Crankshaft by Tom Batiuk and Dan Davis for September 22, 2024

Good point…

Wouldn’t it be more appropriate to quote something from Fahrenheit 451 here, somehow? Or maybe something that has to do with censorship or thought oppression, perhaps?

That speech had nothing to do with this topic. Why quote that here?

Jeff needs to get new better glasses.

You were able to get into a college!

Next up, Thomas Irony Batiuk quotes one of FDR’s fireside chats.

Hey, Jeff, tell us how this fire compares to the Great Hollywood Fire of recent memory, and how you and your Inner Child escaped it by taking refuge with Queen Tika in the underground empire of Murania. I’m sure that will inspire Pam and Mindull!

Look at P4’s smoke clouds. Lillian’s either smoking one of Pam’s “special blend cigarettes,” or lighting her next Molotov cocktails. “In NorthofHereBurg, there’s another bookstore still standing!” she cackles madly.

Fear… it’s elf!

Hm, yes, Jeff, certainly there was NOTHING else you learned about speech and protests (what THIS story is allegedly supposed to be about) during your time at Kent State. I’m sure there was absolutely nothing of interest that happened during your time there, which canonically included the year 1970. (And certainly there was never a story arc lasting several weeks about that very same nothing.)

If Batiuk wanted to show real fear, he’d show Lizard Lil isolated and abandoned by the community. The arson investigators would dismiss the crime. The police would hint that she might have set the fire herself. The local news would interview people who thought she provoked the attack. The neighbors would either avoid her or suggest she back down. Threatening phone calls in the middle of the night. An angry demonstration against literature that corrupts the young. Real fear is a prolonged nightmare.

Wow. Just looks at the title panel. What loa of misleading misinformation. Not a single book was burns so far in this komix but sure why not advertise a burning book in title panel eh.

Even though all books (so called banned books which ain’t really banned at all) was safe and not burns in a burning event in Booksteenker earlier, and as Skippy ol guy is says there ain’t a shred of evidence that it was protestors who was burns it and was implies it most likely a convenient coincidence.

Even though only a couple of bottom stairs was particularly doused in gasoline and sets on fire. And all the books is still safe and is never burns.

But sure. Lets we builds up a fake hype of a burning book in the title panel when there was none actually burnt or even actually was a target of getting burnt. Because it’s called burning.

It must be some sortsa political science that me is not getting here. No wonder why me is no gets why on earth anyone who is wanted to burn a books woulda burns a couple of bottom stairs and be contented with it. And not to mentions that them books ain’t even banned and available everywhere. Yeah. Maybe it because it got to does sometheeng with political science so no wonder me no gets it. It’s called politics. And me is never gets politics see.

So, is he saying the garage should be repainted or not? Does looking at “fear itself” induce fear, and is that a good thing or not? My head spins.

At Kent State the fear was the Ohio National Guard. :-(

Cranky went to the gas station to refill his can for round two.

Now do “Veni Vidi Vici”

Now that we are all aware of the problem with all of these cities and towns throughout our great nation burning books and stores that have those books, maybe we can move on to what a comic strip like Crankshaft is supposed to be and be, um funny? This story arc could really use some ending.

With this strip, including everything from clip art of an open book pasted over clip art of a cheery campfire (notice the book itself is not burning, as no such clip art exists in the Crankshaft Reusable Art Portfolio), to inconsistencies with the previous week (why is smoke coming out of the window in one panel when the fire was clearly shown to have never gone past the bottom stairs, let alone into the building?), to a character in the classic “mansplaining” pose spouting an FDR quote he was apparently unaware of until a college class, Batiuk takes his place alongside such greats as Ed Wood and Tommy Wiseau. The gulf between the Pulitzer-worthy Topical Drama he thinks he’s writing and what’s actually on the page makes the Grand Canyon look like a roadside drainage ditch.

Thankfully Jff was here to explain things for the female characters! Ask not what your garage can do for you, but what you can do for your garage.

Sadly, that’s how people are being controlled these days…

Fahrenheit 451 is a short book, not the gigantic tome depicted in the title panel. The book being incinerated is actually Dead St. Lisa’s Story: the Complete Saga, With Annotations.

Kent State…..how did you miss the shootings??

Good comment.

I fear fascists and trumpists — but I repeat myself. (With apologies to Mark Twain)

You had to know Kent State was going to brought up.

Four weeks later, those poor students are still waiting for their copies of the book. This story arc might not be over until well after Christmas.

In the meantime, Ed Crankshaft has applied for a recurring role in any comic strip seeking an elderly, grumpy bus driver prone to using malapropisms.

I guess Ed got tired of standing around with his hands in his pockets, not the center of attention.

Crankshaft got tired of not being able to speak……so he left! Attaboy Cranky!

Of course he went to Kent State.

Title panel: Change of plans. Best Actress Award Winner Les Moore has decided Fahrenheit 451 is much too controversial to cover. Instead, the class will be covering the Necronomicon.

I have to admit. Whatever creature left those claw marks on the garage must be terrifying. I’d be fearful of it, too.

Panel #4: Lillian has apparently blown off Jff’s mansplaining to go upstairs and send smoke signals.

Perhaps a quote on freedom of speech, or freedom of the presses by such historical figures as Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Winston Churchill, would be more appropriate to the story. Maybe that is a favorite quote of Batiuk. Fire is a way of creating fear in your opponents, so maybe he is right. Problem with book burners is that they seem to think that they are protecting society from ideas which they find offensive or which differ from their own. . The truth of freedom of speech laws is that They protect one’s freedom to express their thoughts. They do not protect against prosecution for libel , slander, or falsehoods and lies.

Reminiscent of the book burnings in Germany, May of 1933 when right-wing German students started burning books they considered opposed to Nazi doctrine.

And this wouldn’t have happened at all if Les had just taken the books to his own house and handed them out in class.

Lillian picked a weird time to shake the dust out of her rugs. I mean, it can’t be smoke, since the fire was nowhere near the inside of the bookstore.

Fear. Fear only exists through ignorance. Knowledge defeats fear. The fear peddlers must interfere with knowledge in every way they can to survive. Banning books, burning books, a policy of “Alternative facts” since 2016, telling you your neighbors ate your pets. All the lies of our Great Nation going downhill, the lies about our border, the lies about people’s rights, the lies about the lies. tRump has managed to scare a nation. We need to defeat the fear peddler and take our Great Nation back.

Of course, that was not the sort of fear that FDR was talking about. He was outlining his plans to combat the Great Depression and not being afraid to do what needed to be done:

“So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is…fear itself — nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life, a leadership of frankness and of vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory. "

And he put the blame for the Depression on unrestrained greed:

“The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit. Recognition of the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success goes hand in hand with the abandonment of the false belief that public office and high political position are to be valued only by the standards of pride of place and personal profit; and there must be an end to a conduct in banking and in business which too often has given to a sacred trust the likeness of callous and selfish wrongdoing.” How woke!

Deep. Super funny. Ha ha.

what happened to Ed? And why is the window open and ventilating smoke? The fire was outside.

If you don’t like a book, don’t read it. However, don’t inflict your views on everybody else.

C’mon, Batty… why don’t you grow a pair and call out the real-world fear peddlers: the MAGA terrorists harassing the citizens of your home state?

Its a very twisted world! No wonder he wants them to read the book, think about tomorrow and a bleak future.

Oh, Batty, will you PLEASE just get over yourself???

Along with most of his party and advisors FDR was a progressive, liberal, antisemite.

Nobody I know or have seen recently has banned books. Some parents are correctly concerned about age-appropriate books being available only to those readers who are mature enough to handle the content. Parental choice as to when a child is ready to consume information is important.

The arsonist is…..Eugene.

I mean everyone knows the quote—it doesn’t need several panels to explain how you came to learn this great, obscure quote rolls eyes

We are in a crisis and Batiuk accurately illustrates it

Exactly

Meanwhile, at the same time in Germany, in 1933, A. Hitler had won Germany’s highest election, and among other things, was burning books.

Did we really need Jff to mansplain the the ladies what fear is all about? And did we need his “When I was in college at Kent State…” lead-in to repeating what is certainly one of the two most famous famous FDR quotes of all time (the Dec. 7th “day of infamy” quote being the other)? And, most importantly, did we need this Sunday recap that added nothing to the storyline?