I am not necessarily outraged by the message or the cooption of a beloved clothing retailer’s name. I may object to the shock tactics and poor historical equivalencies which validate Godwin’s Rule of Nazi Analogies—the longer an online discussion continues, the greater the probability of devolving into comparisons with Hitler, and in this case, the Holocaust.

Rather than continuing to debate the definition of genocide, I would like to bring attention to the truck itself. According to the CBR website, these trucks have been part of a “full-time operation” starting June of 2001. Outraged citizens have been unable to keep them off the streets, but I suppose this is because the bigger issue is being ignored—the Genocide Awareness Project employs terrible drivers.

The drivers are much more focused on displaying their roving message rather than sharing the roads with commuters. During the CBR’s last excursion to Columbus, a gray haired man with questionable CDL credentials drove a truck emblazoned with the word “choice”, a dime, and what at first glance looked like ketchup on French fries.

I am stopped directly behind it when the light turns green. As the truck passes through a short-lived green light, the driver abruptly breaks in the middle of the turn, effectively blocking the I-270 south off-ramp onto Sawmill Rd. What is this? Go! The light is green for few precious seconds.  There were no cars ahead of him. I politely honked my horn. This driver was obviously insistent on grandstanding on the overpass with his new ride.  He then proceeded to cut into my lane as I attempted to drive around him.

His poor driving overshadowed the cause he must be very passionate about. Rather than thinking about the message, drivers like me are now preoccupied with the nature of this man’s driving. Quit hot-dogging and drive!

Say, this is a sweet phone!  It’s like a little computer that fits in my pocket and can do anything and everything on-the-go!  What’s that?  I have to pay over $80 a month for the privilege of using it, and despite the fact I rarely even use the phone part, costly voice and data plans will only go up in price if I attempt to get a cheaper rate?

I bet I have a great career that makes me excited to get out of bed in the morning and I make a meaningful contribution to the future of mankind.  No?  I make a subsistence living that quite literally includes hunting and gathering wild fruit in the woods as if I’m living a sadistic real-life version of the game Oregon Trail?  At least I finished my degree.  Oh, but it’s worthless because I went to school at a university that doesn’t give a damn about its journalism program?

Have people as a whole made substantive progress toward a better future?  I assume Al Gore just finished his eight year tenure in the White House and tackled a number of pressing issues including global warming and energy usage.  Wait, the last eight years have seen unprecedented rollbacks of environmental protection and now things are so much worse that the natural factors which regulate the climate have moved beyond the point of recovery?  Well, I’m sure GM’s EV1 took off and now we all drive even more advanced electric cars.  You say the auto manufacturing sector in the United States is bankrupt because car makers insisted on producing the largest most wasteful vehicles we have ever seen?

How is my retirement account doing?  It’s been ten years and I’m sure my IRA has made impressive gains I could only imagine.  What?  The stock market has fallen to a 12-year low and the only thing my account has to show for all that time is a net loss?  Well I can just make that money back, because the economy is doing just fine, am I right?  The global banking system has nearly collapsed and we’re on the precipice of a financial cliff where if we fall it will make the Great Depression look like an idyllic time of plenty?

This is a lot to take in.  I think I’ll smother the pain while watching three brand new Star Wars movies that are sure not to disappoint!

Oh yes! Buy stuff! Faster! Buy stuff faster! It’s too bad your average retail worker doesn’t get the same obscene pleasure from his work as the corporate honchos who actually make a living wage.

I made this comic just so I could draw Pod-Pod as a little kid. This is a response to an opinion article in The Lantern that echoes the same insane arguments made by “professional” pundits. I wrote a number of jokes for the last panel, but I erased them and went with simplicity. The real joke is the trick that political blind loyalty plays on people.

And they decorate the grave with poop instead of flowers.

I don’t see how anyone can maintain enthusiasm for canvassing for more than three hours every four years.

It’s unquestionably outrageous that the Catholic Church is taking this hard-line stance in our election, but it’s not surprising considering its regressive policies and crimes throughout the centuries. The church’s ankle-deep intellectualism fails to take in consideration all the other issues that affect the lives of Americans and people throughout the world, including access to healthcare, education, a decent standard of living, and exposure to crime and violence. Is there even a mention of war from this “holy” man? Are the lives of the American troops and hundreds of thousands of people who died in Iraq completely inconsequential? What of the environment, the health of the planet as we know it, and our continued survival as a species? Apparently this bishop and the Catholic Church want me to turn a blind eye to the life and death matters that affect the lives of hundreds of millions of people–if not billions–merely because they don’t think women should have reproductive rights.

I’ll wear my “sinner” brand proudly, and until the church decides to keep its inquisitorial hands out of American elections, I will continue to deny them support of any kind.

Issue 5 is a voter referendum on a house bill (HB 545) passed earlier this summer that addresses predatory lending and loan sharking tactics used by the payday loan industry operating in Ohio. A yes vote on Issue 5 will confirm consumer protection laws under HB 545, reducing annual interest rates on short-term payday credit from 391 percent to 28 percent and providing new rules which aid borrowers in the repayment of these loans.

I see a lot of arguments being made by the industry that are nearly verbatim quotes from Al Capone, noted organized crime gangster of the prohibition era. The payday loan industry is not looking out for the people. I wish this cartoon was a libelous gross exaggeration of their arguments against Issue 5, but it’s basically a copy-and-paste job from their distributed literature.

If you’re in Ohio, vote YES on Issue 5.

Has anyone in the history of campaign yard signs ever been convinced to vote for someone merely because of the number and strategic placement of signs?  Is the point to persuade, or is it actually a massive nationwide game of Risk?

The original idea I had for this strip was to double its size and illustrate the 4th panel to run the width of a standard Pod-Pod the Rhino comic. But I drew this first, and I’m not redoing it.