When I drew this cartoon, I was worried that by the time it appeared in print, gas prices would have decreased again, and $1.29 would read as an irrelevant exaggeration. In fact, the fallout from Hurricane Katrina pushed the prices far higher, and $1.29 ended up seeming like a bargain. In satire, it's safer to err on the side of wild implausibility.
Exclaim! magazine called this annotation an example of how Weltschmerz is "reactive." But being reactive is part of the nature of satire. Without a topic culled from the media or life to react to, there can be no satire. It's always a dance between being too literal and too obscure, I guess. Comments?
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