Kickass and the Hodag

Attribution: The Wide World Magazine, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper and Phyllis in celebrating the capture of what was first thought to be the Rhinelander Hodag but turns out to be Elon Musk who was nabbed while trying to stuff currency into the personal body …
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Kickass and ICE

Attribution: Cgoodall, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, agrees with the keeper that it is only a matter of time until he and Phyllis are accosted by black clad masked young men who demand that they come along peacefully as the deportation process has advanced to their category—that being “elderly …
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Altered States

Illustration by Michael DiMilo By Geoff Carter In the late 1970s, when I was still in college, a movie named King of Hearts was the popular midnight movie (before it was preempted by Eraserhead and the ubiquitous The Rocky Horror Picture Show). The film was about a French town taken over by inmates of an insane asylum during World War I. The …
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Kickass Hiding Under Bed

Attribution: Photo by kuaileqie RE on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, woke up to the dripping of the keeper’s poetry on a rainy Sunday: ‘If I had a Telsa I would sell it. “if I were a Repub you would smell it. “If the mad POTUS has his way And tells his lies with every …
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Kickass and Questions

Attribution: Photo by Ludovic Migneault on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, is unable to assist the keeper and Phyllis as they wake to yet another day of grappling with the profoundly absurd questions of the day: *How the hell did we give a narcissistic sub-par lying golfer the clubs to drive the entire world into …
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The Fourth Wall

Attribution: Photo by Ilmi Amali Q.A on Unsplash By Geoff Carter I’m sick of politics. The last six weeks—four months—have been exhausting. We’ve gone from shock to disappointment to denial to acceptance (pretty much the stages of grief) to greater shock, disbelief, fear, and anger. Of course, to be fair, this is only one side of the argument.  …
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Kickass and Dream Job

Attribution: Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, sympathizes with the keeper in his disappointment over missing out on his dream job as advertised by a stable owner in Richford, WI, an area the keeper is very familiar with for its trout fishing and weekend escapades at his former weekend cabin. The …
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Get Up! Stand Up!

Attribution: Photo by Colin Lloyd on Unsplash By Geoff Carter No living American has seen anything like it. We’re being invaded. From within. Our government is being dismantled by a gang of billionaires, white supremacists, and radical Christian Nationalists. Veterans, park rangers, teachers, scientists, doctors, federal workers, and many other hard-working Americans are suffering. Because of thoughtless and …
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Dialogues on Robber Barons 2.0: This Land is My Land

Illustration by Michael DiMilo Featuring the Fabulous Dadbots: Mark M., Dave S., Mark O., Dennis C., and Geoff Carter Bots, Not a lot has been spewed on this thread regarding Trump’s power grab in Washington. So I’ll launch an opening shot. As I write–and things are changing rapidly–several of Trump’s Executive Orders (EOs) have been …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Film Review of “The Apprentice”

Illustration by Michael DiMilo ★★★1/2 The Art of Greed: Film Review of The Apprentice By Geoff Carter One of the timeliest films to come out this year was The Apprentice, a biopic of Donald Trump’s life as a young man and his subsequent career as a ruthless and unscrupulous businessman. Even fans of Donald Trump might find …
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