Like most newspaper readers, I like a good break from news coverage -- and the usual liberal biases therein -- by escaping to the comics pages. Yesterday reading through the Washington Post's comics section, I was struck by how many of the syndicated artists ran appropriate, even touching tributes to the victims and heroes of September 11 from strips like "Blondie," "Beetle Bailey" and "Hagar the Horrible."
Stan Lee's "The Amazing Spider-Man" strip was among the best tributes, with Spidey praising the "real heroes" who "gave their own lives" on 9/11 who make his "little problems seem like nothing."
"Dennis the Menace" even managed to melt the stony heart of old Mr. Wilson with his tribute to the heroes of 9/11.
And then, unfortunately, there was Darrin Bell's "Candorville."
While equally liberal cartoonist Gary Trudeau kept his September 11 "Doonesbury" strip apolitical, Bell opted to issue a screed through the persona of Candorville's central character Lemont Brown, who said that when he went to bed on 9/11 he hoped "we'd rise to the occasion and honor the dead" by "torturing prisoners, mocking the French, invading the wrong country" and "curtailing our own civil liberties."
"I like to have realistic hopes," Lemont groused, prompting friend Susan Garcia to reply, "I don't think sarcasm's allowed on 9/11 day."
Bell followed up that strip with one today featuring Lemont writing "grief," "anger," "guilt," "bloodlust," "fear" and "battered country syndrome" before burning the strips of paper and throwing them off the roof of a building.
While Bell's 9/11 cartoon is featured at Cartoonists Remember September 11, it seems to be the lone weed in the bouquet. You can find the other strips I've mentioned and many other excellent 9/11 comic strip tributes at cartoonistsremember911.com.
