Toon & text by John Auchter
My dad let me use a car for the winter term of my senior year at Michigan Tech. It not only was a generous thing to do, it was also very smart, saving him from making multiple trips between Flint and the hinterlands of the Upper Peninsula to drop me off and pick me up.
It did, however, come at a cost.
One day in the spring soon after I came home, Dad was in the driveway puzzling over the car. He called me over and asked, “John, what are all these nicks in the paint?”
I said, “What do you mean?”
“Well…,” he paused, “I can see if you got behind a gravel truck or something that these little cuts would be on the hood and maybe the roof, but they seem to be all over. What happened?”
I had to think for second, but then I remembered, “Oh! They’re from the snow shovel.”
“Um, snow shovel?”
“Yeah. I didn’t need to use the car while I was at school, but I made sure to drive it at least once a week like you told me. By the weekend, it would be completely covered in one big mound of snow, so I’d take my shovel and poke around in the drifts till I found it.”
Dad just stared at me.
I pantomimed holding a snow shovel and jabbing downward, “Kush, kush, kush, ting! Kush, kush, kush, ting! And sometimes I didn’t remember exactly where I parked it, so I’d have to dig enough to see the paint color.”
Dad laughed and gave me a pat on the back. Possibly the only positive reaction ever for a son who reduced the value of his father’s automobile.
I tell you this story for two reasons. First, to establish my credibility in understanding the potential harshness of winter. So even in a “best case” scenario where the United States nuked North Korea without them nuking us, there would still be horrific consequences (a possible nuclear winter among them).
And second, to avoid having to think about a President of the United States who would brag of such things.
John Auchter draws cartoons. Lots and lots of them, each one better than the last. You can find them at auchtoon.com. You can also find his stuff on Michigan Public Radio’s website under Opinion.
You can’t even relate an attempted heart warming story between father and son without bitching about President Trump.
You are pathetic John Auchter
You are deplorable, Stable Genius Dad. How in the world could you be still on Trump’s side? And… You know what? When Trump has to dig his helicopter out of deep snow, Trump uses the same technique. That Marine One helicopter has scratches and dings all over it.
But I thought you were here because you are so pathetic?
You sure do comment a lot for someone who is working, does the boss know that you read blogs on company time?
You missed the whole point Dad!
Working Dad is correct – it’s pathetic that some of these people cannot have a conversation without hating Trump and directing personal insulting remarks to anyone who don’t also hate Trump. You liberals have to get over it some time and remember that Trump did not start the trouble with N Korea or any of the other world problems. These things were all brewing up for the 8 years that Obama was in and doing nothing. But the country of liberals were all happy and just simply charmed by his personality, and also thinking that things were all OK in the world. Things were NOT OK. Noko was building these rockets all during the past years. Syria was poisoning and starving their own people, etc. etc.
Yeah. Isn’t it a shame they can’t show trump the same respect you and Working Dad showed Obama?
Where is he hating trump in the cartoon or article??? Obama did nothing And neither did bush. When you have some idiot saying his button is bigger than his, that’s scary. Look up nuclear winter. You might understand it a little more.
The nuclear winter is something that has been misconstrued by liberals.
If all the nuclear weapons were fired off by everyone that had one. there would be a lot of damage, but a nuclear winter? Not so much. In order to create a chance for a nuclear winter all nuclear weapons would need to go off in a very short time.
Then they would need to be spaced about 40 to 50 miles apart to achieve the best case possible to kick up enough dirt to spread it evenly across the planet. Not going to happen.
When Mt. St. Helens erupted in 1980, scientists calculated that the eruption released enough energy to equal 20,000 Hiroshima weapons. All the nuclear weapons in the world might not get to that level of energy released.
I forgot to check on how much ash and other things were expelled into the air. It was a lot.
One other thing to keep in mind, with all the liberal left and other socialists trying to infer that President Trump is mentally unstable.
It should be noted that the left unearthing some psychologists that claim, in their opinion, that President Trump is unfit for office, without the psychologist doing a one on one with the President.
It should be noted that Communists in Russia would have a psychologist state that a person was insane or something to that effect. NO interview, when the doctor said that, the person in question was arrested and hauled off the hospital.
China and other communist, liberal, countries did that to their own citizens.
It should be noted that Communists in Russia controlled the press and sought to punish them for speaking out against their leader. Doesn’t that sound a little familiar?
Yes it does. Happened during the obamma years. If anyone dared to criticize obama and treated him the same way the liberals treat President Trump, they would have been scolded/harassed by the left leaning media. The liberals would have been having hissy fits all the place. There would have been death threats made against the “offender”.
Jim III if you want to be willfully stupid, thats your choice, but it doesn’t change the fact that your President Trump almost everyday says something to undermine the free press because he doesn’t like how they report his antics. He has openly called to change libel laws so he can sue anyone who writes about him negatively and suggested that they should be arrested. Please explain this to me and how it is not comparable to what tyrants of the past have done. Can you “REFUTE” this, Jim III? Would you like to see and hear countless statements and tweets from trump thst make this clear? Or are you just going to contnue to be willfully stupid?
When someone is losing an argument/debate the usual response is to call the other side names. I have not ever called you any names. Yet you and some others call working dad and myself all sorts of names.
I have heard something about President Trump wanting libel laws changed, however, I have not heard anything about wanting them arrested.
During obama’s time in office over 75% of news articles about him were always positive.
During President Trump’s time so far in office over 80% of the news stories about him have been in the negative range.
If he does something that upsets the liberal left media it is all over it. Harping onit constantly. If he does something goo, the media tries to put a negative spin on it.
Then you haven’t been paying attention. I haven’t called you any names. I am just pointing out that you are stupid. All the media is doing is reporting what Trump says and does. He did say that, he did tweet that, he did do that, did he not? Yes or no?
Can you show me one single time Obama has spoken out against the free press in an effort to undermine them? Just one?
Why would obamma call out the press. they were giving him very favorable reviews. The media did not criticize obamma like they do President Trump.
The liberal media were fawning all over obamma. He had no reason to speak out against the media.
Really? Fox News, Breitbart, Drudge, Wall Street Journal and a number of conservative outlets were “giving favorable reviews” to Obama? What planet are you on?
And I gather you can’t show me one single example, nor “refute” anything I said. Here is a whole list of articles on Trump and Trump’s Justice Department to back my argument. But I am sure you will just dismiss them, because, well, you are stupid.
https://www.google.com/search?ei=hElWWqLeFefQjwT-tp6QDA&q=session+wants+to+arrest+journalists&oq=session+wants+to+arrest+jour&gs_l=psy-ab.1.0.33i21k1l2j33i160k1l2.45362.50741.0.52636.28.27.0.0.0.0.201.3000.5j18j1.24.0..2..0…1.1.64.psy-ab..4.19.2369…0j35i39k1j0i67k1j0i131k1j0i20i264k1j0i131i67k1j0i131i20i264k1j0i10k1j0i22i30k1j0i22i10i30k1j33i22i29i30k1.0.LE3Tupstrgg
fred, I stated that had heard that President Trump wanted to change the libel laws. Maybe the slander laws also. I did not know that he and sessions wanted to arrest those who cast slurs upon them.
Should the libel/slander laws be changed? NO. Should liberal “journalists’ be arrested for not telling the truth? NO. If they were to be arrested they would be freed long before the ink would dry on the warrants. No judge would uphold such illegal action.
Even if President trump was to try to change the laws via legislative action it would not pass. Too many CONgress critters would not vote for it.
As far a you stating that you are not calling me and working dad names, rings hollow.
When you call someone stupid among other things you are actually acting like a bully.
It also means that you are running out of arguments on some of the things that I bring up.
Yes, Fox news Breibart and other right wing news stations did report favorably on obama on a few occasions.
Like I stated in my 11:23 a.m. why would obama call out the press? Especially the liberal media.
They printed a whole lot positive stories about him. They might of printed a couple of not so nice stories, but they mainly printed only positive stories.
Well now that you know what Trump and Sessions would like to do with journalists, and you stated that you disagree with that. Can you now make the connection between that practice and the Soviet Union’s control over the press?
Well, President Trump was a democrat for years before he changed parties and became a republican. Maybe his true democrat/liberal roots are starting to emerge.
I was listening to Fox news this morning and they were talking about renewing some surveillance act that that violates the 4th Amendment. The FISA court act was started years ago and supported by both political parties at some time..
Unlike liberals/democrats/socialists/communists a conservative will not get upset if someone criticizes the leader of the nation. So long as it is not as nasty as the liberal media has been to President Trump. Even if President Trump was to enact some of the things that obamma did the liberals would put a negative spin on it. If President Trump does a positive thing, the liberals would dig around and figure out some way to highlight the negative. Liberals elitist bigots. Thin skinned.
We know you have a very real and deep hatred for liberals So if you think Trump’s democratic roots are emerging, as you just said, would you agree that he is unfit for office?
no more unfit than obamma and hilliary. I do not hate liberals. That is something that you are pulling up from inside your mind.
The reason why you made such a statement is because you and other liberal posters cannot tolerate dissent. If someone disagrees with liberals,sjw’s and other like minded persons, the only way they know how to respond is to verbally assault, physically assault and other wise try to neutralize them or kill them or
Send them to prison.
So you believe Obama and Hillary are unfit, are you saying that Trump is also unfit?