I was born in 1970, and I became a daily reader of Doonesbury with the "Extra-Terrarium" strips. Prior to that I often didn't "get" the humor, or got lost with the number of characters. Seeing Zonker trying to revive "E.T." was a distinct moment for me (I thought it was hilarious!) in which I decided to make a point of reading it daily to keep up with the stories. Since then I've gotten to know and appreciate all the characters more, and more . . . Thank you, GBT!

P.S. In those days my hometown paper The Boulder Daily Camera had Doonesbury on the editorial pages, which also had fairly regular (and sometimes controversial) contributions from Hunter S. Thompson.

The 40-years-ago strip yesterday: how prescient.

OMG. Kim is 40?!  I loved it when GBT brought her back years later as an A+ teenager, and even more when she became the new love of Mike's life.

Seeing Zonker talking with his plant homies it suddenly dawned on me: this could be the genesis of the Green Movement!

Your current policy of running Classic strips has encouraged me to also check out the Doonesbury Flashbacks page daily. It is enormously useful to read the strips regarding Vietnam and Cambodia, such as the 5-4-75 Sunday. Seven hundred thousand deaths! I was a Canadian teenager at the time and it meant little to me then. Now, as an adult living in the Middle East, I can perceive the absolute criminality of these horrific and utterly unjustified killings, because I live among people who are disregarded or even demonized in the conservative U.S. news bubble, and can relate this to the SE Asian situation. I dont know to what extent, if any, these events somehow precipitated the Pol Pot nightmare. Again, thank you so much for your unique and marvelously expressed perspective on our world.

I notice, in the 30-years-ago-today Flashback strip, that Mike drinks beer in the 'display' style beloved of admen, rather than the the normal, relaxed way of holding a bottle with the fingertips.

I too have always loved Honey, with or without Duke. Her naivete, flavored with firm determination, her cluelessness about her current situation, combined with random astute cultural observations, form such an original and amazing hodgepodge.

So The Red Rascal was a Deke. Good on ya, brother!

The Duke and Honey cartoons crack me up. It's crazy but it works.

Would you please reprint the strip from almost the very beginning of the strip, when B.D. and Michael discuss their biology papers?  It was so hilarious I remember the last two lines word for word.

I've been butt-puckered for weeks worrying over upcoming spine surgery. I cannot thank you enough for the Willie Nelson video. I'll be laughing all day 'cause you (and Willie & Co) helped chase the nerves away. Thanks!

Honey is one way to look at the China/U.S. relationship; possibly how some people think it should be.

Even the first time around, I didn't find the Duke-and-Honey cartoons funny or uplifting. (I hold Doonesbury to a high standard!) She's clearly smart. Why does she stay in this abusive relationship with a jerk? It's not because she depends on him economically, the traditional reason; she can and does find rewarding work when she's not following him around.

The Russian public is eating 10% less food ? Not Impressed. If they were drinking 10% less vodka --  then we'd see true gratitude.

Wonderful sharp jibe at Mr. Putin, GBT! However the Blowback comment about Mr. Putin being on the political Left is incorrect. Mr. Putin has nothing to do with the political Left and instead stands in a long line of Russian autocratic thugs, from Ivan the Terrible on through Nicholas II and Stalin. The only plausible Leftist/Communist would be Stalin, but his behavior was no different than that of the Tsars, only more extreme. Communist ideology was only a cloak for him to wear for his true believers. Mr. Putin today makes no efforts to revive Communist ideology. His kleptocracy has no ideology other than some washed-up Russian nationalist drivel. This caters to those in Russia who want to revive a greater Russian empire.

Re WIT AND ARTISTRY: I cannot agree that Putin is socialist or communist. Russia has shed both the centrally commanded character of its economy, and the ideology of liberation through the abolition of market relationships generally, and exploitation specifically, which underlies communism as a teaching. Nor does it any more adhere to the "revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat pending the transition to full communism" which best describes socialism. Nor even does Russia have the kind of Nordic economy in which a generous welfare state is provided by relatively high taxation. Russia just sells oil products and tries to keep its population from starving, freezing to death, or violently revolting. It's not quite politics as we know it but it's a long way from the idealism of the Left.

Thank you for using your wit and artistry to criticize someone on the Left for a change; Putin (Left as in the socialist/communist direction). I have been reading your cartoons since 1970 or so, when I first read them in my college newspaper, and I remember very few where the Left was taken to task like this. Thank you!

A line in today's 40-years-ago Flashback strip --  "roll those film clips" -- focused beautifully on today's concerns about cell phone video cameras.

Re ASTROLOGICAL SIGNS: Zeke Brenner tends to survive, to the detriment of others; he's both a Libra and a Cancer.

Admittedly, Zeke lacks Uncle Duke's unexplainable charm. But since he is so completely amoral, I wonder if, in addition to Earl, he is another of Duke's lost offspring.