Choke at the clutch moment, it's Sick Little Suicide #34, "Comey Memomey," in which we let our darlings touch the stove rather than stop them.
This piece was originally prompted by former FBI Director James Comey's impending memo congressional testimony, and this meme-style comic is what I envisioned the gag to look like--inspired by those "You mess with the" [funny way to refer to an animal] you get the [funny way to refer to something dangerous]" meme. Like, "You mess with the Hoppo, you get the choppo," and it's a picture of a rabbit holding an axe or something.
So this is a pretty old concept, but I finally finished it off in time for James Comey's appearance on Stephen Colbert, so it's not totally untimely.
I was glad in the interview that Stephen Colbert brought up that supremely odd reaction his crowd had to the breaking news of James Comey being fired as FBI director. I remember watching the show at that time and thinking, Why are these idiots cheering his getting fired? Are they so knee-jerk locked into cheering anything negative happening to people in this iteration of the government without consideration to the specific person being fired? Weren't they paying attention to what that all meant, the clear attempt at obstruction of justice and the comically blatant parallels to Watergate? I doubt they were cheering because this meant we were accelerating to the impeachment phase.
Anyway, I detested James Comey's undeniable negative effect on the election. I believe Nate Silver has discussed the statistical implications James Comey's public re-opening of the Hillary Clinton email investigation had on the election in comparison to how little the public re-closing did to offset the crucial tank in her support.
However, I believe James Comey to be honest, earnest, and trying to do the right thing, and it is important that he, as a prominent (former?!) Republican, is speaking out on the realities of the rot and menace of the Republican party. We need more people to step back from that party and describe it as it has become evident: a dangerous, deluded operation of accumulating power for power's sake.
I was also pleased from the Stephen Colbert interview to find that his book isn't just polite schoolyard jabs at that orange fraud, and that that snippy section is apparently only about six lines in the book, while the remainder is a description of leadership. And as Dave Chapelle had brilliantly articulated in his Equanimity Netflix special, relating the current state of the US to its state of racial understanding upon seeing Emmett Till's mangled corpse, I liked how James Comey held that while we're in an undeniably tumultuous spot right now, there is reasonable hope that these trials will deliver us into a greater state of being once this disgusting cartoon is out of office. And you know what, I'm also fine with him blaming the voters in part. It's true that he never would have won if enough people simply did not vote for him, so yeah, in an ideal world, only those who voted for him would have to suffer through his obviously foreseen disastrous administration. But we all have to hang together, unfortunately. More fortunately, those who didn't vote for him have newfound enthusiasm for justice and civic responsibility for seeing the rotten fruits of apathy and cynicism.
Indeed, more young people are being activated into caring about civic duty, and I myself have every confidence things are going to start turning around even as soon as this very November, it is beyond my imagination that things won't improve. We just need to keep up the enthusiasm and morale, and we can right this ship. I know we can.
So, I appreciate the complicated figure James Comey is: he is not a straight-up hero or villain. He made a monumental lapse in judgment in breaking with FBI policy to disclose the Hillary email investigation, not to mention scolding her upon closing the case. But he is also clearly a person of integrity trying to do what's right. Before the interview, I had thought he should have at least disclosed both candidates were under investigation, but I now understand that that could have jeopardized the orange investigation, and all I want is to see that disgusting piece of garbage rot in prison with all his myriad cronies. If suffering through this present turmoil is the cost, and the additional benefit is a stronger country of responsible, knowledgeable voters, than let Comey what may.
Not normal,
Reuxben
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