The Pain - Is Mostly in the Belly

I just discovered Tim Kreider's "The Pain - When Will It End?" and I cannot stop laughing. The Pain is therefore most definitely that pain-in-the-belly from laughing too much and too deeply, and of course it will stop as soon as I stop reading these damnably hilarious comics and get on with something productive like doing the dishes or folding the laundry. But, damn! The thing is, the art, the cynicism, the dark-edged tone -- all of these things are so spot-on for me. It's a real soul-mate moment. Each comic I read makes me feel like sharing it with everybody (for instance, right now I'm on the CAT's IRC) but of course I can't do them justice, even by posting URLs, and of course the humor will be appreciated, just not as exquisitely as I'm appreciating it now.

So anyway, here's a blog posting celebrating that lonely recognition.

For an example of that exquisiteness, consider: "Some people's faces are so disfigured by hypocrisy and corruption that they render caricature redundant." I've often felt this way about the smirking Chimperor himself, and this line from the artist's statement captures that idea perfectly: Dubya is beyond caricature.

Thank the Maker!

. . . for Ambrose Bierce! Yet Another Must-Read Author (YAMRA). Some choice quotes:

• War is God's way of teaching Americans geography.
• Christian, n. One who follows the teachings of Christ insofar as they are not inconsistent with a life of sin.
• Politics: The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.

Now there's a man who's not just a cynic, but a cynic for the ages. Makes you realize the curent disgusting tumult and slime tossing in the public arena is merely a recycling -- perhaps, more accurately, a regurgitation -- of that which came before: and only more sophisticated in having a slightly broadened scope, an ever-accelerating speed, and an exchange of coherence for cacophony.