The *ILK (*Impeached But Not Removed) Lyin' King Has His "Fake-News" & Tom Tomorrow Answers With "Action McNews" — Take It Away, Biff & Wanda

In the e-mail that conveyed today's episode of "This Modern World," Tom Tomorrow (Dan Perkisn) wrote:

Hey all,

Man, it’s been another week already? Where does the time go, when time has lost all meaning and the hours blur together into a ceaseless void? Well, at least I have a small cat friend to keep me company now. Best decision I’ve made in years.

With this week’s cartoon, I was trying once again to indicate our changed circumstances through graphic design — in a normal “Action McNews” cartoon, the anchors [Wanda & Biff] would have been crowded together in a single panel, but in this one as you can see, everyone is skyping in from individual locations. My initial idea was to have everyone in front of their bookshelves, but I decided to simplify, as it already seemed a little crowded once I had it all laid out. There were a number of things I wanted to get into this one, as it progresses gradually from the mundane to the grimly surreal. (As an aside, this is the first time I’ve managed to finish a cartoon before Sunday afternoon in awhile. Looking forward to a nice relaxing weekend of finally cleaning my chaotic apartment!)

Last Monday I went out for a morning walk and saw the classic Milton Glaser "I (heart) NY" logo in a storefront window, and it made me think of how Glaser updated his iconic image after 9/11 by giving the heart a singed edge, and then I was thinking about what an appropriate update for the Covid era would be, and this image popped into my head. It's not really a cartoon, but I just wanted to put it out into the world, so I drew it up pretty quickly and posted it on Twitter.

Last week, I thanked all you new subscribers and mentioned that this direct reader support is what’s likely to keep TMW sustainable in 2020, as my client papers drop cartoons or go out of business (lost another one last week). A bunch of you wrote in to ask if it is possible to subscribe at a higher level, like you’d be able to do on Patreon. Unfortunately it is not! The interface I use to get Mailchimp (the email service) and Stripe (the payment service) to talk to each other has limited functionality. However, there’s an easy workaround: if you’re so inclined, you can set up an additional recurring payment on Paypal. This link should work, but if it doesn’t, there’s a Paypal “Donate” button on the left side of my website. It won’t be directly linked to your subscription, but it will be appreciated! (Let me emphasize that I am grateful for everyone’s support at any level, though.)

Be safe and be well.

Dan

And there you have it, straight from the 'toonist hisself. If this is a (fair & balanced) graphical depiction of "the news" in our difficult times, so be it.

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[x YouTube]
"The Liar Tweets Tonight" (Parody of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight")
By Roy Zimmerman and The ReZisters, featuring Sandy Riccardi

This genius parody has become this blogger's current earworm and Resistance Anthem. So, if this is a (fair & balanced) first step toward doing the right thing, so be it.

[x TMW]
News From The Coronaverse
By Tom Tomorrow (Dan Perkins)

[Dan Perkins is an editorial cartoonist better known by the pen name "Tom Tomorrow." His weekly comic strip, "This Modern World," which comments on current events from a strong liberal perspective, appears regularly in approximately 150 papers across the US, as well as on Daily Kos. The strip debuted in 1990 in the SF Weekly. Perkins received the Robert F. Kennedy Award for Excellence in Journalism in both 1998 and 2002. When he is not working on projects related to his comic strip, Perkins writes a daily political blog, also entitled "This Modern World," which he began in December 2001. More recently, Dan Perkins, pen name Tom Tomorrow, was named the winner of the 2013 Herblock Prize for editorial cartooning. Even more recently, Dan Perkins was a runner-up for the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning.]

Copyright © 2020 This Modern World/Tom Tomorrow (Dan Perkins)

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