. . . on the eve of America's first 2016 Presidential Debate between Donald J. Trumplestiltskin and Hillary C. Hotrodhammer. Since Porky Pig is first pictured here by Warner Bros.' always prophetic Animated Shorts Division in the company of an offensive Racist Stereotype, Today's viewers can quickly deduce that Porky IS Donald J. in PATIENT (only thinner and cuter). The cat-like androgynous "Dr. Chilled Air" is portrayed as an inane giggler, with little or no respect for the Hippocratic Oath it's taken to Protect America. Dr. Chilled Air is all about one thing: The Redistribution of Wealth. Since Porky (as Donald J. is so Rich that he can afford to have an entire Birthday Cake (with LIT candles) tucked inside his tummy, Ms. Hotrodhammer reverts to her Hillary Care daze and attacks Trumplestiltskin with a box saw in a wild attempt to divvy up this loot! As this seems to be a match made in Heaven, the Looney Tuners close PATIENT by showing the couple in bed together. (I once heard a something about "Muskrat Love," but after the musk wears off, you're just left with two very fat rats!) I found PATIENT to be so disturbing that I heeded Warner's warning and boycotted the "Big Debate."

"Patient Porky" is a fine Porky Pig cartoon directed by the wacky Robert Clampett. Poor Porky - he ate too much birthday cake. So he goes to the hospital and gets ABUSED! Here are my favorite sequences from this cartoon. I like the very opening scene at the hospital, involving a switchboard operator with an annoyingly funny voice (a caricature of Helen Troy) and an African-American elevator operator (a caricature of Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, if you'll pardon the racial stereotype). Carl Stalling's wonderful music score plays a swinging rendition of "Rock-a-Bye Baby" when the camera focuses on a blackboard indicating today's births. When Porky arrives at the hospital, a feline patient (posing as a doctor) literally throws the hapless pig in bed and begins to sing a very silly song, which is taken over by a trio of beautiful female voices. I also like how funny Porky is when he squirms violently in bed as the "doctor" whips out a handsaw."Patient Porky" is a lot of fun to watch! Find it on the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 5 Disc 3, a disc that is loaded with wild cartoons directed by Bob Clampett.

One of the many relics from the days when Porky Pig mostly appeared in black and white cartoons, Bob Clampett's "Patient Porky" does contain a racial stereotype (in the form of an elevator operator). As in "The Daffy Doc" two years earlier, an excessively eager physician tries to operate on Porky (in the earlier one, it was doctor wannabe Daffy Duck).Having seen many of Porky's cartoons from his debut until the US entered WWII, one can see that the studio usually cast Porky in rather sedate, pedestrian roles: fireman, pilgrim, bullfighter. Therefore, this one was pretty much representative of the era. "You Ought to Be In Pictures" may have been the one exception. Porky's roles got really cool once Chuck Jones started directing him regularly after WWII, frequently casting him as a foil to Daffy's craziness.Anyway, this one isn't bad. Worth seeing maybe once.

This was an all right Porky Pig short. Most of the jokes were not really stale and it had some really funny stuff here. The whole story is kind of interesting, not really at all boring. It wasn't excellent, but it was good. Thumbs up.