Tea Party Comics, At Last!

Mike Gold

ComicMix's award-winning and spectacularly shy editor-in-chief Mike Gold also performs the weekly two-hour Weird Sounds Inside The Gold Mind ass-kicking rock, blues and blather radio show on The Point, www.getthepointradio.com and on iNetRadio, www.iNetRadio.com (search: Hit Oldies) every Sunday at 7:00 PM Eastern, rebroadcast three times during the week – check www.getthepointradio.com above for times and on-demand streaming information.

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70 Responses

  1. mike weber says:

    EEeeeewwwWWWWW!

  2. Miles Vorkosigan says:

    What you said, Weber. I know free speech and freedom of the press are cornerstones of the Constitution, but damn, this is repulsive. As such, it needs to be seen by everybody and laughed at for its ludicrous content, until the Tea Party and the people who did this are so ridiculed they move to Outer Mongolia… Or an angry mob strings them up by their genitalia, whichever comes first. Has anybody alerted the White House about this fei hua yet?

    • Christopher Back says:

      Or better yet the lawyers at Time-Warner/DCE and Disney/Marvel?

      • Mike Gold says:

        I'd say you listened to my "Weird Scenes Inside The Gold Mind" over at getthepointradio.com, where I made that very point. But it doesn't go up until tomorrow. So instead of thanking you for listening to my rant, I'll thank you for giving me the opportunity to plug my rants!I wouldn't go up against the Warner lawyers OR the Disney lawyers… but I wouldn't mind sitting in court watching them go after each other. And to think they're paying actors to be in the prequel to Spartacus…

  3. Steve says:

    I agree these are in extremely bad taste but I do not believe it is affiliated with any Tea Party member. Every instance of Tea Party racism has been shown to be either made up (usually a bold faced and often repeated lie) or planted by the Left.

    • Mike Gold says:

      Yeah, sure. Check under your bed much?I thought the whole point of the Tea Party was that there were no leaders and anybody could identify himself or herself as a member. And some Libertarian ideals are decidedly left wing; the appeal of the Tea Party is that it's not Democratic or Republican, not left or right. I guess the Republicans and the right wing have already co-opted them.No surprise there.

    • Tony Isabella says:

      "Every instance of Tea Party racism has been shown to be either made up (usually a bold faced and often repeated lie) or planted by the Left."If you want to talk about bold faced and often repeated lies, Steve just unleashed a whopper with the above statement. I don't claim that every member of the Tea Party is a racist, or even that a majority of them are racists, but to deny the existence of that element in light of all the evidence, which includes members who are white supremacists and involved in Tea Party activities, is either an act of willful deceit or delusion. And to try to dismiss all that evidence as plants of the left is even more so.

    • mike weber says:

      I'm going to begin with a quote from a comment i just posted over at Peter David's blog.I explained that i had gone, the day it opened, to see "The Fifth Element", and …the girl who sold me my ticket looked at me pityingly, as if i were a bit slow, and said "That is the most over-hyped film of the summer."She didn't seem to appreciate the irony of the fact that she was standing in front of a garish six-foot cutout stand-up and that she was wearing a button with a blinking LED on it, both promoting the second "Jurassic Park" film, scheduled to open two weeks later…You seem to suffer from the same sort of selective blindness, just like a friend who once averred that "left-wing" commentators and pundits were "mean spirited" and made hateful personal attacks on poor, misunderstood President Shrub, unlike "conservative" pundits. etc, who would never do such a thing.I pointed out that he regularly listened to Rush, Hannitay and "Savage" and would often quote them approvingly.He didn't seem to see the irony, either.

  4. Tony Isabella says:

    "Every instance of Tea Party racism has been shown to be either made up (usually a bold faced and often repeated lie) or planted by the Left."If you want to talk about bold faced and often repeated lies, Steve just unleashed a whopper with the above statement. I don't claim that every member of the Tea Party is a racist, or even that a majority of them are racists, but to deny the existence of that element in light of all the evidence, which includes members who are white supremacists and involved in Tea Party activities, is either an act of willful deceit or delusion. And to try to dismiss all that evidence as plants of the left is even more so.

  5. Brandon Barrows says:

    Holy crap. I am ashamed as a human being that someone ostensibly of the same species produced these. I am absolutely disgusted.This isn't free speech, it's hate speech. I feel very sorry for whatever person is so filled with hate that they feel this is an appropriate outlet for their bile. You've moved so far beyond political, you're not even in the same world as your already-ignorant Tea Party brethren Mr. Racist "Artist."I hope Disney/TW stomps these guys into the earth.

  6. George Haberberger says:

    "Some tea baggers have disavowed these books, and at least a few have declared them plants from the left-wing commies. Now that's funny."It may be funny but it is not impossible. For what it's worth, I do not believe these books were produced by anyone connected to the Tea Party. Racism is not endorsed by the Tea Party but it may be comforting for some individuals to wish it were so that their positions could be dismissed out of hand.

    • Mike Gold says:

      Please see my response to Steve. The Tea Party promotes itself as a leaderless a non-party open to everybody. Of course, some of its most highly self-appointed spokespeople are complete motherfucking racists. Ain't that so, Rush?

      • George Haberberger says:

        Okay, I get it. The Tea Party can't prove this guy wasn't affiliated with them so they are guilty until proven innocent. Even if a group has no strict hierarchy, not everyone who claims to be is part of the club. Amy Bishop is as an ardent Democrat and supporter of President Obama. Do you want to claim her?

        • Miles Vorkosigan says:

          Who's Amy Bishop? It's not so much the comics that makes them look bad, George, as everything else they've been doing. This is an anarchist organization that would have been rounded up and shot in Soviet Russia, and likely would be now in China. So far, they've done very little that could be construed as innocent. All they need is pitchforks and torches to be extras in a Frankenstein remake. And they're doing about what I'd expect when it comes to the hack artist doing thses things. They're denying him, which makes it look worse for them. There's a story I heard from Hunter Thompson lo, decades ago now, about LBJ in the Fifties, running for governor of Texas against a man who owned a large pig farm. Johnson told one of his staffers to float a rumor that the man was having carnal knowledge of his female livestock. "Jesus, Lyndon, we can't call this guy a pig fucker. Nobody'll believe it." "I don't give a shit if anybody believes it. I wanna watch the sonofabitch try to deny it." Sadly, that's what the Tea Party People are doing, denying this. and the louder they yell, the less they're believed.

          • George Haberberger says:

            Amy Bishop was a biology professor from the University of Alabama who when denied tenure, shot 6 people killing three of them on February 12, 2010. She was widely known as an ardent Obama supporter. This of course has nothing to do with Obama and is not representative of the people who support him. Would that the same consideration be given to the Tea Party.i'm trying to understand why you posted the LBJ story. He made up a lie about an opponent so that the opponent would be forced to deny it. That kind of parallels these comics and the Tea Party. In your anecdote the Tea Party would be LBJ's opponent, (forced to deny a lie). So who is LBJ?

          • Miles Vorkosigan says:

            Oh, her. Yeah, I kinda remember the story now. Things have been weird for a bit, with the lack of a job and all, so Amy's Calamity Jane impersonation sorta fell by my personal wayside. LBJ was Lyndon Johnson, the man who took over after Kennedy was murdered.

          • George Haberberger says:

            "LBJ was Lyndon Johnson, the man who took over after Kennedy was murdered."I'm 58-years-old. I know who LBJ was. I meant who does he represent in your analogy because the way it was phrased LBJ's opponent was the Tea Party.

          • Miles Vorkosigan says:

            Oh. Cool, someone in my age bracket. The LBJ thing was an example of trying to proving a negative. Sometimes I get a little clumsy with my phrasing. I do better with dialogue.

      • Miles Vorkosigan says:

        Mike? Isn't the definition of a leaderless group of indeterminate size a mob? Because the way the Tea Party seems to be dis/organized is very similar to what I remember as a peasant mob from my history lessons about the French Revolution… As to George's comment, I have to agree with part of it. I don't think these were produced by anyone that is knowingly connected to the Tea Party. And the Tea Party probably wants it that way. After all, the IMF team led by Jim Phelps was completely covert, and the reason was so the Secretary of State could disavow any knowledge of their existence, pretty much the way the Tea Party People can point to this guy and say "He's not one of ours!" while cramming the hoods and robe back in the closet…

        • Mike Gold says:

          A mob forms an instant mob mentality. Sort of like lemmings. When the people in front (either physically or technically, with bullhorns or the like) decide to take a turn in the route or start breaking windows, the mob will follow. Some people won't go any further in their mayhem, but others who have never done that before will. Maybe only once, but some will do it.The Tea Baggers maintain there is no leadership or organization. Organizing rallies and running misinformation websites is not the same thing as organization; it's inspiration, perhaps, but not in and of itself leadership. I've been in more than a few mobs, and I've seen this happen repeatedly. "I love the sound of breaking glass. Especially in the morning." Nick Lowe sang that.

          • Miles Vorkosigan says:

            "I need the noises of destruction, when there's nothing new…" Know the song and singer very well. Most of the mobs I've been in were prefaced by "Drunken". I have fond memories of many a Saint Patrick's Pub Crawl in Memphis. A curvy brunette snatched the bottle of Captain Morgan's outta my hands and went glugglug…

          • mike weber says:

            Rah once said that to determine the average intelligence of a mob, divide the lowest individual IQ there present by the total number of members of the mob.

          • mike weber says:

            Arrrgh. "RAH".

      • Miles Vorkosigan says:

        Mike? Isn't the definition of a leaderless group of indeterminate size a mob? Because the way the Tea Party seems to be dis/organized is very similar to what I remember as a peasant mob from my history lessons about the French Revolution… As to George's comment, I have to agree with part of it. I don't think these were produced by anyone that is knowingly connected to the Tea Party. And the Tea Party probably wants it that way. After all, the IMF team led by Jim Phelps was completely covert, and the reason was so the Secretary of State could disavow any knowledge of their existence, pretty much the way the Tea Party People can point to this guy and say "He's not one of ours!" while cramming the hoods and robes back in the closet…

  7. Miles Vorkosigan says:

    Eek. Double post.

  8. ed zarger says:

    In a tough economy, and politically polarized climate, there's no surprise that something like the Tea Party would arise — to give people a chance to vent their frustration with a world that doesn't respond like they want. They're AGAINST things, not constructively building anything, nor showing any respect for anyone unlike themselves. The more someone tries to mold the Tea Party into something cohesive and self-consistent, the more cracks will show. I think incumbent Republicans could be nearly in the bullseye like Democrats, although they'll claim they don't have a voice in the government that Tea Partiers despise.About these "comic masterpieces" — anyone remember the Chick Publications through the 60's or 70's, with the blatant anti-Catholic propaganda? This pastime seems to draw them out.

    • Mike Gold says:

      Absolutely right. Thus far, several incumbent Republicans have indeed been voted down by Tea Baggers. That's why the Republicans are trying to corral the movement.That, and nature abhors a vacuum.Yeah, those Chick things are still coming out, although I wouldn't know if any new stuff has been produced. They ran a series of standard four-color comics as well.

      • Brandon Barrows says:

        Someone I bought a comic from on eBay recently inserted a Chick comic (the little 8-page coupon-sized ones) into the book. It was about how even the court jester is wiser than the fool who doesn't accept Jesus into their hearts and lives. It was copyrighted 1997.I didn't know whether to laugh or be insulted that someone was trying to foist religion on me through an eBay transaction, but I chose to laugh. Not that I'm against religion, or anyone who wants to be religious, but it was fairly ridiculous as the seller knows nothing about me and couldn't possibly gauge my reaction.It was a Maze Agency book, by the way, so maybe they just figured mystery readers need some Jesus in their lives.

        • Miles Vorkosigan says:

          I think I saw a documentary advertised somewhere about the guy who does Chick comics. Ebert would know, I may have to ask him. But as I recall it was pretty straightforward, talking about a guy and his mission, no real commentary on his religious biases or anything else apart from a mention of his dislike of Catholicism. For the record, I don't have a bit of use for organized religion. I consider it hypocritical, but understand why a lot of people need the community structure it can offer. My feeling is that if you're devout, wear it proudly and live a good life around the clock. Don't lie, cheat, steal, fuck and kill six days a week and then beg forgiveness on the seventh. Walk the walk, talk the talk, and do it 24/7, or else you're gonna lose that beat, to paraphrase Steely Dan.

        • mike weber says:

          Tear it into little pieces and mail them back.When i find little piles of propaganda – whether funnymentalist or left-wing – left on the writing desks in Post Offices or the like, i rip them in quarters and leave them.

          • ed zarger says:

            Just to provide my own counterpoint…I haven't seen or looked at any of the Chick Publications comics in years and years.So they may have gotten the anti-Catholic spiels out of their system, and focus instead on more positive storylines. There has certainly been a big change in relations between Catholic church and many other Christian churches in the last 40 years. That change might have been reflected in the comics' content. If you're interested in the subject matter, read and discern for yourself.

  9. Tony Isabella says:

    How about this? It turns out that the creator of these racist comic books is, indeed, a member of the Tea Party. Rich Johnston filed this report:http://www.bleedingcool.com/2010/08/03/tea-party-…The creator is an Arizona comic-shop owner – this could do wonders for his business in one of the three dumbest states in the union – and, of course, he denies there's any racism in his comics. But he's taken them off eBay, probably trying to stay a step ahead of the DC and Marvel lawyers.And, of course, he makes the absurd claim that the left did far worse to Reagan and Bush. To sum up…Not a plant from the left.Created by an actual right-wing whack-job and Tea Party member.Suck on it, Steve and George.

    • George Haberberger says:

      "Suck on it, Steve and George."Lovely. I read the link Tony posted and the links that were within that link. No where does comic shop owner Tom Kalb, (hmm, he may have more in common with Tony Isabella than the Tea Party), state he is a member of the Tea Party. Even if he was, he is not representative of them. People who are in positions of authority within the Tea Party have rebuked him. For the record I did not say these comic were a plant from the left. I love the comic art form and hate to see it abused. Ed Zanger above mentioned Chick Publications which were vehement anti-Catholic comics. As far as I know, no mainline Protestant denomination embraced him. He was out there on his own. So it is with Tom Kalb.

    • Miles Vorkosigan says:

      Tony, you forgot to mention that he's a crappy artist. The Left did worse than this to Reagan and Bush? We did? Funny, I was there, and I don't recall any comics done about those right-wing jackasses. As disgusting as the Tea Party People and these gorram comics are, at least it's this and not a buncha loonies building bombs in their basements. Although, with my luck, that'll be next. Four years ago I predicted a series of taxpayer revolts before Bush left the Oval, and now, about two years too late, we pretty much have them. Too bad the baggers aren't going after the ones who really fucked the country. At least Clinton restricted his sexual antics to the occasional White House intern.

  10. Brandon Barrows says:

    Except that Tom Kalb is contributing to a comic explicitly called "TEA PARTY COMIX" (so he clearly believes he is a member) and as several people have pointed out, under the Tea Party's non-structure anyone who says they are a member of the Tea Party is, by default, a member since there's no "official" organization to join and no leaders to say "sorry, you can't join our club."

    • George Haberberger says:

      Except there are official Tea Party organizers. In St. Louis their names are Bill Hennesey and Dana Loesh. If they say you're not part of the club, you're not. Tom Kalb can think what he wants obviously, but he is not a member of the Tea Party.

      • Mike Gold says:

        Sez who? I mean, other than Bill Hennesey and Dana Loesh. The Tea Baggers keep on saying there's no leadership, that it's just an affiliation of like-minded people.The term "organizer" applies to people who try to get other people to join their movement. Nothing wrong with that. But there's a difference between organizers and leaders, and the Tea Baggers loudly state they have no leadership structure. This makes it easy for certain Tea Baggers to distance themselves from other Tea Baggers who offend them. The Tea Baggers are not a party — hence I use their original name and not the misleading "Tea Party."Which, by the way, shares none of the values of the Boston Tea Party. The Tea Baggers are bitching (as is their right) about lawfully elected representatives. They're just a bunch of weasels who want all the benefits of a federal government such as Medicare, highways, an overblown military and police forces (virtually all state and local initiatives are funded in whole or in part by the federal government) without having to pay for it. They're freeloaders living in a fantasy world.

        • George Haberberger says:

          "Sez who? I mean, other than Bill Hennesey and Dana Loesh. The Tea Baggers keep on saying there's no leadership, that it's just an affiliation of like-minded people."Well, If Hennesey and Loesh say so that seems to settle it. And Tom Kalb, by his actions demonstrates that he is not like-minded.

          • mike weber says:

            Have you ever heard of the Provisional IRA, the Real IRA and doubtless more such names? When i was stationed in Sicily in 1970/71, one national election had something like eighteen parties, and at least six of them had "Communist" or "Socialist" in their names or used a variation of the hammer-and-sickle logo.Actually, i suspect the two you cite are part of the even-more-astroturf-than-the-"real"-Tea Party bunch who are trying to steal the name to legitimise their own activities.

          • mike weber says:

            Oh – and generally, groups that try to hijack a party/organisation name like that are more radical and intolerant than the "mainstream" organisation.

          • George Haberberger says:

            "Actually, i suspect the two you cite are part of the even-more-astroturf-than-the-"real"-Tea Party bunch who are trying to steal the name to legitimise their own activities."I have no idea why you would suspect that Hennesey and Loesh aren't "real" Tea Party activists. They are founding members. Here is a quote from the local alternative weekly newspaper, The Riverfront Times, that did a story on Dana Loesh this year."Loesch has appropriated some of the name-calling, frequently describing herself and Hennessy as 'co-extremists' and 'co-conspirators.' There's no denying their group has become one of the most active in the United States, according to the Nationwide Tea Party Coalition. Meanwhile, conservative activity in historically liberal St. Louis has mushroomed."I can't speak to your own experience in Italy but Hennesey and Loesh haven't hijacked anything. I could post a link, (let me know if you want it), but I see no reason to clutter up a message board with links nobody is interested in.

          • mike weber says:

            No, they're founding members of the "National Tea Party Coalition" which i'm pretty sure is the Big Money-funded operation denounced by others within the "movement" as an astroturf attempt to grab the "movement" for partisan purposes.And, you know, if you're averse to "… clutter[ing] up a message board with [things] nobody is interested in …", why did you post that full-paragraph quote from the source you didn't post the link to?A link takes up a lot less space…

          • Brandon Barrows says:

            That and a quote with no link to the original source material, or date it's supposedly from, is highly suspect and very difficult to verify.

          • Mike Gold says:

            Actually, the initial boot-up money and support for the Tea Baggers came from Lyndon LaRouch's operation. Lots of others jumped on the bandwagon, but the LaRouchies are backing this as a takeover of the Republican party.And if you look at how the primaries have been going, they've had some success here. That's short-term success; in 2010 a Tea Bagger Republican is more likely to lose to a known Democrat than a "traditional" Republican. The Tea Baggers seem to dislike incumbents strictly because they are incumbents, but I firmly believe the LaRouchies understand this and are looking towards the 2012 free-for-all, if not the 2016 contest.In an off-year election, it all depends upon who comes out to vote. It'll be interesting to watch. The traditional Republican Party doesn't realize how irrelevant they've become.

          • George Haberberger says:

            Okay here is the link.http://www.riverfronttimes.com/2010-02-24/news/da…I didn't post the link originally because I really believe no one cared to read it and it was a possibly-too-subtle reference to Tony's post below.

          • mike weber says:

            Yeah? Well, George W Bush said he was a great leader and that there were were WMDs in Iraq.Didn't make either of those true, either.

      • Brandon Barrows says:

        So, does that mean you are? You're taking this pretty personally.

        • George Haberberger says:

          I'm not a member of the Tea Party. I have voted for people of both parties. And I'm not taking anything personally at all. After all, I haven't called anyone names or told them to suck it.

          • Mike Gold says:

            Well, if you wanted to tell somebody (even me) to suck it here on this site, I am a believer in freedom of expression so enjoy yourself. However, too much of a good thing usually makes you fart, fat, and slow.

          • George Haberberger says:

            It's good to know you believe in freedom of expression but I always try to maintain a higher level of discourse than telling someone to suck it. So thanks for the opportunity but I shall decline. By the way, it takes much less than that to get censored on some sites. Sometimes all you have to do is repeat the host's words back to him.

          • Mike Gold says:

            George, I appreciate your point. However, there's a time and a place for everything. For example, when actor Ron Perelman was asked about Sons Of Anarchy being locked out of the Emmy nominations, his response was succinct: "Fuck 'em!"

      • Miles Vorkosigan says:

        Oho! They're not just anarchists, they're elitist anarchists, too!

        • mike weber says:

          My friend Dave Minch, who died way too early (at the Denver WorldCon … in '81, was it) once said that in his observations of political groups, the first thing a bunch of anarchists do is elect officers.Factsheet Five, in an issue about how to publish a fanzine and the people and groups who do, remarked that "All anarchists know the exact form that True Anarchy will take. This explains why they generally spend more time smashing each other than the State".

  11. Brandon Barrows says:

    ^ This was in reply to George. Not sure why it didn't post that way after I hit reply.Also, thanks for the laugh, Tony.

  12. Tony Isabella says:

    You're welcome, Brandon. In my small way, I try to make the world a happier place. :)

    • Miles Vorkosigan says:

      Why we love ya, Tony. For some reason, reading all this, I'm hearing the voice of Zack Allen, the security chief on Babylon 5, when he said that it was "like there was a buncha full moons all lined up, beamin' bozo rays into everybody's brains…"

    • Brandon Barrows says:

      Oh, you do Tony and we appreciate it.

  13. Tony Isabella says:

    On a related note, I recommend reading "Confessions of a Tea Party Casualty" at:http://motherjones.com/politics/2010/08/bob-ingli

  14. mike weber says:

    "George Haberberger"?Don't i recall that name from an earlier political discussion here?

    • George Haberberger says:

      "Don't i recall that name from an earlier political discussion here?"You might. I won that one too. ;-)

      • mike weber says:

        No, everyone just got tired of butting up against a brick wall.

      • Brandon Barrows says:

        I see you losing this "debate," actually, as the majority appears to disagree with you.

        • George Haberberger says:

          Okay, that was a joke. Didn't anyone see the emoticon?Having the majority agree with me is not my goal. I don't really even have a goal. I'm just giving an opinion and information. Take it or leave it. I maintain Tom Kalb is not a member of the Tea Party because he is not a like-minded individual and the officials of the Tea Party rebuked him. There is nothing here to "win or lose."

          • mike weber says:

            Sorry. It's been the Tea Party mantra all along that "If you say you're one of us, you are one of us."SO you say that this guy isn't a Tea Party member because you say he isn't, even though he says he is … but that Hennesey and Loesh are Grand High Poobahs of the Tea Party, with the right to claim they lead it and can say who is and isn't a member, simply because they say they are.Could you perhaps explain the logic behind that one, because somehow it doesn't seem to quite compute.And, as i've said before, if everybody's out of step but you … well, you better listen to the band.

          • Mike Gold says:

            At this point, I gotta say that the problem with having a leaderless movement that anybody can join is that anybody can make up their own rules and represent themselves any way they want. The Tea Baggers can be conservative, they can be libertarian, they could be Ku Klux Klanners, they could be undercover commies, they could be Zarathustrans (which would be sort of cool, actually). So defining them defies definition.I say, screw it, let's take 'em over!

          • George Haberberger says:

            " even though he says he is…" I read the link about this story and Kalb didn't say he definitely was a Tea Party member. He calls his comics Tea Party Comics but that doesn't mean anything. A friend of mine is a career Marine. He says there are no ex-Marines except one: Lee Harvey Oswald. A group has the right to say who is with themIf the Tea Party says, "You're an embarrassment to us, we deny you", it really doesn't make any difference what he says.It seems obvious that people who oppose the Tea Party and it's goals desperately want to say this bigot represents the Tea Party. I used the example of Amy Bishop up above. She was an ardent Obama supporter and murderer. Certainly the Obama camp has the right to say. "You're an embarrassment to us, we deny you."

          • Mike Gold says:

            Really? Out of the millions and millions of Marines who have served our country over the past 225, Oswald is the ONLY one to get the retroactive boot? Jeez… I mean, like any other group with that many members over time, they've had their share of convicted criminals, including murderers. Yet Oswald is the only one?I believe you, but that doesn't make sense. There are a couple of former Marines I know who are unworthy of the title.

          • mike weber says:

            Doesn't work that way. The original Tea Party manifestos said what i've been saying they did.The "organisation" – which, as i've said, is considered by many who were there first as an interloping attempt to co-opt the "Tea Party" name for Special Interests – really has no right to say that anybody is or isn't a "member" of the non-organisation that is the "real" Tea Party, which, after all, allegedly grew out of people rejecting all party politics.And explaining this over and over to someone who can't (or, more likely won't) follow the logic, is tiring.Congratulations – you "win" again.Enjoy it.