Still pumpin’ out gas gags

On behalf of editorial cartoonists everywhere, I confess. In the 30 years since a president faced a major oil crisis, we’ve done some of our crudest and least-refined work on the subject of gasoline prices. We’ve pumped out scores of trite gags about OPEC having us over a barrel and infinite variations of the gas nozzle as a stickup weapon. We haven’t completely kicked the bad-joke habit. Researching this, I saw a Three 6 Mafia spinoff cartoon called “It’s hard out here at the pump” — but after three decades, we’re getting the hang of it, drilling a little deeper, exploring a little further afield. After all, without a broader perspective, the living-in-your-SUV jokes are $3.19 a gallon, up tenfold from the good old days, but still cheap gags.

— Joel Pett

Joel Pett is the Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist of the Lexington Herald-Leader. His work also appears in USA Today.