The Comics Curmudgeon

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Housing bubble goes to the birds

Shoe, 11/11/07

“These are perilous times to be refinancing your mortgage, Cosmo.” Ah, an auspicious beginning to any light-hearted journey into the Sunday funnies! But at least the Perfesser’s encounter with his mortgage lender is fairly straightforward. See, his name is “I. M. Usurious”! Which indicates that he is usurious! Ha! It’s a sharp and subtle commentary on modern mores. He’s also a buzzard, you’ll note. Because banks metaphorically feast on the flesh of the dead and dying, you see! (Or is it metaphorical? The world of Shoe, so much like ours but with anthropomorphized talking birds, always straddles the line between metaphor and nightmare.)

Family Circus, 11/11/07

The post-modern emotional desert in which the Keane kids gasp for sustenance is starkly illustrated today, as they can only interpret mom and dad’s attempt to have a genuine moment of romantic intimacy through the lens of the horrible pop cultural products of late-stage capitalism. A more realistic thing to shout at them might have been, “Hey, no getting frisky, you two! You can barely afford to feed all of us now as it is.”

And, just for the heck of it, let’s check in to see what’s going on over in Rex Morgan, M.D.!

On second thought, maybe let’s not.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 11, 2007 at 06:11 pm and is filed under Family Circus, Rex Morgan, M.D., Shoe.

86 responses to “Housing bubble goes to the birds”

rita
November 11th, 2007 at 6:13 pm [Reply]

aaaaag after 10000 years im free
Inspector Dim
November 11th, 2007 at 6:17 pm [Reply]

Oh Shoe. You make me want to drink, too.
Shmork
November 11th, 2007 at 6:17 pm [Reply]

Yow, there’s a distinctly anti-Semitic vibe about the Shoe vulture.
Dean Booth
November 11th, 2007 at 6:18 pm [Reply]

#1 Nice one, rita. Enjoy your freedom.

Will we be seeing pics of the MT show, Josh?
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 6:18 pm [Reply]

How weird is the Cosmo/Cosmo symmetry between this Shoe and yesterday’s Beetle Bailey?
AMC
November 11th, 2007 at 6:18 pm [Reply]

Apparently, “Cosmo” can be either the loanshark or the chum(p).
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 6:19 pm [Reply]

3: I’m glad someone else said it first. But…yeah. Big “beak,” plus the loaded term “usury”….yeah.
Skullturf Q. Beavispants
November 11th, 2007 at 6:19 pm [Reply]

I liked the commenter here who said that their 11-year-old kid described this Family Circus as reaching a “new low”.
bats :[
November 11th, 2007 at 6:19 pm [Reply]

“Post-modern emotional desert”? I’m not sure about the melon-headed Keanes, but the ones responsible for their creation live in the Lower Sonoran desert.

It doesn’t excuse the lack of wit in the Sunday strip though. Or the rest of the week.
Skullturf Q. Beavispants
November 11th, 2007 at 6:21 pm [Reply]

#3 and #7: Plus, the eyebrows and the glasses make him look a little like Groucho Marx.
Inspector Dim
November 11th, 2007 at 6:21 pm [Reply]

#3 Shmork: I noticed that, too… Not very subtle.
Inspector Dim
November 11th, 2007 at 6:30 pm [Reply]

Hey kids! It’s create your own Spider-Man joke!

It SO EASY! All you have to do is fill in the blank with an appropriate word!

In today’s strip, Spider-Man obviously has the proportional _____________ power of a spider.

Some suggestions:

TV-watching
Sleeping
Talking to himself
Complaining
Audience-boring
Fleeing-the-scene
Vacationing
Ignoring his wife
Scrimping for work
Not chasing bad guys
Drawing things out
Loafing
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 6:31 pm [Reply]

I also keep seeing the little black squiggles running down the drain in Shoe as spiders, which, upon reflection, makes more sense as bird currency than, you know, actual currency does.
Red Greenback
November 11th, 2007 at 6:32 pm [Reply]

One can combine the two above strips and distill them to “dancing with the mortgages” …if you handle them with a ten-foot trivet, that is.
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 6:38 pm [Reply]

10: Or Jeffrey Katzenberg.
Ben
November 11th, 2007 at 6:40 pm [Reply]

Presumably, there are more illustrious houses of money lending than “Megabucks Mortages To Go (Broke)” for the Perfesser to utilize, but I guess those would require a credit rating higher than “drunk.”
Rotten Arsenal
November 11th, 2007 at 6:42 pm [Reply]

Hey! Where the hell is PJ!!?! Shouldn’t someone check on him to make sure hasn’t finally managed to escape this hellish existence? Good god! What if he told the authorities or the Enquirer about the obviously brainwashed cult mentality in the Keane Household!?!?!
Islamorada Girl
November 11th, 2007 at 6:49 pm [Reply]

Hey, you want Anti-Semitism, racism and sexism? Check out the current Steve Canyon storyline. Of course it’s sixty years old, but Zebus in a basket, it would have been offensive sixty years ago, and it’s only gotten more rancid and creepy with time.
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 6:53 pm [Reply]

1, 4: A metermaid no more.
Chert the Chort
November 11th, 2007 at 6:53 pm [Reply]

Yeah, I was going to post about the Shoe vulture issue, but I see I’ve been beaten to the punch here.

On the other hand, I can honestly say that “load the rod and let it go” is the greatest thing I have read in weeks. Weeks, I tell you.
Poteet
November 11th, 2007 at 7:00 pm [Reply]

I’ll bet there are places where vultures feast on the flesh of the dying, maybe where the competition for carcasses is really tough. But around here, I only see them eating stuff that’s definitely dead, thereby performing a public service. And to take the side of this particular vulture, I assume nobody held a gun and made Shoe walk in there. Hmph.
Poteet
November 11th, 2007 at 7:03 pm [Reply]

# 21 — Sorry, I guess it’s the Perfessor who walked in there. I haven’t followed SHOE for years.

# 16 — Yeah, Ben, what you said.
Islamorada Girl
November 11th, 2007 at 7:14 pm [Reply]

One fine summer day, I was lying in the backyard, nursing what had to be the world’s worst hangover. How did I know this? Because about fifteen vultures were circling over me. They can smell death from miles away and they’re not real picky about whether dinner is dead or dying. My Aldo breath finally drove them away to easier pickin’s than a woman so hung the ends of her hair hurt.
Mr. O'Malley
November 11th, 2007 at 7:19 pm [Reply]

Cartoonist of the day–Bruce Bairnsfather. More here
Uncle Lumpy
November 11th, 2007 at 7:22 pm [Reply]

#18 I-Girl –

Re: Steve Canyon, you may be right — Herr Splitz’s appearance and accent look and sound like over-the-top Yiddish stereotypes, though this strip seems to frame him as an ethnic German.

As for racist and sexist, I’m not so sure. Caniff’s “natives” and women are always presented as stronger and cleverer than the white males in the strip assume them to be — here is an example. Though panel two of this strip gives me the creeps.
Artist formerly known as Ben
November 11th, 2007 at 7:23 pm [Reply]

“Shoe” does have a nice first panel, though. It seems that Uncle Moneybags has been staying at the Bates Motel.
Chocohol
November 11th, 2007 at 7:25 pm [Reply]

I’m amused by how easily the Keane children were lured by the music coming from the other room. This, coupled by how mannequinlike the dancing figures look, leads me to believe their parents, finally sick of their melon-headed antics, decided to trick them into investigating and lock them in a closet.
criminallyinane
November 11th, 2007 at 7:36 pm [Reply]

I’ve seen less obvious anti-Semitism in Chick tracts.
Poteet
November 11th, 2007 at 7:36 pm [Reply]

I checked Wikipedia because I was curious, and sure enough, vultures in general do sometimes eat the dying. I’m glad I haven’t seen it. On the other hand, I read a news story awhile back to the effect that India is desperate to rebuild its vulture population, which has been mostly killed off by a substance administered to livestock that poisons the vultures. India has banned the substance in question, but it’s still sold illegally. Meanwhile, the animal corpses are piling up, and India is learning the hard way that having vultures is much better than not having them. *end vulture rant*
Sekuin
November 11th, 2007 at 7:41 pm [Reply]

I like the bug-eyed shock the perfesser elicits twice in one strip. Or do depressive birds (what is he, a seagull?) quickly goose anyone nearby to stave off suicide?
sonneta
November 11th, 2007 at 7:47 pm [Reply]

Wouldn’t a vulture wearing a ski mask be redundant at best? Sounds less scary, to me.
Ukulele Ike
November 11th, 2007 at 8:01 pm [Reply]

Re: yesterday’s “Beetle Bailey”: What the heck is the difference between Cosmo and Rocky?

Rocky is supposed to be a beatnik/rockabilly hybrid, and Cosmo is a conman-type out of “Sgt. Bilko,” am I right? So BOTH of them are artifacts of the ’50s?

Christ, what a stupid strip.
Non Compost Mentos
November 11th, 2007 at 8:04 pm [Reply]

Yesterthread, #44 Islamadora Girl said, “I want to rule by diktat! … Hmmm. Maybe ruling by fiat would be better.”

Nahh. You know how hard it is to get parts for those things?

And speaking of motorcars, I’ve been out of it for most of the week, so I don’t know if anyone else has commented on this: in Judge Parker, Humbert…err, Sam…and Sophie drove to the winery in a classic Jaguar roadster, but are now driving home in a late-model Mercedes convertible. What gives? Was a vehicular swap part of the complicated quasi-legal shenanigans in this story arc? And shouldn’t Sophie be badgering Sam to get a Prius? (Or maybe a Smart Car, but those really look more like something Zippy the Pinhead would be drawn to.)
Uncle Lumpy
November 11th, 2007 at 8:18 pm [Reply]

#33 Non C. M. –

Maybe Sophie could badger Sam to rule by Fiat?
rhymes with puck
November 11th, 2007 at 8:30 pm [Reply]

MW: I didn’t think Mary could be any more insufferably full of herself until she decided to award herself a goddamn Nobel Prize for bringing a dog to the vet.

FW: Hey, isn’t she late? Or more likely, can’t Batiuk get his annoying ‘reveals’ in chronological order?

JP: Today we find that a Judge Parker without heaving bosoms is just not worth reading.

Phantom: Why do those terrorists/pirates look like Hell’s Angels? Is that how pirates in Saudi Arabia dress now?
Sharona
November 11th, 2007 at 8:37 pm [Reply]

The oddest thing about that vulture is that he’s dressed like a Prohibition-era gangster. I’m not sure what that signifies, but I do know it would be a shame if Cosmo were to lose a few ~~fingers~~ ~~remiges~~ whatever.
Frank Parsnip
November 11th, 2007 at 8:41 pm [Reply]

Shoe: I don’t know if the vulture fits a Jewish mold in a classic anti-semitic way. First, look at his name — “Userious” sounds Roman, just as “Userian”would have sounded Armenian. Second, are all big-beaked persons and birds going to have that trait forever tied to the Jewish faith, despite the enormous numbers of Arabs, Italians, Greeks, and French with noses that could put an eye out? (Watch out for mine!) Third, is it really necessary to equate Jews with money-lending anymore?

So, in order to make somebody happy, Shoe needed to choose a carrion-eating bird that has anthropomorphic qualities that are more “Aryan” just to prove his not anti-semetic? There’s a point where sensitivity goes far enough to border on an insult itself in that it repeats old stereotypes or insults where none were intended. Pick an ethnic group, any ethnic group, and just write an outraged letter on their behalf anytime there’s a cartoon depiction of a rat, a snake or perhaps leeches. Or look into our society to find real examples. Hey, how was that Redskins game?
LoFoFan
November 11th, 2007 at 8:42 pm [Reply]

Wow!! Mary Worth thinks she’s St. Francis of Assisi for waking up a dog from its nap and subjecting it to x-ray by Etch-a-Sketch, not to mention sentencing it to a life of eating tuna casserole while listening to Mary’s self-aggrandizing blathering.

Good work, Mary. Fido is now on suicide watch at the vet’s office.
Sharktattoo
November 11th, 2007 at 8:44 pm [Reply]

‘Load the rod and let it go’ is the only pick-up line that will work on me from now on.
Aleph Null
November 11th, 2007 at 8:50 pm [Reply]

Sorry I didn’t post this sooner, but I had to gather my thoughts about Saturday’s 9CL: (here) I thought it was one of the most romantic renditions of a wedding night that I have ever seen.
Islamorada Girl
November 11th, 2007 at 8:59 pm [Reply]

#25 Uncle Lumpy: Ach! Bitte! Herr Splitz Endz is escaped Nazi war criminal? Why isn’t he in South America with all his buddies? I tell you what; Steve Canyon may be a bit of beefcake, but often he ain’t that bright. I can forgive a lot for a good adventure story, even love in the time of cholera, but still and all.

#29 Sister Poteet: I have nothing against vultures or turkey buzzards. They have a job to do, and the ecosystem needs them. I read that story about the endangered vulture population in India, too. Still, when they’re circling overhead, you do have to wonder just how bad off you really are.

#33 Non Compos: You do know what Fiat is an acronym for, don’t you? Fix It Again Tony.

Surely, this talk of diktats, fiats and aviation mooncussers in the desert ought to conjure up an appearance from Emperor Chennux, ready to stomp us all back into our places.
Frank Parsnip
November 11th, 2007 at 9:11 pm [Reply]

(Of course, I meant “he’s” instead of “his” in the mini rant above. And of course it would not be “Shoe” choosing a carrion-eating bird that has more anthropomorphically “Aryan” characteristics — Cassatt and Brookins would surely be in charge of that. I think I was referring more broadly to “Shoe” the cartoon. )
rhymes with puck
November 11th, 2007 at 9:16 pm [Reply]

40 ummmm…yeah, ok
Big Sims
November 11th, 2007 at 9:18 pm [Reply]

Load the rod and spoil the child.
I swear to God Wilson and Nolan are reading the Comics Curmudgeon.
Niall
November 11th, 2007 at 9:21 pm [Reply]

I agree with 37. Frank Parsnip here.
ScienceGiant
November 11th, 2007 at 9:23 pm [Reply]

Garfield: Here’s another fun, new word. CRESSET: a metal container for burning oil, wood, etc., fastened as to a pole or wall and used as a torch or lantern. As in, “Hold on, angry mob! I’ve got some Garfield strips we can use to light the cressets.”
yellojkt
November 11th, 2007 at 9:43 pm [Reply]

And if today’s Dennis the Menace were any more homoerotic it would be Judge Parker.
Loopina
November 11th, 2007 at 9:52 pm [Reply]

Diktat? So would one who rules by diktat be a diktater? Sounds like a hybrid involving DT and the baby from Snuffy Smith. A filthy, filthy hybrid.

#17: Where is PJ? I think the kids were running to tell mom and dad the bad news. You see, PJ was in his crib and decided to try and make an escape. His body slipped through the rails easily enough, but that hydrocephalic head just couldn’t make it. Notice the expressions: Jeffy looks mildly traumatized, Billy concerned, and Dolly is grinning smugly.

#37: Redskins suk!!!! Steelers rule!!!! 7 and 2, yo!
Groovymarlin
November 11th, 2007 at 9:58 pm [Reply]

I am unspeakably depressed at the long absence of our Galactic Overlord. O Chennux, why have you abandoned us?! Even the surreal, full-color, strangely-beautiful-yet-relentlessly-depressive artwork of Funky Cancerbean can’t pull me out of my…er…funk. :-(
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 9:59 pm [Reply]

37: I would agree with you, Frank, except that Jew/vultures have a long history in racist caricature (such as this), and I think the unsettling nature of this strip comes from the aggregate of all the factors: the beak, money-lending, the word “usury” itself (as opposed to “avarice” or something), the haplessly small-beaked Cosmo… If it were only some of these factors, I’d be more inclined to agree, but all of them together just….doesn’t sit right. The semiotics have a history, and you can’t just access them blithely when things like anti-Semitism in its most traditional forms still exists, and especially in a cartoon where all the birds are allegorical: if no vulture is just a vulture, no beak is just a beak.

I do agree that this is very minor, though (go Redskins indeed), and probably unintentional, and I’m not running off to release the hounds on the creators. But I don’t think I and other commentators were entirely imagining things, either.

I just noticed the IOU highlighted in I. M. Usurious, too. And that’s just lame from any angle.
Loopina
November 11th, 2007 at 10:07 pm [Reply]

#49: Chennux is taking the weekend off to honor his many thousands of relatives who have died in intergalactic wars.
Big Sims
November 11th, 2007 at 10:13 pm [Reply]

#44 Me

Load the rod and despoil the child.

Sheesh, I can’t even mix my own metaphors.
Beetled Baily Bridge to Nowhere
November 11th, 2007 at 10:24 pm [Reply]

The problem with Beetle Bailey is that its basically stuck in 1960. Kinda. There are nods to modernity, like Lt Fuzz, and that Asian corporal, but Sarge wandering around in khakis and all the enlisted still wearing OD green fatigues pretty much dates the strip to the cold war conscript army. Not to mention sarge beating up beetle all the time. Even when I was in the infantry 20 years ago that would got sarge a quick trip to Leavenworth. You don’t touch a troop.
Skullturf Q. Beavispants
November 11th, 2007 at 10:24 pm [Reply]

#50 SecretMargo:

– See, this is why we have anti-semiotism.

(Disclaimer: I don’t even mean anything in particular; I just couldn’t resist the horrible pun.)
Bunnë
November 11th, 2007 at 10:33 pm [Reply]

50, Secretmargo…
Good god! I saw that darkened “iou” and didn’t figure it out till you said that.

Meanwhile, I tend to agree a little more with Mr. Parsnip… what other bird could have been used to signify predatory lending practices? Still, you also make a good point; the vulture/usury trope reeks of antisemitism.

But I am more disturbed by the facile jab at the mortgage industry. Where is the in-depth analysis? Oh, the business section? Boring! Why can’t I get insightful analysis on the funny pages?
Non Compost Mentos
November 11th, 2007 at 10:43 pm [Reply]

#54 SQB’pants: I had to nail my hand to the computer desk to keep from making the same pun. I’m glad someone else done it, though.

I used to be a big fan of postmodern theory, but now I’m not Saussure about it.
junk science
November 11th, 2007 at 10:52 pm [Reply]

Hey, at least Shoe acknowledges once in a while that its characters are birds, and doesn’t always have them cheerfully discuss eating fried chicken. Unless that lender really was supposed to just be a Jewish stereotype.
dyslexic dog
November 11th, 2007 at 10:55 pm [Reply]

DT: What’s really scary is the gag over the Mayor’s clenched teeth. No one’s getting any sleep in the haunted mansion tonight with all that grinding.
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 10:59 pm [Reply]

Really, all this talk is just a way of letting me forget that the first thing “I. M. Usurious” made me think of was the abominable Australian comic Yahoo Serious. Who played a version of Einstein who was stripped of his Jewish heritage and reimagined as a Tasmanian who puts fizz in beer and then gets electrocuted repeatedly to diminishing comic effect. And who resembled a secretary bird in his coiffure. So now I’m back where I started: wondering why birds base their economy on dollars, not tasty tasty spiders. Oh man, I think I need Barthes bag.
Dingo
November 11th, 2007 at 11:01 pm [Reply]

Ah, this Last Kiss comic made me laugh aloud tonight. Back in my drinking days, how many times did I lose track of the Batmobile, the invisible plane, or the bear-lovin’ Jeep?
King Folderol
November 11th, 2007 at 11:04 pm [Reply]

FC – Who the hell’s watching the baby?

Shoe – Ski mask/robber jokes weren’t even that funny when I first saw them in Mad Magazine back in the 1970s.
dyslexic dog
November 11th, 2007 at 11:09 pm [Reply]

#61 King Folderol:
Who the hell’s watching the baby?
Judging from the stereo in the background, this strip hearkens back to their younger days. PJ is the twinkle in Daddy Keane’s glasses.
Hysterical Woman
November 11th, 2007 at 11:14 pm [Reply]

I think Shoe is prejudice against people who wear ski masks.
SecretMargo
November 11th, 2007 at 11:15 pm [Reply]

62: They ate him, simple as that. One less mouth to feed, and it feeds the others. As one of my favourite authors, Lorrie Moore, once put it: two birds killed with one of the birds.

Surely cause for celebration, no?

(My God, I have to stop thinking about birds.)
Non Compost Mentos
November 11th, 2007 at 11:25 pm [Reply]

#59 SecretMargo: Is there an Eco in here?

Also, re: birds: “Don’t they ever stop migrating?”
Big Sims
November 11th, 2007 at 11:26 pm [Reply]

#64 Secret Margo
A loaded rod in the hand is worth two snags in bush?
(My God, I have to stop thinking about Rex Morgan, MD)
ColoZ
November 11th, 2007 at 11:41 pm [Reply]

Josh, I’m surprised you didn’t comment on this. I think Sunday’s Get Fuzzy demonstrates in hideous detail why the ‘no nipples’ convention should be maintained in the comics.
Bill Wright
November 11th, 2007 at 11:48 pm [Reply]

How many years is it that FW is supposed to have jumped ahead? Crazy Harry appears to be in his sixties now.
dyslexic dog
November 11th, 2007 at 11:52 pm [Reply]

#68 Bill Wright:
That’s actually PJ.
SecretMargo
November 12th, 2007 at 12:01 am [Reply]

69: dd: HA!!

(ps: I hope I didn’t reverse your initals!)
dyslexic dog
November 12th, 2007 at 12:09 am [Reply]

#70 SecretMargo:

You did, but that’s ok. I’m having an identity crisis anyway.

slaitini ruoy
Mibbitmaker
November 12th, 2007 at 12:13 am [Reply]

11/12 FW: Another jump-forward, another group of Westview High students.

Hey! New kids we readers don’t know yet! Yeah, you! Beware! You’ve now just begun your stint in the Comic Strip of Doom! You WILL, in the future, be AGED 10 YEARS, and it won’t be pretty! See your teacher there? And his friends? They were students here once. LOOK at them!! IT COULD BE…. YOU!!! Don’t get your hopes up, kiddies.

That is all.
Mibbitmaker
November 12th, 2007 at 12:17 am [Reply]

11/12 FOOB: Look who’s talking, Mr. Future Easy Book Deal!! (reacting to last panel)
SecretMargo
November 12th, 2007 at 12:19 am [Reply]

65: You are such an Eco maniac. But I know it’s not your Foucault, so I’ll forgive you.
SecretMargo
November 12th, 2007 at 12:24 am [Reply]

71: And I’m such a fan of your novel, Sgniht Llams fo Dog Eht, too! So embarassing.
dyslexic dog
November 12th, 2007 at 12:38 am [Reply]

#75 SM:

Perhaps you’ve read these too.
(Your selection is way down in the last section.)
Poteet
November 12th, 2007 at 12:49 am [Reply]

# 41 — Islamorada Girl, I once saw vultures circling over two young friends who were wearing bikinis while sunbathing on a river sandbar. They looked great in those bikinis, positively seething with youthful vigor, and at the time, I thought the vultures weren’t too bright. Now, having read way too much MT and MW, I figure the vultures were meddling avian oncologists trying to make a point about future skin cancer.

And dearly as I love STEVE CANYON, I won’t be sorry to see him and the crew escape the current storyline, because whatever else Herr Splitz is supposed to be, he’s icky. Actually, I’d like to go back to the U.S. and see more Copper Calhoon fashion statements.
SecretMargo
November 12th, 2007 at 12:54 am [Reply]

77: Hee hee! I hadn’t seen that. Thanks for the spin around the Droller Rink.

And with that, g’night cherubs!
Happy Happenstance
November 12th, 2007 at 1:38 am [Reply]

#64 SecretMargo — Lorrie Moore, really? I love her books. I have a copy of “Who Will Run the Frog Hospital?” sitting right here, next to my computer. It’s true, what they say. Great minds really do think alike.
AlmostAGhost
November 12th, 2007 at 1:40 am [Reply]

Not only was the post-modern emotional desert depicted metaphorically in today’s FC, but it’s also depicted literally, hanging on the family’s wall. Fascinating.
Frank Parsnip
November 12th, 2007 at 1:52 am [Reply]

Loopina (48): The Redskins are the only football team who doesn’t enjoy trademark protections on their club name because the U.S. trademark laws don’t protect insults. A court decision actually noted that “redskin” is mostly used in a pejorative sense and ruled against extending trademark protections for their team name, and so thus I have to say that the Redskins team suck because they’ve got a racist team name and persist in using it. Conversely, I have no problem whatsoever with the use of Native American tribal names or even team names such as the Cleveland “Indians” — although I do not like the “Chief Wahoo” character.

Secret Margo: “Usury” does have a legitimate Latin origin — coming from “interest” and “excessive interest” — and is a concept that does not solely belong to the Jewish community by any means. Gangsters (of various ethic origins) have been charged at various points for “usury” crimes — essentially what is also unofficially known as “loansharking” or other sorts of lending involving heavy interest charges. I’m a bit concerned that reading an anti-semitic vibe into any and all uses of “usury” might underscore a Jewish connection into all sorts of unsavory lending where no connection exists.

As to the use of vultures, there’s no really positive spin to an animal that feasts upon the softened rotten flesh resulting from another creature’s miserable death. However I imagine that it has been used against many ethnic groups, professions, in-laws, etc. over the centuries. I am not entirely sure it has an exclusively or predominantly “Jewish” connection.
Canaduck
November 12th, 2007 at 2:31 am [Reply]

That is the best “first comment” I’ve ever read in my life, rita.
Freezair
November 12th, 2007 at 2:51 am [Reply]

#9: No… no… NO! Say it ain’t so! I have to LIVE in that desert!

Also, of RMMD. Dag, yo. I don’t want to read these things into this strip! I’d be willing to write that panel off as a one-off even!

But God dangit, Monday’s! What am I SUPPOSED to think?
Bathless Groggins
November 12th, 2007 at 6:04 am [Reply]

Semiotics, postmodernism, call it what you will, it means sweet Foucalt.
Lockestep
November 12th, 2007 at 6:06 am [Reply]

The Phantom: I finally realized the Phantom wasn’t a real life documentary this week when I saw the cargo ship had a U.S. registry. Everyone knows there are no American cargo ships. Way to burst my bubble, Purple Man.
Vistavision
November 15th, 2007 at 10:54 pm [Reply]

What truly alarms me about that Family Circus is Daddy’s stereo.

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Housing bubble goes to the birds

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