'Doonesbury' Character to Lose Leg in Iraq
 

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) -- A main character in the "Doonesbury'' comic strip will lose a leg while fighting in Iraq, one of two strips published this week that feature soldiers getting injured in the war.

In Monday's "Doonesbury,'' B.D., a football coach-turned-soldier, was injured after being reactivated in the Army at the end of 2002, following a losing football season.

Later this week, he will wake up to find his left leg amputated, according to Universal Press Syndicate, the strip's distributor.

"Doonesbury'' creator Garry Trudeau said he wanted to illustrate the sacrifices American soldiers are making.

"It's a task any writer should approach with great humility, but I think it's worth doing,'' Trudeau said. ''We are at war, and we can't lose sight of the hardships war inflicts on individual lives.''

Trudeau said B.D. would learn to deal with his injury "probably the same way so many wounded vets seem to -- with gratitude for having had one's life spared, empathy and respect for those who have suffered worse, and a grim sense of humor indispensable to fending off despair.''

About 10 newspapers have called Universal Press with concerns about the strip, primarily with language the character uses after learning his leg is gone, company spokeswoman Kathie Kerr said.

The strip, which appears in 1,400 newspapers nationwide, has a long history of addressing difficult topics since Trudeau started it at Yale University in 1968.

Trudeau is not the only comic-strip artist using the war in Iraq as a backdrop. In Monday's edition of "Get Fuzzy,'' main character Rob Wilco learned that a cousin had lost a leg in the war.

Darby Conley, the strip's author, is not giving interviews, said Mary Anne Grimes, spokeswoman for the United Features Syndicate, the strip's distributor. She said Conley prefers to let the strip speak for itself.

"Get Fuzzy'' appears in about 400 newspapers.

This is all Bush's fault. His arrogant arrogance and incompetent incompentance has caused this unforgivable injury to a brave comic strip character.

He should be insulted and called names until he apologizes.:m:

He should be insulted and called names no matter what, he deserves it

how about put him thru a empathy center so he realizes all the people he has ordered killed have feelings and needs just like him force him to be accountable for sure and removal from any place he would have power over life less his own

demands, moralism and moralisitic judgment are violence , this guy uses the word evil in over 1/3 of his speaches, my inner Bright was scared the first time i even herd him talk. because i knew allot of things i valued and needed were going to get compromized by his assertion of biggoted power.

Doonesbury?

Who reads that liberal puke anymore...

Get Fuzzy is much more relevant.

:tard:

:SP:

:uu: