Author: Mike Gold

Don Imus uttered a phrase that was heard around the world. Of course, his radio show is broadcast across the world on sundry radio and cable television stations, but you get the idea.

Last Wednesday Mr. Imus referred to the Rutgers’ women’s basketball team as “nappy headed hos.” Sadly, he wasn’t referring to the late Dan Blocker. On Friday Imus apologized for his remarks in no uncertain terms, and his host company CBS said they’d put his show on a tighter leash.

Now, I’m a First Amendment absolutelist, and there’s not “but” at the end of that sentence. If Winston cigarettes wants to resume sponsoring The Flintstones and the broadcasting outlets want to advertise it, that’s fine by me. It’s free speech, and it always applies to all sides of any debate.

That doesn’t mean that people shouldn’t react to it. If you don’t like Imus for any reason whatsoever, you don’t have to listen to the show. I don’t because after 40 years it’s grown self-righteous and lame – in my opinion. But that’s my right. You don’t have to sponsor it, you don’t have to broadcast it on your affiliated station.

But let’s remember one thing. Everybody says stupid things from time to time. Anybody who has ever been married knows this. Rev. Al Sharpton, who has called for Imus’s termination, should know this – particularly after the Tawana Brawley situation, which Sharpton properly explained away by saying “because I believed her.” He should grant Imus the same license. He made a stupid mistake.

Predictably, everybody you’d guess is calling for Imus’s well-endowed scalp. He committed the sin of unthinking political incorrectness, and he did so in as little as three words. It’s not as if he’s got an entire career making such offensive statements, like, say, Bill Donohue or Louis Farrakhan or any number of other people I could mention.

A couple years ago, Farrakhan renounced his extreme statements and we were expected to take that at face value, and I did. Should we not grant Imus the same opportunity? Last week, in response to his skewering on the current episode of South Park, Donohue admitted he comes on “a bit strong” and he said he laughed his ass off at the teevee show. Should we not grant Imus the same understanding?

Back in the day, my radio show on (then) WEAW-FM in Chicago was followed by a half hour from the syndicated Reverend Carl MacIntyre, a man so far to the right he actually “exposed” both the FBI and the Boy Scouts of America as Communist plots. One of his listeners tuned in early and heard me playing the Grateful Dead’s version of “Turn On Your Lovelight” and got all offended, saying I was promoting prostitution. Like Sharpton, she filed a complaint with the FCC. Being more liberal times (it was during the Nixon Administration) the FCC overseer ruled in my favor – but only after the radio station spent more in legal fees than they did on my show.

Imus was stupid. Don’t listen if you don’t want to, but let everybody else make up their own minds.

Johnny Hart, of B.C. and Wizard of Id fame, died Saturday while working at his storyboard in Endicott NY. He was 76. 

B.C. appears in more than 1,300 newspapers worldwide – quite an achievement in these days of newspaper mergers and disappearing strips.

No stranger to controversy, some of Hart’s cartoons had hard Christian themes. A Sunday page published on Easter, 2001 was deemed by many Jews to be quite offensive – a menorah transformed into a cross, accompanied by Jesus Christ’s dying words. According to the Associated Press, critics said it implied that Christianity supersedes Judaism. Similar themes have appeared in the strip since, leading to a number of cancellations.

Nonetheless, both B.C. and Wizard of Id (produced by Hart and Brant Parker) will be remembered as two of the funniest and most clever newspaper comic strips launched since World War II.

Ironically, he quotes Jesus in today’s Easter strip (reprinted below) saying "Assuredly I say to you today you will be with me in Paradise." Here’s hoping for you, Johnny.

This September (the 26th, if you’ve got a "Week At A Glance"), our friends at Dark Horse will be releasing the difinitive story behind one of their leading franchises. Paul Sammon’s CONAN THE PHENOMENON promises to offer a complete look at the mostly naked barbarian, covering Robert E. Howard’s original stories, the subsequent prose authors, and all the comics incarnations – including those produced by such masters as Roy Thomas, Barry Smith, John Buscema, and Timothy Truman.

The Schwartzenegger movies will not be ignored. At least, not by Sammon or, for that matter, by the voters of California.

One cannot produce such a tome without offering tons of illustrations, and this book promises to be up to the task. Of course, it will sport a Frank Frazetta cover (above). The introduction is being provided by Elric’s daddy, the eternal champion himself, Michael Moorcock.