Whenever I came downstairs to find my father completely immobilized by tears, I had only to look to the newspaper in his hands for the reason: Mike Royko. Royko was originally a daily columnist for the Chicago Sun Times and when Rupert Murdoc bought the paper he switched to the Chicago Tribune. My parents followed just to keep the tears flowing.

At one point the Tribune advertised a pair of Royko socks for somewhere around two dollars. They were purported to be, “as at home in the office as on the El.” (The El is the elevated public transit system in Chicago.) I eagerly sent away for them and proudly wore the small white socks with the stitched red signature, despite not really having any idea what the man said. Now that’s marketing.

Royko wrote primarily about Chicago politics, which was both ripe for the roasting and totally inscrutable to me. I would beg my parents to explain and, through the tears, they would give me some vague idea of what was happening. I learned to love Dunesbury in much the same way, and with a touch of Blume County that was my introduction to politics and world events.

John Stewart’s Daily Show on Comedy Central seems to be the modern equivalent. Whenever I get a chance to see the show I’m either laughing or furiously searching the internet for enough news to understand the joke. NPR usually keeps me well informed enough to keep up but I wonder how many kids out there are getting their first taste of politics and news from a comedy show now.

I actually got a chance to meet John Stewart a while back. I was following Bill Bradley, a former basketball star and senator, with a camera at the time and so when John walked in my initial observations were the decidedly mundane, “he’s short!” He was also lively and charismatic and a great representative of the nuttiness of politics and the flow of human drama to the masses. I’d gladly wear his socks and explain his shows to my niece.

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