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" Beetle Bailey is actually me, in uniform. I've got about 20 characters, and they're all after friends of mine. "

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" Professionals don't get writer's block. I can always come up with the punch line. "

" I've always said that what cartoonists do is create friends for readers. "

" The people who were against the Vietnam War thought I was attacking the Army. The guys in the Army thought I was representing their experiences. I was on both sides, and I survived. "

" Most people are sort of against authority. Here's Beetle always challenging authority. I think people relate to it. "

" If I'm going on vacation, I just work ahead. "

" I think it's legitimate to do satire. If you're going to write a book of satire on Marilyn Monroe or Madonna, you're not going to get their permission, because you're going to make fun of them! "

" Laughter is the brush that sweeps away the cobwebs of your heart. "

" When I introduced a black soldier, Lt. Flap, in 1971, the Stars and Stripes banned the strip. They were having racial problems and thought it would increase the tensions. "

" The frustration of being ordered around by somebody to do something - everyone can relate to that. I think Beetle represents that - the common man caught in that morass of rules and regulations. I don't even think of it as an army strip... it's a world anyone can understand. "

" I first sold a cartoon for five dollars. I was in the fifth grade. "

" People take a liking to me like I'm a long-lost friend. "

" Seven days without laughter makes one weak. "

" I like to keep doing something new and different so people can't say I'm doing the same thing all the time. I like to challenge myself. "

" None of the established museums were treating cartoons seriously. It was considered a lesser art or no art at all, just a way to sell newspapers. Even the syndicates who were dedicated to the cartoons were throwing them out, figuring they had no value after they were printed. "

" I like a happy ending. That's what I do all the time. I like to make people feel happy. "

" Everything I know, I write about. My only research is what I did. "

" When I write 'Beetle Bailey,' I can always do jokes about him being lazy, and everyone gets it. "

" You learn just by trying and experimenting. By the time I was 14, I had my own comic strip in the Kansas City paper. "

" About the only way you can find out about the common man, his slang, what he looked like, what he thought, is through the comic strips. It's a powerful way for young people to learn history. "

" I say, if you believe what you read in the comic strips, then you believe that mice run around with little gold buttons on their red pants and drive cars. "

" When I first started, you couldn't mention divorce or death. You couldn't show smelly socks. You couldn't show a snake. They took a skunk out of my strip one time. "

" At one time Tribune Syndicate emptied out their storeroom. They put tables full of original cartoons down in the lobby and said take one if you want one. The comics were simply a burden to them. "

" Humor strips dominated what were called the funny papers early in the century, but by the 1920s and '30s, adventure strips had taken over. With 'Beetle Bailey,' I revived the funny part of the funny papers, and I'd be proud to be remembered for that. "

" My father was a dreamer who was always broke. He wanted to be a cartoonist. "

" Old cartoonists never retire, they just erase away. "

" I go to the grocery store with my wife. She goes off to buy something. Where is she, anyways? So I ask the manager, 'What aisle do they keep the wives in?' "

" You can go through comic strips alone and study the common man. You can trace our history. "

" Belly buttons were a big battle of mine. Down at the syndicate, they would clip them out with a razor blade. I began putting so many of them in, in the margins and everywhere, that they had a little box down there called 'Beetle Bailey''s Belly-Button Box. The editors finally gave up after I did one strip showing a delivery of navel oranges. "

" Some people will do schlock or anything, just to get their name on it. "

" I was kicked out of The Stars And Stripes twice, and finally got back in. "