

…and I'm going to write about who's stronger, the Thing or the Hulk?  Not bloody likely.

Tuesday AM, everyone was comparing the terrorist attacks to Pearl Harbor and, from the standpoint of moving us towards all-out war, that may turn out to be true.  Still, two critical differences hit me right off the bat.

One was that Pearl Harbor was about soldiers being killed on battleships.  It was, I'm certain, horrible and frightening, but it was removed from the lives of civilians, i.e., people who were not in the business of war, going about their daily lives.  Our parents and grandparents could not have possibly have thought, as you and I did Tuesday morn —

"That could have been me.  I could have been in one of those planes.  I could have been in one of those skyscrapers."

You thought that.  You're lying if you claim otherwise.  And you'll think it, the next time you have to fly somewhere or enter a large office complex.

The other difference is this: Pearl Harbor wasn't televised.

There was no footage of the Japanese Imperial Navy dropping bombs on the U.S.S. Arizona and, even if there had been, there was no television.  Our folks did not sit in their homes, in their pajamas, witnessing what we all saw on CNN Tuesday morning.

We saw it, not once but repeatedly — the jets flying into the buildings, as caught by every camcorder around.  After the eightieth viewing, I started switching channels, searching for one that would give me info without the incessant instant replays.  Each time I thought I'd found it, the screen would then change.

Sometimes, they'd cut to footage of the jets flying into the buildings and the buildings crashing down, while they continued the speaker's remarks as voiceover.  Sometimes, they'd split the screen and put the speaker in a little box and then, in the big box, they'd put the image of the jets flying into the buildings and the buildings collapsing.

Over and over.  Again and again.  From different angles.

I finally decided I might as well get used to it: We're going to be seeing it the rest of our lives — in our media, in our culture, in our sleep.

For a time, I tried radio, just so I wouldn't have to see it the eighty-first time.  I was listening to someone's too-graphic description when it hit me: This was how our parents and grandparents experienced Pearl Harbor.  On the radio.

I love radio but I've never fully bought the bromide that hearing something has greater impact than seeing it.  Radio, they claim, engages out imaginations and I suppose it does.  Still, Orson Welles in his prime could not have induced the horror and helplessness we all felt Tuesday morning, watching the planes hit, seeing the towers implode.  This was beyond all imagination.

If it leads to World War III or anything close, we ought to be even better girded than what some now call "The Greatest Generation."  When our Pearl Harbor occurred, we were there.

As always happens in time of calamity, our thoughts turn quickly from the problem to the solution: How do we make certain this never happens again?

There are no easy solutions but I'd like to throw out one probably-silly suggestion.  Forgive me for even mentioning the notion but could we perhaps care about this as much as we care about, say, partisan politics?  Or other peoples' sex lives?  For the last few weeks, my TV screen has been filled with a leering, huffy inquiry into the dating habits of an obscure Modesto congressman.

One of the nation's leading interview shows — with the jurisdiction and clout to interview anyone on any topic — is Larry King Live on CNN.  In the month of July, Larry King aired 21 programs.  Gary Condit and Chandra Levy were the sole topic of 15 of those shows, and they were discussed on several others.  That's an amazing amount of airtime when you consider that everything that is known, really known about the case could probably be summarized in under ten minutes, and that it really has little bearing on your life or mine.

Meanwhile…

In January of this year, a bipartisan Defense Department-chartered commission on national security recommended 50 steps that they felt needed to be undertaken in order to prevent domestic acts of mass destruction.  In its summary, the report proclaimed that, "the combination of unconventional weapons proliferation with the persistence of international terrorism will end the relative invulnerability of the U.S. homeland to catastrophic attack."

How much air time on Larry King Live do you think has been devoted this year to this now-suddenly-hot topic?  (Answer: None.  Maybe if the terrorists were boffing interns —?)

How many articles in the press have there been?  How many televised discussions?  How many debates in Congress?

The commission pointed out an enormous problem.  How many hours did our leaders devote to implementing solutions?  (Answer: Same as above.  But you can bet every member of the House and Senate either issued a statement about Gary Condit or pondered how to sidestep the question.)

Tuesday afternoon, we saw the heads of both houses of Congress, Democrat and Republican, appear together on the capitol steps to proclaim solidarity and the set-aside of partisan divides.  "We must all work together," they said over and over, in so many ways.

It was a nice moment and a splendid photo-op.  But what I wanted to yell at my set was: "GREAT, GUYS!  BUT WHY CAN'T YOU DO THAT ALL THE TIME?"

Why in the names of Trent Lott and Tom Daschle do thousands of innocent Americans have to die horrendous deaths before we start acting like maybe, just maybe, we're all in this together?  Is it a sudden revelation that there are people on this planet who fantasize about killing a lot of Americans?

In 1996, we're now tragically reminded, Osama bin Laden issued a "fatwah" — a religious ruling urging Muslims to kill U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia and Somalia.  Coming from a man who'd already presided over the murder of 18 U.S. servicemen in Mogadishu, you'd think that would have rousted our leaders to some action.

But no.  Our Congress and the White House spent most of 1996 hurling accusations at one another, staging an election that, at times, seemed to be only about Bob Dole's age and Bill Clinton's genitalia.

Then in 1998, Osama bin Laden announced a second fatwah, demanding savage attacks on American citizens.  As I recall, our leaders spent most of 1998 impeaching Bill Clinton.  That certainly made us all a lot safer.

In January of this year, when the above-described report was issued, it didn't get a lot of attention.  Did you hear a word about it?  I didn't, and I just did an Internet search that could find no mention of it older than about six hours.  However, in the first month of this year, we all heard plenty about…

Who President Clinton had pardoned…

The condition in which his staff allegedly left their offices…

And whether Democrats would sink George W. Bush's nominations as "payback" for past Republican torpedoes.

Three weeks ago, Osama bin Laden told journalists that his followers would carry out "an unprecedented attack" on the United States.  At least, that's what the London-based Arabic newspaper, al-Quds al-Arabi, is now saying.  Even assuming it's true, it wouldn't have made a bit of difference.  Three weeks ago, this country's attention was directed at the following outrage of vastly more importance…

When Gary Condit was interviewed by Connie Chung, even though we all knew he'd had an affair with Chandra Levy, he wouldn't say so in explicit terms.

We all knew he'd had the affair.  He'd told the police he'd had the affair and he admitted it to Ms. Chung in discreet lingo.  Connie then spent 20-24 minutes of a 30-minute interview trying to get him to say, "Yeah, I did her."  And because he wouldn't, our forums of public discourse — the news shows, the editorials, the chat rooms — were filled quickly with hatred of Gary Condit.

Hatred.  Some used that verb: "I hate Gary Condit."

Today, I wonder what those people say about the conspirators who destroyed several blocks of New York City and murdered thousands of our friends and relatives.  What term adequately conveys the Condit-haters' (presumably) stronger feelings about the hijackers?

Maybe we should reserve the word "hate" for special occasions — say, for when innocent men and women are brutally and deliberately killed.  Remember that when you "hate" the next Adam Sandler movie.

I am not suggesting that we ignore trivial matters — I make my living off trivia and, God knows, always will.  I am not even defending Condit who, for all we know, may have committed a crime that warrants some amount of our anger.  But as I write this, there's not a shred of evidence that he did, and the amount of anger and interest seems to me, at the very least, premature.  And, worse, distracting.

There's nothing wrong with trivia just so long as someone, somewhere is paying heed to the important matters.  In this country, we expect that of two groups of people: Those who run the government and those who report on them…

Our elected officials and the press.

We have a saying in super-hero comic books: "With great power comes great responsibility."  No, the people in those two groups probably could not have told us what a few dozen madmen would do Tuesday morning.  The chilling advantage that terrorists have on us is that they are willing to do the unthinkable; the kind of thing that we, as reasonable people, cannot conceive of anyone ever doing.

But our representatives and our reporters could have told us something was likely to happen.  That commission knew.

We could have started the process that has to begin now, sadly after the fact, of how to combat suicide attacks on American soil.  We need to tell our elected officials, "Hey, fellas!  Spend a little less time on stained blue dresses and flag-burning and trying to gin up scandals about one another, and a little more on things that get innocent people killed."

Today, watching TV and roaming the Internet, I see America at its best and worst.  I see it sad, I see it shocked, I see it angry.  I see people who are so out of their skulls with rage that they probably resemble the kind of person who would seize the controls of a Boeing 767 and fly it into the side of a building.  I see people who are so scared, they're deciding which civil rights we can well do without.

As the initial trauma fades, it gives way to reminders of how good we are, how good we can be: Folks queuing up for blocks to donate blood, strangers comforting one another, businesses opening or closing their doors as best serves their communities, acts of heroism among the rescue workers.

We need to cling to that America and not to the aspect of our national character that divides us into two camps and lives to destroy the opposition.  For now, our leaders talk like leaders but, just a few notches down the food chains, you already have Democrats trying to figure how to pin this on Republicans, and Republicans trying to fathom how they can use this against Democrats.

You have people who hate Bill Clinton trying to jury-rig some way that this is his fault, and those who hate George W. Bush whipping up arguments that he's culpable.

You have those who favor the so-called "Star Wars" missile proposal arguing that this proves we need it.  You have those who oppose it arguing back that this proves it won't help.

It's that way on too many Internet sites that advocate strong positions: For gun control, against gun control; pro-choice, pro-life; lax immigration; no immigration; even gay rights versus its opposition.  I don't think the last jet had even crashed before some of these factions started spinning, asking themselves, "How can we use this to advance our cause?"

Well, I'm no better than they are.  I'm going to try and use it to advance my cause.  My cause is that we need fewer causes taken to the extreme that they pit us against one another, and divert our attention and resources from real enemies.  We all just saw what a real enemy can do.

My cause is that we embrace that we are a great, intelligent and compassionate nation.  It's a sin to abandon the compassion and to funnel all that greatness and intelligence into trivial, partisan squabbles and "gotcha" politics and journalism.

The number one function of government was defined by Gouverneur Morris and the co-authors of our Constitution.  It's to "establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity."

Tuesday morning, we got None of the Above.

We can blame it all on this season's Foreign Madman and his insane, fanatical followers and, of course, they deserve every condemnation now being heaped upon them.  They must be — they will be — tracked down, slaughtered, put on trial, martyred, executed, whatever.  Some of that, I hope and suspect, will occur before this reaches you.

But in the long range, the way to prevent the next Foreign Madman is for the United States to try something novel: Being united.

And it shouldn't take what happened Tuesday to make that happen.  It just shouldn't.

Some of what we've been saying here about the Gary Condit matter is said, with greater eloquence and examples, by Eric Boehlert over on Salon.  Here's a link.

Heads up! Results of the big press recount of the Florida vote will be released Monday, September 17.  You can count on both Bush and Gore partisans finding some way to argue that the numbers prove, inarguably, that their boy won the state.  You can also count on so many missing ballots, inconsistent standards, instances of fuzzy math and general chaos as to cause history to record it all as one of those, "We'll never know for sure" matters.  Let me know if you spot one public figure or pundit saying, "You know, this all casts doubts on the claim that my chosen candidate won."  You won't.

Our highest recommendation: If you get anywhere near Las Vegas between September 13 and October 7, head for the Rio Suites Hotel, any afternoon except Monday.  My pal Ronn Lucas is doing a daytime show show there and…well, how often do you get to see the best ventriloquist working today?  If you saw Ronn on the Jerry Lewis Telethon, you know how funny he is.  A whole hour-or-so of him and his puppet pals is a joy forever.

We also recommend: The Reprise! series, which stages musicals for short runs with scant scenery at U.C.L.A.'s Freud Playhouse has opened a terrific version of the Sherman Edwards-Peter Stone musical, 1776.  Roger Rees plays John Adams, Orson Bean (with lotsa make-up) plays Ben Franklin and the cast includes Marcia Mitzman Gavin, Thomas Ian Griffith, John Scherer, Hamilton Camp, Larry Cedar, Stuart Pankin and other splendid performers.  I enjoyed it a lot but, as is often the case with these hastily-mounted productions, you wish the cast had had another week or two of rehearsal and try-outs.  A friend of mine who was in one of them once told me, "We did about a dozen performances and, by the last one, everyone knew what they were doing."  1776 closes September 16.

The Los Angeles Times recently ran an interesting article about the excisions that Richard Nixon obtained in the film version of 1776.  We've talked about them on this site and this piece has more info.  But it's one of those links where you'll have to hurry because they'll begin charging for access to it any day now.  (Ignore the Times' review of the new production of the play, by the way.  Their critic knows not of what he writes; at least not this time.)

At the risk of turning this website into Obit Central, I'm posting a couple of articles I wrote years ago about great comic book artists who left us.  One is about Curt Swan and the other, which I put up a few days ago, is about Manny Stallman.  They were both men who did amazing work and who really, really loved drawing comics.