Pearls Before Swine by Stephan Pastis for July 26, 2013

Hey, if they can run their stupid cable through my front yard without my permission…

Reminds me of DirecTV commercials.

Only you, Rat, only you…

Why would anyone want to steal cable, when ordinary rope works just as well?

Who still uses cable? Who still watches TV? (Okay, Pig and Rat do.)[I will admit to watching some broadcast TV via “rabbit-ears,” but never have had either cable or satellite.]

Is stealing cable[tV access] really a felony? I would have thought it a misdemeanor.

nobody steals cable anymore because:(A) they passed laws against it (right, sure),(B) they encrypted the signal (hacked by a high school kid),© people stream content from Netflix these days,(D) people get pirated content from bittorrent

And remember, Netflix is copyrighted. :-)

I liked it when TV was FREE!

Nice shading on the bar stools Stephan.

The major networks have very little worth watching. “Dish” has History, TLC, Hallmark, Discovery, Disney… and several more good ones.

So, if theft-proof cable TV becomes a reality, the cable giants will LOWER their rates? Find someone who believes THAT! I’ve ocean front property in New Mexico I want to sell him/her/it!

…and, yes, I’ll be selling it DIRT cheap!

Tree trimming truck came through the alley and cut about half a dozen cable wires. The one over my backyard was left dangling almost to ground level. I called C*mcast to report it since I had to dodge it every time I cut the grass. They sent me a letter accusing me of stealing their services.

No-one steals cable anymore, although many of your characters have box tv’s so they must live in the olden days.

No TV for me anymore – PAY to watch crap + commercials???? No!!! Netflix it is, and a kind neighbor has already extended an open invite when Downton Abbey returns.

When your cable goes out, you get desperate, when you get desperate, you steal cable, when you steal cable, you get arrested, when you get arrested, you go to prison when you go to prison, you drop the soap. Don’t drop the soap, upgrade to Directv.

Many years ago, just a little while after cable had gotten started, my parents canceled our cable service. I noticed that the cable just outside the house was simply cut, so I went to Radio Shack and bought some cable end connectors and re-connected the two cables back together. It worked! Later, I also noticed that the scrambling of the Showtime channel wasn’t 100% effective and I managed to use two TVs, one tuned to the best picture and the other tuned to the best sound to get watchable Showtime. I don’t consider that stealing as I didn’t go off our property and just took advantage of the shoddy practices of our local cable company.

Uh here’s a suggestion — JUST TURN OFF THE CABLE. Free to air TV is still out there if you MUST have TV, and if people stopped paying for cable they might find time to do other things like read books, talk to friends or even (gasp) go for a walk. Not to mention that the cable companies would go broke and stop cramming such )(#$(@Y%(* at us!

Cut the crap. Give us more @#& CROCS……….

R.I.P. Dennis Farina. His last appearance was those Comcast commercials

When Rat’s decision is final… IT’S FINAL!

LOL xxx

What came first—the cable thief or the price gouging?

I remember TV by candle light. (hahah)Springsteen comes to mind.“57 Channels and Nothin On”.So I bought a 44 magnum it was solid steel caseAnd in the blessed name of Elvis well I just let it blastTil my TV lay in pieces there at my feet.And they busted me for disturbing the almighty peaceJudge said “What you got in your defense son?”I said “57 Channels and Nothin ON”I can see by your eyes friend you’re just about gone57 Channels and Nothin’ ON.

Phatts California said,

nobody steals cable anymore because:(A) they passed laws against it (right, sure), “Al Gore was our champion in the ’80s against scrambling..Hell, I was on his side…traded letters, etc came to nothing…. rats…”(B) they encrypted the signal (hacked by a high school kid), “(Don’t look at ME… !!) I waz running a biz of my OWN them days !!”© People stream content from Netflix these days, " (Thru Hulu and most of it is ‘kid stuff’ crash, bang, shoot-um up crap that went straight to video to begin with.)"(D) people get pirated content from bittorrent " …..always trying new crap… finding that it’s just old crap with new, hip-hop clothes.."

UncaJim says that we’ve dug to the bottom of the barrel, found the top of a worse barrel, scrabbled through the content of it, and are now digging through the one underIT… So what’s next? Is there REALLY a pony under all this horseS#!T?

Thanx, Phatts for giving me a soapbox.

This comic would have been better if it ended with the 2nd frame. :)

This was one of the causes, historians believe, that the Roman Empire had such troubles in the 300s to the 600s. The taxes were so high that many abandoned the land or gave it to the local rich families (who were exempt from taxes, at least in practice), choosing to become serfs rather than go bankrupt. Meanwhile the tax base kept shrinking, putting more pressure on the taxpayers who remained, until eventually the system just collapsed.

Our cable co says rates rise due to greedy content providers that make them take all their channels when they only want one and want them to put all the channels in basic programming.