I don't watch a lot of cartoons these days, other than a little Family Guy, the Simpsons, South Park and King of the Hill.The other day I stumbled across the old Jonny Quest cartoon on TV. Jonny Quest was cool.

The thing I remember the most about Jonny Quest was that it was shown on prime time television in the mid 1960s, I think on Friday night, and later on syndication. I was about 6 or 7 back then, so there was nothing cooler than Jonny Quest.

Think about it, you're about 12 years old and you get to travel around the world with your scientist father, Benton Quest, his assistant Race Bannon (how cool of a name is that), your Indian friend name Hadji, who wore a turban and could do magic tricks that always began with a chant of, "sim, sim, salabim." Then there was Bandit, a small dog (maybe a pug) who was cool. Bandit was always sniffing around, getting himself in trouble.

Who could not dream about being Jonny Quest. You're in the jungle, fighting off killer leopards, running from crocodiles, ducking poisonous spears from pygmie natives, flying airplanes ... basically saving the world a few times over. And you're still just a kid.I do admit, there were a couple of episodes that used to scare me at the time. That very large daddy long leg spider monster thing still gets to me. So did the huge condor. And Dr. Quest's arch enemies, like Dr. Zin, with his his sinister, evil laugh. "We will meet again, Dr. Quest," Dr. Zin would proclaim, shaking his fist while making his escape in defeat. Dr. Zin would be like a modern day terrorist. I'm not sure what nationality he was, but he was one bad dude.

There was also General Fong, Amed Kareem or Baron Heinrich von Froelich. They all tried to take over the world, but Dr. Quest, Race, Jonny, Hadji and Bandit were there to save the day.

That leads to me wonder. With all of the turmoil in the world these days, what would Jonny Quest do? He's probably still 12, but foiling terrorist plots in the Middle East.