Raging Moderate

It’s way past time to congratulate the baby Jesus on the anniversary of his birth. While all those annoying unending ads for the Christmas sales have blessedly come to an end, they’ve been replaced by all those annoying unending ads for the after-Christmas sales. The only major difference is there are much fewer jingle bells on the soundtracks.

It’s also a relief to have the traditional holiday music stuffed back into the poisonous mistletoe vault, meaning we’ll have to wait nine whole months to hear the same thirty songs sung by the same thirty dead white men. And Nat King Cole.

As we throw the last shovel full of dirt on the most festive of seasons and kick the dried-out fir tree to the gutter, it is our self-imposed, public-service task here at Durstco to right the many wrongs perpetrated by the corpulent bearded cisgender male in the scarlet suit on his global flight.

Apparently Santa had some holes in his bag and a few folks didn’t receive the gifts they so richly deserved. A little mistake we would like to rectify here with WILL DUR$T’$ AFTER XMA$ GIFT WI$H LI$T.

At least the after-Christmas sales will make the purchasing of said items more bargainy. And by delaying another week or so, we could dovetail into President’s Day sales. What with the government shutdown, every penny saved is a penny earned. Earning a couple hundred or so could buy us a cup of coffee. Not a latte, but still.

For Kellyanne Conway: A red, white and blue muzzle.

For General James Mattis: An all-expenses paid vacation to the relative calm of Damascus, Syria.

For Melania Trump: Not a designer coat, but a new coat designer.

For Nancy Pelosi: A whip, a gun and a chair.

For Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III: A cold dish of revenge.

For Sarah Huckabee Sanders: A round-trip ticket on the clue train.

For Michael Cohen: A poster to hang in his cell that reads “What Happens in Jersey Stays in Jersey.”

For Mitt Romney: A cape and pair of tights to help him single- handedly save the Republican Party.

For Kamala Harris: Some of Hillary Clinton’s excess testosterone.

For Donald Trump and Roseanne Barr: Two pairs of those Chinese finger traps for their thumbs.

For Ivanka Trump: A fully furnished pied-a-terre in the Seychelles.

For Jared Kushner: The same kind of family reverence his father showed his uncle.

For Kanye West: A new hat.

For Brett Kavanaugh: Clarence Thomas’ primer on how to question Supreme Court litigants.

For Mike Pence: A strobe light, so at press conferences, he can at least give the appearance of movement.

For Elon Musk: A years’ supply of whatever medicine they give kids with Attention Deficit Disorder.

For Bernie Sanders: A series of bushes to lurk behind for the next two years.

For Rudy Giuliani: A case of mint-flavored shoelaces for the multiple occasions he puts his foot in his mouth.

For Joe Biden: A 55-gallon drum of patience.

For Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador: A wall to control our immigration.

For Rachel Maddow: A nice blue sweater.

For Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Two six-foot spools of industrial strength bubble wrap.

And finally for the American People: Total gridlock of the 116th Congress. No harm, no foul.

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Copyright 2019, Will Durst, distributed by the Cagle Cartoons Inc. syndicate.

Will Durst is an award-winning, nationally acclaimed columnist, comic and former sod farmer in New Berlin, Wisconsin. For a calendar of personal appearances, including his new one-man show, “Durst Case Scenario,” please visit willdurst.com.