Opinion: Brother took my spot as comedian of family

When I was a kid, people compared me to Tommy Smothers, who, at age 86, died just as 2023 was winding down.

Aside from sharing the same first name, I was also a blonde-haired, blue-eyed white kid with an off-the-wall sense of humor. When I imitated the clueless Tommy Smothers with one of his routines I memorized from a Smothers Brothers album, people would laugh and say I sounded just like him.

My brother Don was more like Tommy’s brother, Dickie Smothers, straight man for their comedic schtick. Donnie, as we called my brother back then, took life a lot more seriously than Tommy ever did.

Fast forward a half-century or so, when I bought a newspaper. Don, an avid newspaper reader, enthusiastically threw in some “startup cash” that I declared to be 1% of the value my new business venture. I also gave him a column to write, naming it “The One Percenter,” to run along with my already established “Dispatch New Mexico” column (which you’re reading right now) on my newspaper’s editorial page.

I gave Don free rein on what he could write about, though I’m sure he’d tell you I lorded over him ruthlessly as editor. And, yes, as he has alleged, after he’d written few serious columns mixed with humorous ones, I urged him to go with the funny stuff. And for the most part, he’s been cracking jokes, often at my expense, for six years now.

So now I guess I’m Dickie, which isn’t as much fun.

It was much more fun being Tommy.

There I was, the comedian in the family, going through life making people laugh and stirring things up (like Tommy Smothers and his left-leaning politics), when, for reasons that escape me right now, I entered the world of journalism and actually got serious about life.

Meanwhile, Don, the serious-minded, nose-to-the-grindstone Dickie-type character in this tale, makes a small fortune as a psychiatrist and decides to relax a little. He’s still working, but he now has a new mission — to make the world healthier through laughter.

But don’t be fooled, he’s no Tommy Smothers. Maybe he’s funny like Steve Martin’s old comedic persona, with all of his totally unjustified arrogance, but when I get wound up, I’m still more Tommy than he’ll ever be.

Nevertheless, if I’m going to be the Dickie in our dueling columns, I can at least take solace in knowing that Mom always did like me best.

Tom McDonald is editor of the New Mexico Community News Exchange. Contact him at:

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