Cryogenic Comix # 32

Cryogenic Comix # 32
Copyright (c) 2019 Steve Willis

From 1980, felt tip on very thin bond. Includes another appearance of Morty the Bear.

The Richard Nixon Song

Richard Milhous Nixon

Resigned in disgrace

The best thing about him?

It was easy to draw his face!

[Below: Nixon meets Morty the Dog in Cranium Frenzy # 9]

A Morty Comix Twisted Conundrum

OK, so you and I are having lunch in sort of a weird new restaurant that includes a guy in a clown suit who entertains the customers by playing seriously romantic tunes on a violin as he roams the dining room floor. He doesn't smile even though his makeup indicates that he is supposed to be happy happy. Somehow the strange combination is meant to be ironic, but it just doesn't work.

We go to eat there for the first time mainly to watch this failed attempt at being hip, which we heard about from friends. We order and as we wait for our meals the clown plays "Let's Face the Music and Dance."

But then you notice that my eyes and the clowns eyes lock. You hear me utter, "Oh crap!" I turn pale, shove the table back as I pull out and run. You never knew my aging, portly out-of-shape self could move so fast. I'm out the door.

The clown yells, "Willis! Stop!" And from out his absurdly puffy costume he produces a sophisticated looking firearm. He bolts out the door in pursuit, pistol held high over his head. His comic oversize shoes prevent him from running too fast.

For about 15 seconds not a sound is heard in this eating establishment, but then the slow murmurs start and build to a sound like that of an air hose in action with nothing to fill, and you realize all eyes are on you.

About five minutes later the clown returns, empty handed. His fake nose, fake ears, hat, and wig have all fallen off. Streaks of sweat are traced on his facial greasepaint. He looks like our worst hideous nightmares of what clowns can be. He is panting, and pissed off.

The clown resets the chair I tipped over, plops down in it, crosses his arms with his elbows on the table, leans close and stares at you. In the distance you hear sirens. He presents you with some sort of official looking credentials and badge, representing some kind of national security agency you've never heard of with an acronym like the NSGV or something like that.

Then he reaches in his clown pocket, pulls out about a half dozen Morty Comix, and carefully arranges them on the table so you can see each one. "We intercepted these in odd places, like in gas stations, cafe menus, dead phone booths, you know, the usual place lowlife scum spies pass coded messages. Which is, in fact, what these are."

Meanwhile, the local police arrive and they appear normal except they are all wearing styrofoam Abraham Lincoln stovepipe hats. They see the clown and become very agitated and hesitant. None of them come close to him, but instead the one who seems to be in charge whispers into a radio communication device. Before you know it a man who looks exactly like Richard Nixon, dressed in an old-fashioned gangster pinstripe suit, complete with fedora, walks in the room and says to the clown in a commanding voice, "I'll have those Morty Comix now, Mister."

The clown starts to reach for his gun, but before he even touches it he is surrounded by officers who quickly draw their weapons and in an unified precision aim right at his heart. So he slowly rises and calmly announces, "You win. Let Hercules himself do what he may. The cat will mew and dog will have his day." 

There is always a bigger fish.

The styrofoam hat law enforcement officers allow the clown the leave quietly, but seconds later another set of sirens are heard in the distance, coming closer. The uniformed guys look at each other and the Nixon guy says, "Jeez, it's the REAL cops!" and they all run away, forgetting the original purpose of their mission.

So you are left sitting at a table with six Morty Comix and the sirens are getting closer. You have about 2 or 3 minutes to either cut and run or stay and deal with the authorities. What would you do, and what happens to the comix? 










 

Postcard - Buhl/Castleford, Idaho

"'The President Nixon Profile' rock formation near Castleford, Idaho. Located in the famous 'Balance Rock' scenic area off highway 30 near Buhl, Idaho."

1970s.

George McGovern, 1922-2012

 

Come Home America

In many elections I hear voters say they have to choose between the lesser of evils. But in 1972 it was clearly a choice between Good and Evil. And America re-elected Evil in a landslide. Two years later it was hard to find anyone who admitted to voting for Nixon.

There was a bit of graffiti someone wrote on the restroom wall of McGovern HQ in Oly. I'll share it here, and as off-color as it was, it does sum up how us young volunteers felt about Dick Nixon: "Don't change Dicks in the middle of a screw, vote for Nixon in '72!"

When I balance the choices I made in my life, I count the experience of being a volunteer for McGovern in '72 as something I will never regret. I also supported him in my caucus when he ran in 1984 against Ron the Con. And I don't regret that either. Several issues considered radical in the 1970s-1980s are now embraced by many Republicans. So our side eventually won. George was a pioneer and a winner on the right side of history.  But being a pioneer has a big price.

To quote McGovern, "You know, sometimes, when they say you're ahead of your time, it's just a polite way of saying you have a real bad sense of timing." 

He also said something to the effect: "I wanted to run for President in worst way-- and I did!" 

My fave was when his wife, Eleanor, came to Seattle and proclaimed the Nixon administration the "most corrupt in recent history." There was a big uproar. A few days later George arrived and apologized. He said Eleanor should have left out the word "recent."

McGovern was on the winning wide of history, at least on social issues and foreign policy. In this area obstructionist conservatives will always lose and progressives will always win. Economics has more of a universal pendulum.

Goodbye Sen. McGovern. And thank you for being a voice of reason on a national stage filled with haters shouting out messages of greed and fear. You were an inept politician, but you were a decent man. It was a miracle you were ever nominated. But working for you was the cleanest political experience I have ever had in my life, and I frequently revisit the idealism of that year if I need to recharge to keep up the Good Fight. Of course we all evolve, but at my core I still think of myself as a McGovernite. And a whole generation of us were inspired by your campaign. You were a WWII vet who worked hard to end war. I salute you for your service and your vision.

Come Home America

Morty Comix # 2445

Morty Comix # 2445 was dropped into the mail slot of a long vacant storefront on Oly's Westside where a pizza place used to be.

Actually two different pizza places were there from the 1970s-2000s. Lots of good memories in both.

I think it was in this place I heard a good McGovern/Nixon story. Since George is in his last days I think it is appropriate to relay this tale.

Around 1976 a bunch of us guys taking a Constitutional law class at The Evergreen State College went here to share a pizza and beer. One among us was Vietnam War vet who was badly wounded on a gunboat, patched up, and then sent back to the U.S. for noncombat duty. He said he was then assigned to the White House.

According to this fellow, he stood at attention in a room where President Nixon came most evenings and studied papers. The President always wore glasses and had a beer with him as he did so. After a month of basically being ignored by Nixon, the Commander in Chief suddenly looked up at the soldier and asked, "Who did you vote for in the last election, son?"

"McGovern, SIR!" was the reply.

And the next day he was given a new assignment.

Goodbye George, and thank you.

Morty Comix # 2444

Morty Comix # 2444 was left on a brick ledge over a couple of pathetic real estate brochure distribution boxes in a strip mall on the Westside of Olympia. This was the same facility where I first met J.P. Patches ca. 1960 when he came to promote the grand opening of this place. Notice both storefronts pictured here are vacant.

Old, decaying strip malls, I must admit, do hold a certain fascination for me. They were the proto-malls of their time. This particular one predated the Oly area's first bonafide mall (South Sound Mall in Lacey) by a half dozen years. Both vacant holes pictured here hold many memories for me as the spaces have performed a variety of retail roles in their past.

In cartoonist terms, the left half of this image once housed a pharmacy/gift shop back when Tricky Dick was in office. They also sold LP albums, lots of them. The owner was a big fat Republican member of the Washington State House of Representatives who used his girth as a campaign plus since he claimed it would make him be noticed when he stood up to talk. But in fact all he did was introduce bills to benefit pharmacists.

Anyway, when my parents would be shopping for groceries next door, I'd slip into this place and study the amazing album covers. I didn't really care about the music on the vinyl as much as I studied the big graphic images used to sell them. This was part of my education as a visual artist.

$25 Sale - Original Art - Spring! and Nixon

 

 

Two drawings I am selling as as set, both unpublished

"Spring" black ballpoint on light bond, 14 x 22 cm. Drawn during the Pullman years, ca. 1984

Nixon: blue ballpoint on card stock, 22 x 28 cm. Drawn in 1973 or 1974 during the Watergate affair

$25 ppd

Check or money order to
Steve Willis
PO Box 390
McCleary, WA 98557-0390

Or order through PayPal

$25 Sale - Original Art - Mukey the Mutant Membrane, p. 9

Mukey the Mutant Membrane, page 9

Heavy bond paper, 35.5 x 28 cm. Felt tip over nonphoto blue pencil. Drawn in 1996.

$25 ppd

Check or money order to
Steve Willis
PO Box 390
McCleary, WA 98557-0390

Or order through PayPal

$25 Sale - Original Art - Cranium Frenzy # 6, p. 9

 

Cranium Frenzy # 6, page 9

Medium # paper measure 35.5 x 28 cm. Nonphoto blue pencil with felt tip finishing lines. Drawn in 1990.

$25 ppd
Check or money order to
Steve Willis
PO Box 390
McCleary, WA 98557-0390

Or order through PayPal

Buttons - Presidential Campaign - 1968

Nixon

This small bit of metal was designed to clip on to a shirt pocket. I found it on the ground in 1968.

Buttons - Presidential Campaign - 1972

 Remember Oct. 9

For more buttons, Ms. Anderson, Clergy & Laity Concerned, (402) 426-4006, $25.00/M

This was a button distributed by the McGovern campaign. The reference was to a statement supposedly made by Richard Nixon, Oct. 9, 1968, when he was campaigning for President. Now this is only from my memory, but the quote was something like: "Those who have had a chance for four years and could not produce peace should not be given another chance." At the time Nixon uttered this he was aiming at LBJ's Vice-President and 1968 Dem. nominee, Hubert Humphrey. In 1972 this button attempted to remind voters of how Nixon had not only failed to end the Vietnam War, but actually escalated it.

Buttons - Presidential Campaign - 1972

President Nixon

Curl says: COADCO - COMM FOR THE RE-ELECT OF THE PRESIDENT

The Committee for the Re-Election of the President in 1972 was known by the acronym CREEP in some circles

Buttons - Presidential Campaign - 1968 or 1972

The curl has: Official Nixon Button, Feeley & Wheeler Co., 370 Lexington N.Y.C. 10007

Buttons - Presidential Campaign - 1972

Nixon Now

A most impressive effort of the Nixon campaign trying to lure the youth vote, 1972 was the first where 18 year-olds could vote.

There was a real storm front between those who were raised during the Great Depression and World War Two as opposed to us Boomers who only saw the shadow of the atomic/nuclear cloud. We grew up with the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam, and the Cold War. Our protests had a sense of urgency since we were concerned tomorrow might never come. Something had to be done about this mess NOW! At the time this was recognized and dubbed The Generation Gap. This button was an attempt by the Nixon people to reach over that gap. Apparently, in terms being re-elected, it worked.

I find it humorous that in 1972 Nixon won by a landslide, but by 1974 when he resigned in total disgrace I could find few people who admitted they voted for him.

When I think about who was the worst president in U.S. history, I have a hard time choosing between Nixon, Reagan, Bush II, Harding or Buchanan.