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Hi everybody! Please excuse a few programming notes before we get to the comment of the week. First off: Have you noticed that there’s an election coming up? I have, because there’s been an uptick of people in the comments section saying things like “I don’t want to get into politics, but…” but then it’s obvious that they do want to get into politics, because that’s what they do with the rest of the sentence. Thus, this is a time to review the posting and discussion policies, but the gist is: I don’t really care that much if you comment about politics, but it does tend to start fights, and I really, really dislike it when people get into fights in my comment section, and I might just ban everyone involved if it happens, including you, so maybe don’t do that! I understand the urge to get into political fights — I write for Wonkette, for pete’s sake — but the comments of this blog have always been very friendly and civil and I’d like to keep them that way. If you really want to get into political fights, though, I give you permission to do so … on this very post! And no others. If you get the urge to get into a fight on another post, you should come over here and have a politics hate party instead. (I’ll link back to this post more and more as we get closer to the election, I’m sure.)

But I’m not just telling you all this to be a scold! I’m telling all this to set up some true amazing excitement. Those of you who’ve been around for a while might remember how I dealt with the rising tide of political argument in 2008: by ordering the arguers to stop arguing and write Roosevelt/Taft slash fiction instead. And people obeyed this bizarre whim of mine and produced some amazing stuff. (This one was my favorite!) So for 2012, I’m going to produce, on its own separate site, a presidential slash fiction contest, which will bring all of America together in political hilarity! The site will launch in a couple of weeks, but I need some stuff to seed it with at launch, and you people are all talented and amazing, and I am very sure you would like to contribute!

The rules are that in your story there (a) has to be sex, or at least intense romantic longing, (b) between two or more people of same gender, of whom (c) at least one has to be a current or former US president, vice president, prominent candidate for president or VP, or spouse of any of the preceding, and (d) the other(s) has/have to be real living or dead prominent people/historical figures (and could of course be a president/VP/candidate themselves but don’t have to be). Is time travel allowed? Yes, of course time travel is allowed! How else would Ron Paul lecture William Jennings Bryan about the gold standard, and then they get it on? So, mail your stories to bio at jfruh dot com, and let me know how (or if) you want to be credited, and you will become famous, if I decide to use it!

THIS IS EXCITING STUFF, RIGHT? So obviously I’m fleeing off to a vacation. Uncle Lumpy will be here until the 26th. Be nice to him!

And finally, at long last, here’s your comment of the week.

“Years later Curtis is going to be in therapy for this, and the worst bit is at some point the therapist is going to stop believing him. ‘Okay, so you say she was dead. Hmm. Wait, what? You did what with the light bulbs? I think I’m going to have to cancel our next session. And the one after that too. Yes? Basically, never contact me again.'” –Holly Folly

And the runners up! Very funny!

“Sadly, ‘watching the Lawrence Welk Show’ is the plugger phrase meaning ‘died in his easy chair.'” –BigTed

“Perhaps the Phantom should be less concerned with los narcos in town and look into the real underground economy — steroids, which every man, woman and child in El Dodga seems to be taking.” –Islamorada Girl

“‘Hand it over, girl’? Has this strip been reformatted as Dennis the Sassy Gay Friend?” –Irrischano

“Everyone is ridiculing Dennis for wanting a penny, but when the train jumps the tracks and goes barreling through Mr. Wilson’s living room, we’ll see who’s laughing. That’s what we in the business call menace.” –Anonymous

“What could have been a seriously dangerous situation has devolved into a simple minor property crime. The sheep murderers are also camera snatchers! That will add about 30 days to their sentences when Rusty’s mom emails their pictures to the game warden.” –Mark B.

“Archie proves that poor people leave a trail of poverty stench behind them.” –Izzy

“‘And I promise Aunt Cathy, I’ll buy us some cell phones NOT made in the 1990s with the money from my new job!’ ‘Whatever dear, it’s not like I can even hold this one right-side up anyway.'” –Justin

“It might not be oil. It might be the fog of despair previously seen blacking out the sky, trying water for a change.” –maarvarq

“Any financial institution willing to take responsibility for Ziggy’s crap deserves to fail, and there’s no ‘too big’ about it.” –Doctor Handsome

I must thanks to all who put some cash into my tip jar! And we must give thanks to our advertisers:

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• I Could Pee on This and Other Poems by Cats by Francesco Marciuliano: For eons cats have strived to express their thoughts and feelings through body language, plaintive meowing, and a filmmaking style known as “fallen camera nudged across floor until forgotten or smeared with saliva.” But now thanks to the stirring power of poetry they can finally share what it truly means to be a cat.

To find out more about how you could be thanked in this spot, and more about sponsoring this site’s RSS feed, click here.

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Momma, 8/17/12

If you’re wondering why Francis would scurry away from the beach in terror after just looking at a nagging sign his mother made, despite the fact that she isn’t even present to enforce her insane edict … take a look at the handwriting on the sign, which Francis easily identifies as his mother’s. Now take a look at the handwriting in his thought balloon. Does it look … familiar? Can you imagine the horror of having Momma’s voice in your head, every time you think? Leaving you always wondering whether your thoughts are even yours at all? This whole beach situation is quite frankly the least of Francis’s problems right now.

Spider-Man, 8/17/12

Just to briefly catch you up on the exciting newspaper Spider-Man action: Spidey was trying to figure out where he could find Clown-9 so they could have a showdown, then he saw an ad in the paper for a circus, and he said, basically, “A circus! Clowns love circuses! He’ll be there!” This seemed like not the most air-tight sequence of reasoning, which even Spider-Man has figured out, because now he’s just going on TV to tell Clown-9 when and where to show up so the two of them can engage in violent, deadly combat. Some might think that he could have chosen any arbitrary spot as the site for their battle. “I’ve a message for Clown-9! I challenge you to a showdown tomorrow night at the old abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of town!” But no, best to do it a the circus, where hundreds of innocent people, including many children, will be gathered to watch. Good planning, super-hero!

Six Chix, 8/17/12

Hey, at least bug-eyed crawling-on-the-floor lady admits that something’s wrong with her, horribly-stooped-over seriously-are-you-a-hunchback lady!

Judge Parker, 8/17/12

As we’ve seen, Avery’s negotiating strategy involves agreeing to everyone’s demands immediately and giving them as much money as possible, so yes, I’m willing to believe that people rarely say no to him.

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Family Circus, 8/16/12

There’s something I find incredibly creepy about the two twin droplets of fluid in this panel — one of them dribbling from Barfy’s tongue, the other running down the side of Jeffy’s face. The similarity between the two seems to hold some hidden meaning, beyond just “This is what a drop of liquid looks like in a cartoon.” Perhaps the key is the unsettlingly knowing look that Barfy is giving Jeffy. The dog seems to be staring straight into the child’s eyes, and assuring him that the two of them are very much alike, that everything that Jeffy has feared and hoped his whole life is true: they may look different and one sweats while the other pants and they walk on different sets of limbs, but the two of them are a genuine pack. “Jeffy, I am your true brother,” Barfy says, in Jeffy’s mind. “These humans, they will never understand you, never love you, like I can. Come, let us run away together, off into the distance. Let’s go poop on somebody’s else’s lawn. You will know true freedom.”

Dick Tracy, 8/16/12

I know I don’t cover Dick Tracy like I used to, but that’s because the new creative team has jettisoned the combination of head-scratching insanity and brutal violence that always drew me to it. Still, I do feel a need to point that they still know how to keep it real! Like, “nurse Dick back to health and then slowly drain his blood” real.

Ziggy, 8/16/12

Haha, someone at Ziggy central sure has some kind of beef with the global financial system! Call me a tool of capitalism if you will, but can’t we all agree that Ziggy is clearly incompetent to run any aspects of his life and maybe his bank should be running his finances for him?

Hi and Lois, 8/16/12

Never has so much entirely justified contempt for two whiny, hapless children been written so eloquently on a noseless, expressionless face.