AN INNER HIVE MAILING
Tom The Dancing Bug Blog 2019-09-26
Every week, at least a day before that week's Tom the Dancing Bug comic is published online anywhere, I send the comic, with some commentary, news, and other comics, to the members of the INNER HIVE.
If you're interested in joining the INNER HIVE, here's a sample mailing, sent out to members Tuesday of this week, and it's fairly representative of the kind of thing you'll get if you join.
Information on joining is here.
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LI'L DON TRUMP
There's a tendency to forget where we've come in Trump's story about getting election help from foreign governments. Before he was inaugurated, his entire campaign was outraged at allegations that anyone had ever met with agents of the Russian government. Don Jr. called the charge that the Russians were helping Trump "disgusting" and "so phony." Now that it's come out that the Russians did help, the campaign welcomed that help, Don Jr. attended a meeting seeking that help, and the campaign manager gave the Russians its campaign its voter data, it's no longer disgusting, it's all perfectly appropriate. And Trump is openly sending his personal lawyer to Ukraine to get their help in his election. -- I think that for most Tom the Dancing Bug readers, this week’s comic will be read as a fairly straightforward satire of Donald Trump’s mendacious denials of his soliciting/coordinating foreign election interference, depicting him as a child denying his obvious cookie theft. Simple enough. But close readers of the strip, some of whom may be INNER HIVE members, may be confused by specific historical comic strip references. So while I certainly don’t intend this background to be at all necessary to enjoy or understand this comic, I’ll lay it out here for you guys: 1. Li’l Don may look like little Donald from my series of “Calvin and Hobbes” parodies, “Donald and John.” 
2. But in fact, I’m invoking a different mischieveous comic strip kid, Dennis the Menace. 
3. I’ve evoked the Dennis the Menace look, using the “Li’l” title, many times before, with Li’l Bill Clinton, Li’l Al Gore, Li’l George W. Bush, and below, with Li’l Barack Obama and Li’l Mitt Romney (a story had come out that when he was in prep school, he and his friends had bullied another boy by forcibly cutting his long hair). 
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-- This one was fun but tough to draw, as you can see in panel 8, which is pretty much border-to-border blue pencil. Blue pencil has been a helpful way to draw (I can ink over the pencil, and then remove the blue on the computer), but it barely erases, so when I really screw up it becomes a mess. 
-- But the big news is that the Tom the Dancing Bug Migrant Children Fundraiser is going nuts. Tom the Dancing Bug readers have now raised over $11,000, with about a week to go! In addition, a reader contacted me separately to tell me that because of the logistics of how he makes charitable donations, he could not donate directly through the Fundraiser, but he sent me documentation of his $5,000 donation, with a request for a matching contribution from his employer! He requested to remain anonymous, and doesn’t want his contribution to count toward any of the prizes, in order to continue to encourage others. But his direct contribution, and a similar $315 contribution of another INNER HIVE member, puts the number we’ve raised to help these children at almost $17,000!! I’m floored by this, guys. This amount will make a real difference in the lives and well-being of extremely frightened and vulnerable children. -- This week’s upcoming Classic comic is Bad Fetus, in "Fetal firepower" (2013). In six years, the only thing that’s changed about the insanity depicted here is that now a conservative would never speak disparagingly about Russia. 
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2. But in fact, I’m invoking a different mischieveous comic strip kid, Dennis the Menace. 3. I’ve evoked the Dennis the Menace look, using the “Li’l” title, many times before, with Li’l Bill Clinton, Li’l Al Gore, Li’l George W. Bush, and below, with Li’l Barack Obama and Li’l Mitt Romney (a story had come out that when he was in prep school, he and his friends had bullied another boy by forcibly cutting his long hair). -- -- This one was fun but tough to draw, as you can see in panel 8, which is pretty much border-to-border blue pencil. Blue pencil has been a helpful way to draw (I can ink over the pencil, and then remove the blue on the computer), but it barely erases, so when I really screw up it becomes a mess. -- But the big news is that the Tom the Dancing Bug Migrant Children Fundraiser is going nuts. Tom the Dancing Bug readers have now raised over $11,000, with about a week to go! In addition, a reader contacted me separately to tell me that because of the logistics of how he makes charitable donations, he could not donate directly through the Fundraiser, but he sent me documentation of his $5,000 donation, with a request for a matching contribution from his employer! He requested to remain anonymous, and doesn’t want his contribution to count toward any of the prizes, in order to continue to encourage others. But his direct contribution, and a similar $315 contribution of another INNER HIVE member, puts the number we’ve raised to help these children at almost $17,000!! I’m floored by this, guys. This amount will make a real difference in the lives and well-being of extremely frightened and vulnerable children. -- This week’s upcoming Classic comic is Bad Fetus, in "Fetal firepower" (2013). In six years, the only thing that’s changed about the insanity depicted here is that now a conservative would never speak disparagingly about Russia. --