Garry Trudeau

President Reagan's major labor leader supporter, Jackie Presser, it has been revealed, acted "without criminal intent" in the payroll-padding scheme with alleged mob figures involving his (Presser's) Teamsters Local 507 in Cleveland. It was done with FBI permission, and Presser claims he acted as an informer to help root out the culprits and corruption. This should place him in line for a Freedom Medal, a series by Garry Trudeau, and an explanation to the media and its readers by prolific letter writer, Stephen S. Trott, chief of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, on how "we have sent a message."

Usually I agree with the predictions of cartoonist Garry Trudeau, who was my vice presidential write-in candidate for 1988, even before they come out; but his recent strip, which depicts a Santa Barbara official preparing to send Santa Barbara's "homeless problem" south to Long Beach, caused brief consternation. On reflection, however, I think that I'd better write the man in for President. Because Long Beach is ready for the homeless. Once we were stuck with a heritage much like the heritage the Santa Barbara council is trying to preserve--palm-lined beaches, an uncluttered expanse of sea, uncrowded schools and parks, safe streets and swarms of relatively quiet, reasonably undemanding retired people; and if that heritage were still with us, it would be wise to hang on to it. But progress has come to Long Beach.

I have seen the strips your editors have labeled "overdrawn and unfair." They are not. Presenting a list of individuals within the Reagan Administration who have been charged with various types of official misconduct is not only high comedy in Trudeau's format, but timely news for Americans. I cannot buy The Times' argument that the strip "makes felonies out of misdemeanors and lumps together the miscreants with those who are wrongdoers." Garry Trudeau seeks to demonstrate the existence of a pattern within the Reagan Administration of legal and ethical misconduct.

The SOLDIER-CARTOONIST who signed himself "Zorro" when he blazed across the country as a guest in "Doonesbury" comic strip has been unmasked. The mother of Tommy Rominger, a 33-year-old Air Force tech sergeant in the Persian Gulf, said it was ROMINGER'S DRAWINGS that were showcased by Doonesbury creator Garry Trudeau under the title, "Living in Purgatory."

Generation X mourns the passing of a lifelong friend. Garry Trudeau was an important guiding voice as we developed our identities. He consistently demonstrated that, although times change, an older generation's ideals continue to be relevant to our lives. With the Nov. 7 Doonesbury strip, this respected guide and mentor is officially deceased. In his place stands yet another elder telling us that change can only come by doing things the way they have always been done. The first symptom may have been Trudeau's often uncharitable portrayals of the children of his founding characters.

President Reagan, probably the most frequent target of the nation's editorial cartoonists, got some comic relief in a Rose Garden speech to members of the American Assn. of Editorial Cartoonists in which he implored them to "take it easy on the old boy." Reagan pointed to blowups of caricatures of himself and offered a tongue-in-cheek critique, particularly a panel showing him as "the Great Communicator" beneath an empty word "balloon."