Tublecane

See it here.

If you only glanced at this panel, you'd probably assume someone's been reading too much Mallard Fillmore recently.

But a deeper examination reveals that this is not a harangue against immigrants. In fact, it is a progressive caution that steadfast provincials, like Burl and Joy, are ill-prepared for life in a rapidly globalizing world, let alone the rapidly diversifying United States.

The surface implication is that the location is meant to be literally taken as a DMV in Crestwood, Illinois. But we have to assume the FBI poster is hinting at something more meaningful, otherwise it is a complete non sequitur. The clear inference we are meant to draw from "Pat"--the man masquerading as woman or woman masquerading as man (the poster is not clear on this issue)-- is that you can't trust assumptions based on superficial impressions, and the perhaps this DMV is not meant to be taken as a literal location, but rather as a metaphoric location...the globe's DMV if you will.

As if that were not evidence enough, we have the names of our DMV employees: Skip and Ola. One bears an unidentifiable but suspiciously foreign-sounding name (a cross between "Hola" and "Olaf", perhaps?). In a panel of pure anti-immigrant intent, he would have been named with more masculine/American integrity: Duke, Bull, or Bronco, for example.

Finally, we have the rather odd dialog from our "immigrant", who brazenly announces: "I'm not from the U.S.A." It would be natural to assume this is simply ham-handed exposition made becessary by the artist's inability to visually represent "immigrant status." As it is, however, the most likely explanation is that it is a code phrase which enables members of the same society to obtain favorable treatment from each other, like a pair of Freemasons.

In this case, however, the society to which both men belong is not a clandestine organization with a few members. Rather they are members of the rapidly globalizing world, equipped to participate in a world whose centers of economic and cultural influence are shifting. Burl and Joy, by contrast, have self-selected out of this society, preferring a fantasy world of parochialism over acceptance of the inevitability of a changing world.

Burl, the panel tells us, will be unable to cope cuturally and unable to compete economically. It really matters little whether he is able to obtain a driver's license, since he will not be able to afford a car and gasoline for much longer.

No hablo marginalia:

• I'm fascinated that the best the artist can actually do to represent "immigrant status" is to make the man a member of the working class. By contrast, USA citizenship is represented by delusional aspirations of athletic glory and indebtedness to a credit card company.
• Is it going too far to suggest that the signature by "X" is a reference to George F. Kennan and a call for a new era of containment against golablization? Probably so.
  
• The large DMV sign repeats the same joke as the rest of the panel. Was it really deemed so unclear that telling it twice was necessary?