--I recently received the following cartoon suggestion from a reader:

"Hi Steve—

"Has there ever been a better time in history to be a late night talk show host or even better, a Political Cartoonist?

"]Here's one of two] ideas for your column [*Editor's note: I don't write columns; I draw cartoons]:

" . . . If it wasn’t a family newspaper--A picture of a d**k and [the president of the U.S.] getting pulled on like a rubber by [tne leader of North Korea].

"You are the expert--Take it from here. . . . You could have been a real visionary if you would have taken this joke/idea/ultimately reality idea . . . a month ago.

"Regards."
_____


--My reply:

"Many people tend to think that their ideas are visionary, even when their ideas are (as in the case with yours . . .), pornographic."


--The reader's response:

"You're right. I apologize."

*****


Wow. That was easy.

It was almost like doing a bishop's interview: "You bad. Repent. And you can't serve in the Church again until you do."

But I was never a bishop. The highest up the leadership chain of command I ever got was high councilman--and then only for five months---when my stake president abruptly released me for doodling cartoons critical of Arizona's eventually impeached, convicted and removed-from-office Mormon governor, Evan Mecham, who was brazenly invoking his religion to advance his political agenda--including reportedly trying to recruit support when he would attend the temple. His LDS supporters were with him all the way, declaring that they were being led by the Holy Ghost, with some openly comparing Mecham to Moses and, yea verily, even to Jesus Christ.

Yet, the stake president showed me the door on the grounds that I was misusing my God-given talents to mock the sacred emblems of the Church. (I depicted Evan the Terrible as Jesus Himself, descending from heaven Second Coming-style, adorned in flowing rainment, holding a copy of the "Book of Moron by Evan Mecham" and declaring to the world, "I warned you sinners," He was flanked by angelic rats blowing their trumpets heralding his return.

Mecham's Mormon supporters were outraged with this cartoon from hell. Damn their comparisons for Mecham to Moses and Jesus. Full speed ahead. The stake president soon informed me that prior to giving me the boot, he had received a call from then-GA H. Burke Peterson in Salt Lake City asking about what was going on in Arizona's cartoon world.

He also said he got a personal complaint from a Mormon member of the AZ legislature at the time, Jerry Gillespie, who told him that I should not be allowed to hold any office in LDS Land. The stake prez said neither complaint had anything whatsoever to do with my subsquent ignominious fall from high council grace.

Hmmmm. I don't recall any of Brother Mecham's TBM pom-pom squad being divinely dinged for comparing him to prophets of God or to the Son of God.

Oh, well. The Lord works in mysterious ways. :)



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/12/2018 05:06PM by steve benson.