Everybody Is Stupid Except For Me

Everybody is Stupid Except for Me

Fans of Peter Bagge's Hate comic may not realize he's been contributing comic-strip opinion pieces to Reason magazine for the last several years... finally collected in this volume. Although a libertarian, Bagge is hardly dogmatic, and most of the pieces undermine traditional party lines in favor of a rather personal, rational and informed take on hot-button issues: Favorite topics include the erosion of our civil liberties, ongoing boondoggles of the American public, the Iraq war, politicians both in general and in particular, and the conservative/religious war on sex. Each piece features Bagge himself front and center as the puzzled, indignant, or deeply conflicted everyman-on-the-street trying to make sense of this 21st century. And of course, every panel is delineated in Bagge's glorious, laugh-out-loud stretchy cartoon style, making even his disquisitions on some very serious topics crackle with wit and energy.From Publishers WeeklyBagge made his reputation with the wicked social satire of Hate, but since 2001 he's also produced these short comics for the libertarian magazine Reason-mostly reported pieces about politics and culture, but also some single-page opinion strips. The formula is that Bagge attends some sort of event (the opening of a tribal casino, an exit strategy for the war on drugs conference, a lecture by the author of a book about the founding fathers), observes everyone and mocks them mercilessly. His visual style-in which people are all huge-mouthed, squinty-eyed, rubber-limbed caricatures-is turned up all the way to jeer; it's also pretty funny on its own. Bagge aims his (constitutionally protected) satirical blunderbuss at both the left and the right, and occasionally points it at fellow libertarians and even himself. He follows up a piece in which he eviscerates self-righteous antiwar protesters with one in which he notes his own failure to do much to oppose the Iraq war. And when he meets with Ron Paul, he observes both that Paul was his favorite candidate in the 2008 primaries and that the betrayed part of me just wanted to punch him in his kindly old racist-pandering face. (June)Copyright