{"id":2486,"date":"2016-07-08T08:21:04","date_gmt":"2016-07-08T12:21:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/auchtoon.2gtech.com\/?p=2486"},"modified":"2016-07-08T08:21:04","modified_gmt":"2016-07-08T12:21:04","slug":"state-flag-of-michigan-redesign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/?p=2486","title":{"rendered":"State Flag of Michigan Redesign"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/auchtoon.2gtech.com\/?attachment_id=2487\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-2487\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-2487\" src=\"http:\/\/auchtoon.2gtech.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/JPA042.jpg\" alt=\"State Flag of Michigan Redesign\" width=\"560\" height=\"405\" srcset=\"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/JPA042.jpg 560w, http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/JPA042-300x217.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 560px) 100vw, 560px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/auchtoon.2gdata.com\/?art=\/2016\/07\/JPA042.jpg&amp;name=State Flag of Michigan Redesign...\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/auchtoon.2gtech.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/buy.png\" alt=\"\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Last month, Rick DeVos complained aloud via Twitter that the state flag of Michigan was &#8220;ugly&#8221; and &#8220;non-useful.&#8221; Well, sharing needlessly judgmental observations is what Twitter is for, so we likely would have all moved quickly on to the next snark if DeVos wasn&#8217;t (a) the founder of ArtPrize and (b) offering $500 to the best three redesigns. At the time I was going to do a cartoon with three of my own submissions. But as is often the case, a different idea came along and overtook it. I figured this one had missed its opportunity.<\/p>\n<p>However&#8230; that absolutely gorgeous, thoroughly enjoyable Independence Day weekend messed me up. I found myself happy, refreshed, and generally pleased with life, which is like kryptonite for editorial cartooning. From the void of my contentment, the flag idea resurfaced. When I realized that the winners have not yet been announced, I thought it might still have a chance.<\/p>\n<p>I didn&#8217;t want to do the three submissions thing, though \u2014 that definitely seemed past its freshness date. The strongest gag idea I had was the &#8220;what&#8217;s Latin for &#8216;crumbling infrastructure&#8217;?&#8221; bit. (The second best: &#8220;If you seek a perilous pothole, look around you.&#8221;) With the theme established, I was inclined to bring in our Governor Snyder and have an underling take a jab at him for his abysmal performance on infrastructure issues. A quick reflection on the money my family sinks into car repair every year because of said infrastructure issues, and I was no longer happy (and therefore ready to draw).<\/p>\n<p>As for the current flag \u2014 yes, it is a design mess with its mishmash of odd choices and conflicting ideas, but it also has a unique beauty. I think that&#8217;s a pretty good description of Michigan.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last month, Rick DeVos complained aloud via Twitter that the state flag of Michigan was &#8220;ugly&#8221; and &#8220;non-useful.&#8221; Well, sharing needlessly judgmental observations is what Twitter is for, so we likely would have all moved quickly on to the next snark if DeVos wasn&#8217;t (a) the founder of ArtPrize and (b) offering $500 to the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,10,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2486","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-andrewheller-com","category-editorial-cartoon","category-michiganradio-org"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2486"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2488,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2486\/revisions\/2488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/auchtoon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}