Comedians, artists and certainly political cartoonists tend to possess an anti-authoritarian, skeptical, irreverent streak. This makes the staunchly conservative cartoonist an especially odd bird.

Rightwing Cartoon Watch seeks to highlight far right cartoons, but also document the broader range of opinion from conservative cartoonists on the hot issues of a given week. While a primary goal is to challenge GOP talking points and fallacies, we also seek to celebrate the fine American tradition of editorial cartooning - and have a little fun in the process.

Which cartoonists dare to criticize their own party? Who seems to literally illustrate GOP talking points? Who are their favorite targets? Who mocks liberals - and who seems to truly hate them? Who’s funny? Who’s independently minded and who’s a hack? Read, and decide, for yourself!

This installment covers three weeks, from 2/26/07 to 3/25/07. This stretch provided plenty of scandals - both the real kind, and the manufactured-BS variety. The litmus tests abound. If you didn’t know before where a conservative cartoonist stood in regards to accuracy, hackery, and what generates his or her moral outrage, you’re likely to find out!

IRAQ

At least one conservative cartoonist has to accuse the Democrats, or Congress in general, of being wimps, surrendering, or the like. It’s one of Michael Ramirez’ favorite themes, and he’s happy to oblige this time. We’ve been over this in depth before, but suffice it to say that conventional “victory.” “failure” and “surrender” are really not adequate terms for Iraq anymore - and haven’t been for years.

Eric Allie seems to forget who started this glorious Iraq adventure. Hint: It wasn’t the Democrats. There’s a whiff of imperialist condescension here, as well.

We’ve been over this countless times. The CIA and others in the intelligence community have concluded, in accord with common sense, that bin Laden wants the U.S. in Iraq. Not only are we bogged down, it’s one hell of a recruitment tool, as the recent NIEs state. Also, Iraqis are not likely to “follow us here” as Bush has asserted. Even Al Qaeda is not in a great position to do so - although it would help if we had that Iraq money to bolster domestic security instead.

Again, “losing” is the fixation of hubris-filled hawks, not really helpful for discussing Iraq. General Petraeus is one of many to state that we cannot achieve a “military” victory, and only a political solution will work. Mike Lester claims these are real signs. A few may be, but cherry-picking protest signs is a common rightwing tactic. Where was the report about a flag-burning? According to Dana Milbank’s article on the anti flag-burning amendment proposal last year, the number of American flags burned nation-wide was officially three or four, as it has been for several years. One of the things that makes America great is that people can have different opinions, but Lester is positing that peace activists are anti-American, conspiracy theorists or otherwise hysterical, which is BS. At least he seems to be acknowledging that the hawks are in the minority these days, regardless of how he mischaracterizes opposition to the war.

I’ve been thinking about doing a separate post on the film 300, but let’s get into some of it here. Whatever its merits or flaws as cinema, it’s a lousy analogy to the Iraq war. First of all, America started the war (sorry, no Iraq involvement in 9/11, kids), and we’re the big guns. It’s no surprise Cox and Forkum depict a Democrat as a traitor here, since that’s standard propaganda bull from them. How is withdrawing from Iraq possibly “surrender” or treachery? Cox and Forkum might also be commenting somewhat on Iran here, since they’ve previously expressed frustration that Bush won’t attack Iran, and that seem to feel any sort of diplomacy is “appeasement.” May we be saved from such idiots as these, who view diplomacy in any form as a “failure,” and can only interpret the world through a lens of dominance, submission, and humiliation. Good diplomacy and negotiations involves crafting “win-win” situations, but the neocons and other bloodthirsty hawks can only understand “win-lose.”

Scott Stantis is normally pretty balanced, but not so here. No one has voted to deprive the armed forces of bullets.

A better cartoon would depict Congress seizing the wheel from Bush. It would be nice if someone was doing more than the punt-and-pray approach!

Henry Payne delivers a striking if bizarre cartoon. Payne has been willing to acknowledge that things aren’t great in Iraq.

Payne brings in NCAA basketball. While of course human lives are more than a game, Payne’s main point seems to be that the outcome in Iraq is still uncertain, and “madness” is about right.

Ken Catalino sums up the public mood better. He’s been pretty consistent about criticizing Bush.

Jerry Holbert sounds a similar note. After all, Bush has called the shots his way for four years!

IRAN

Glenn McCoy has a good visual concept here, but of course the Bush administration hasn’t tried to charm Iran at all! They’re rebuffed all overtures of diplomacy!

On a similar note, Cox and Forkum continue their “Bomb Iran!” campaign.

Iran doesn’t have a nuclear weapon! Bomb Iran! At least Bob Gorrell takes an anti-torture stance here.

In this pretty creepy cartoon, at least Gorrell depicts Iran as wanting nuclear power versus possessing a nuclear bomb.

Since the U.S. has been reluctant to bomb Iran, Paul Nowak hopes that Russia will step up and do it.

WAR ON “TERROR”

Chuck Asay traffics in characteristic false equivalency and islamophobic terror. Did you know that if you oppose Bush’s brilliant escalation plan, you want us all to die? It would be really nice if we could get out of Iraq and focus on the war on terrorists. Zbigniew Brzezinski recently wrote a good op-ed about the Bush administration’s fear-mongering and how America has been Terrorized by [The] ‘War on Terror’

We’ve been over this countless times before. Bush’s escalation is a little more definite than his general approach of “punt and pray.” However, American troops were not being killed in Iraq before we invaded Iraq. Al Qaeda was not in Iraq before we invaded Iraq. Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. It’s laughable to assert that merely talking about withdrawing from the Iraq war is undermining efforts to fight global terrorism. That’s not to say there aren’t legitimate arguments to be made against withdrawing, but here Catalino contributes hackery and propaganda, not insight or debate.

ANN COULTER

Only two conservative cartoonists covered Ann Coulter calling John Edwards a “faggot” at CPAC this year. Jerry Holbert has the decency to note it, and suggest this is Coulter’s repugnant true attitude…

…While Mike Lester poo-poos it. He used this same design, the irritated guy in the bar reading a newspaper, to dismiss Mel Gibson’s antisemitic rant and Michael Richards’ racist rant. It’s wise to remember that these words were completely premeditated by Coulter, unlike those by Gibson and Richards, as reprehensible as they were.

Many cartoonists did tackle prominent Republican star Ann Coulter, but conservative cartoonists almost completely dismissed the incident. Let’s keep this “one mild condemnation and one dismissal” standard in mind as we tour through other scandals, shall we?

WALTER REED

Gary Varvel goes with the wheelchair motif to bemoan the shameful outpatient care at Walter Reed…

…As does Lisa Benson…

…As does Bob Gorrell…

…As does Gary McCoy.

Ken Catalino also targets the poor health care…

…As does Chip Bok.

Michael Ramirez exhibits some of his typical visual flair to tackle the issue. It is worth noting that Walter Reed and the Veterans Hospitals are separate entities, although both are having troubles, so I’m uncertain as to whether Ramirez meant to address Walter Reed, the V.A. hospitals, or is conflating the two. But his heart’s clearly in the right place.

Jerry Holbert invokes Dick Cheney’s recent blood clot to bring up Walter Reed. It’s clever, especially because if you’ve followed the stories, the higher-ups did receive plenty of complaints, and it’s hard to imagine that if they were facing the same treatment, they’d have been so blasé.

Meanwhile, Gary Varvel cleverly works in both Jack Bauer from 24 and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed! So far, so good from our conservative cartoonists!

Uh-oh! Henry Payne notes the problems at Walter Reed, but condemns… the evils of government-run healthcare!

As does Chuck Asay, even more directly!

And Eric Allie, rightwing hack that he is, can’t pass on that action! As the saying goes, Republicans say government solutions don’t work, and then set out to prove it. Their own callous and often sometimes criminal incompetence is somehow proof that their ideology is correct, rather than an obvious indicator of their own mammoth mismanagement and corruption. Well, as long as we’re getting partisan, why is it that the Vet hospitals and Walter Reed were (similar to FEMA) just fine or even exemplary under Clinton? Management. Then there’s also the attempts to privatize Walter Reed, which complicated matters. It’s also obvious that Walter Reed wouldn’t have been overwhelmed if the Iraq and Afghanistan wars hadn’t been going so long and so badly. Payne, Asay and Allie are welcome to their views on health care, but no one following the Walter Reed story can be unaware of the horrible mismanagement perpetrated at the top. It is despicable to try to shift blame for the mess.

PLAMEGATE

Chip Bok notes the scandal shuffle, and Cheney’s role. It really is hard to keep up with them all!

Stantis also notes Cheney’s role in Plamegate.

Gary Varvel also notes Cheney’s role, in a bizarre cartoon. (Guilty conscience, blood clot, it’s all the same.)

Bob Gorrell accuses Cheney of being happy to see Libby take the fall!

Yes, Mike Shelton, in some ways Libby was a fall guy, but he was also guilty. There was never anything to prevent the White House from conducting an internal investigation, which they never did. Of course, they didn’t need to, when they knew what the results would be, and didn’t care.

Ramirez trots out his usual BS about how the Libby trial was a fishing expedition. Hmm, that’s why it stopped with Libby? And what about Libby’s perjury and obstruction of justice?

Glenn McCoy sort of acknowledges Cheney’s role - but this violent cartoon’s main target is Fitzgerald.

Yes, that damned liberal agenda, taking over and swaying those gullible jurors, who were brainwashed into finding Libby guilty based on the clear evidence that he was. I can stand some discussion of the Libby trial, but anyone who refuses to discuss the clear evidence of his perjury is completely full of crap and has no credibility whatsoever. That would include the National Review, the Weekly Standard, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, Rush Limbaugh, all the Fox News crew, Victoria Toensing…

…And Henry Payne. Again, what about that perjury, huh? What about that obstruction of an FBI investigation into blowing a CIA agent’s cover? I just cannot respect or take seriously anyone who won’t mention those.

Ken Catalino considers how disastrous a Libby pardon would be, in sharp contrast to the Kool-Aid felon brigade mentioned above.

Wait! Where have we seen this cartoon design before? Hmm… (This cartoon, from 3/9/07, actually predates Catalino’s Iraq one above, from 3/19/07.)

Eric Allie combines a few chestnuts. Apparently, he does admit that Libby lied! However, he also accuses Joseph Wilson of lying, which is utter crap. Of course, like Ramirez before him in an earlier cartoon, Allie doesn’t bother to say what Wilson supposedly lied about. Gosh, Eric, might the White House conduct in this entire sordid affair be the real cautionary tale to youngsters? Might Joe and Valerie Wilson be laudable figures, for standing up to a shameful, reckless abuse of power? I’m really sick of hearing the same long-discredited talking points over and over again, years later, long after everyone who can read a legitimate newspaper has figured it out. I can understand why an average citizen might be confused by some of the details, especially given some of the GOP spin to muddy the waters, but there’s no possibility Allie and his ilk have been out of the loop. Eric Allie’s hypocrisy and hackery never cease.

Tell us, Paul Nowak, who blew Valerie Plame Wilson’s cover, again? It was Robert Novak, who was told not to by Bill Harlow at the CIA. Novak’s first source was Richard Armitage, but it’s beyond dispute that the White House was actively shopping around the same infomation - Libby, Rove and Fleischer all did.

Another typical BS, straw man hack job from Nowak. The jury was quite certain of many things. They were certain about what Libby was told about Valerie Plame Wilson, what he told others about her, and what he told the Grand Jury. “Forgetting” is not a crime, perjury is. The jury was specifically told that Valerie Plame Wilson’s status was not at issue - lying was. This is for the simple fact that it didn’t matter whether Libby committed a crime by leaking her status or not - he thought he did, and consequently, he lied to the FBI and to the Grand Jury. Sentencing for Libby isn’t until June, but conservative hacks such as Krauthammer have been throwing around “25 years.” It’s more likely Libby will get 3 or close to that, as several media outlets have covered (and they certainly did long before Nowak delivered this cartoon, on 3/18/07).

Ramirez sinks to a new low by accusing Valerie Plame Wilson of lying under oath to Congress. For shame.

…And Gary Varvel, usually pretty moderate, accuses her of blowing her own cover - or at least being happy it happened. Despicable. Valerie Plame Wilson, a NOC, deserved and deserves better than being subjected to more dishonest partisan attacks after having her career ruined because her husband told the truth about a central lie told by the Bush administration. I can and do respect some conservatives, but I can’t respect Bush loyalists. I can’t respect anyone pushing for a Libby pardon, or anyone who still refuses to acknowledge that Valerie Plame Wilson was covert (when Bush’s appointed head of the CIA says so, how can you dispute it anymore?) or anyone refusing to acknowledge that Libby lied. For goodness sake, George Herbert Walker Bush condemned such actions as treason! But Robert Novak is still claiming she wasn’t covert. I have to conclude that these wankers just live in a parallel universe where reality is not the same, or they’re such virulent hacks they just will not stop lying. The party of Watergate and Iran-Contra continues the same old crap, and the apologists and abettors can all be damned.

PURGE-GATE

Jerry Holbert really likes this topic! Here, he satirizes the number of scandals and the plausibility of the official explanations (as well as the gullibility of the press)…

Here he makes a lawyer joke (Jay Leno and others have told similar ones)…

Here he pokes fun at Bush’s stubbornness…

…And here makes fun of the carnage.

Ken Catalino also notes how many scandals are brewing.

Mike Shelton runs with the early reports that the White House was looking for replacement candidates even as it insisted it was behind Gonzales.

Gonzales and Rove turn the Department of Justice into a political tool. Sounds about right.

This may be the best cartoon on the subject. Gonzales used a passive construction to acknowledge mistakes, but didn’t apologize or admit his own culpability. Of course, even if he himself was not directly involved, he was in charge. (Although he was almost definitely acting under orders from higher up.)

Bob Gorrell is on a roll, calling out Republicans!

Whoops! Never mind! Gonzales may be corrupt, but the Democrats are only playing politics! (Gorrell also had some other Dem-bashing cartoons in this stretch I didn’t have room to include.)

Cox and Forkum at least acknowledge that Gonzales is not sitting pretty.

Glenn McCoy’s cartoon is harder to gauge. Is he satirizing Gonzales’ lame statements? Or is he saying the mistake was that Gonzales admitted making mistakes? Given how partisan McCoy is, I’m inclined to think it’s the latter.

Chuck Asay certainly goes in that direction! In the alternative reality Asay lives in, the Bush administration did nothing wrong in blowing Valerie Plame Wilson’s cover, recklessly spreading that classified information, and apparently, they didn’t lie, either. Likewise, the numerous lies, the unethical and possibly criminal behavior of “Purge-gate” doesn’t bother Asay at all. What’s really funny is that Asay is depicting the Democrats as bullies. Is Asay capable under any circumstances of acknowledging wrong-doing by Bush and his crew?

Let’s see, there’s Dan Froomkin’s column from last Friday or his pieces for the last week and a half, or there’s his piece today about the latest Gonzales lies. He also quotes two good summations:

Josh Marshall, the liberal blogger who has driven this story from the beginning, explains: “This isn’t about the AG’s lies. It’s not about the attempted cover-up. It’s not about executive privilege and investigative process mumbojumbo.

“This is about using US Attorneys to damage Democrats and protect Republicans, using the Department of Justice as a partisan cudgel in the war for national political dominance. All the secrecy and lies, the blundering and covering-up stems from this one central fact.”

Glenn Greenwald blogs for Salon: “Whatever one thinks of how convincing the available evidence is thus far, nobody who has an even basic understanding of how our government functions could dispute that the accusations in this scandal are extremely serious. Presumably, even those incapable of ingesting the danger of having U.S. attorneys fired due to their refusal to launch partisan-motivated prosecutions (or stifle prosecutions for partisan reasons) at least understand that it is highly disturbing and simply intolerable for the Attorney General of the U.S. — the head of our Justice Department — to lie repeatedly about what happened, including to Congress, and to have done so with the obvious assent and (at the very least) implicit cooperation of the White House. Even the most vapid media stars should be able to understand that.

“And yet so many of them do not.”

Hilzoy links two other key Marshall posts. Marshall’s site, Talking Points Memo, of course, has been at the forefront covering this entire scandal.

Ramirez accuses Congress of hypocrisy. Umm, the Democrats have been in power less than three months. How exactly have they been corrupt, or political? Here’s the thing - Gonzales and this entire debacle, which keeps expanding (tobacco settlement, denied security clearances, and no taped confessions anyone?) needs to be investigated. How many times do Justice officials have to lie, in press conferences or under oath, before Ramirez will admit this? I really wouldn’t care if Congress was only “poltically” motivated, as long as they’re doing they’re job.

Why is this such a big deal? I thought Howard Kurtz summed it up nicely in “Purging Prosecutors” when he said:

The administration’s mishandling of what the blogosphere is calling Purgegate almost boggles the mind.

After all, the president is perfectly entitled to name any U.S. attorneys he wants. They are political appointees.

But the White House is not entitled to dump perfectly good prosecutors because they aren’t investigating Democrats aggressively enough. And the administration isn’t entitled to sully the reputations of perfectly good prosecutors by saying they are being replaced for “performance” reasons, when the actual reason is to make room for political hacks or, worse, politically compliant lawyers.

It was the administration’s lack of candor that turned this into a scandal, complete with incriminating internal e-mails, the resignation of Alberto Gonzales’s chief of staff, and Chuck Schumer demanding that the AG himself step down.

It didn’t help, of course, that Sen. Pete Domenici and Rep. Heather Wilson waited days to admit they called the U.S. attorney in New Mexico to say, hey, how’s that investigation going, and do you think any Dems might be indicted before Election Day?

As an old Justice Department reporter, I can tell you: This thing reeks of the politicization of justice.

Of course, Kurtz wrote that almost two weeks ago, and plenty has come out since. As a few folks have observed, the Doencini and Wilson misconduct, serious as it is, now pales in comparison!

Stantis levels a similar charge to Ramirez. Well, it might be Quixotic to try to clean up Congress, but as with Ramirez, there’s no consideration here that perhaps Gonzales did something wrong, and that’s why the Democrats are acting? What about the Republicans who have publicly called for Gonzales’ resignation? Are they “political” as well? While the U.S. Attorneys are political appointees, the Department of Justice is not supposed to be used for political purposes. Stantis was more on target with his earlier two cartoons.

Henry Payne trots out a pathetic false equivalency. Come on, lying to Congress and the American public, and politicizing the Justice Department are comparable to the local diner firing some workers?

This is the GOP BS talking point that will not die. Dan Froomkin’s Wednesday 3/21/07 column, “Is Gonzales a Diversion?” and his discussion from the same day lay it out pretty nicely:

New presidents typically start with a clean slate of U.S. attorneys, appointed by them. That’s standard practice.

But from that point forward, the prosecutors are expected to behave with a certain amount of independence.

What’s unprecedented about this case is the large’scale purge of U.S. attorneys, in the middle of a presidential term, potentially because they were perceived to be insufficiently partisan.

I’ve been dumbfounded by all the e-mail I’ve been getting from people trying to forgive Bush’s move by likening it to the generic, whole scale acts of previous presidents. Do people really not understand the distinction?

Well, apparently Bush himself doesn’t get the distinction. Or he does, but he’s just trying to confuse people.

Early this afternoon in Mexico, Bush repeated this entirely unsupported and disingenuous argument, saying that “there is a lot of confusion about what really has been a customary practice. . . . Past administrations have removed U.S. attorneys, it’s their right to do so.”

McClatchy Newspapers explains: “Mass firings of U.S. attorneys are fairly common when a new president takes office, but not in a second-term administration. Prosecutors are usually appointed for four-year terms, but they are usually allowed to stay on the job if the president who appointed them is re-elected.”

This is not a debatable fact — even within the Bush administration. As Gonzales’s former chief of staff Sampson explained to White House lawyers in an Jan. 9, 2006, e-mail: “In recent memory, during the Reagan and Clinton Administrations, Presidents Reagan and Clinton did not seek to remove and replace U.S. Attorneys they had appointed whose four-year terms had expired, but instead permitted such U.S. Attorneys to serve indefinitely under the holdover provision.’”

The actions of the Bush administration in this situation are unprecedented. It’s already clear that Gonzales and his subordinates lied to Congress (which is a felony). The only questions now are how deep the corruption goes, and the details of it.

As Howard Kurtz said in his chat today, “if I hear one more commentator recite the apples-and-oranges talking point that, oh, Clinton fired all 93 U.S. attorneys, I might be sick.”

Henry Payne apparently doesn’t care that his argument is complete BS.

Tony Snow has talked about “show trials.” Sure, we all know that testifying under oath with a transcript aren’t needed - which is why the courts dispense with such silliness! And sure, proven liars shouldn’t have to meet such standards! Froomkin quoted one of Tony Snow’s latest false dilemmas last Friday (column linked above):

Diane Sawyer: “Why not let Karl Rove go up there and show he has nothing to hide? Testify, under oath, and with a transcript? Let everyone see it?”

Tony Snow: “This is what I love, this Karl Rove obsession. Let’s back off. First, the question is: Do you want Karl Rove on TV, or do you want the truth?”

Diane Sawyer: “Why can’t you have both?”

Indeed.

PETER PACE

In case you missed it, General Peter Pace said that homosexuality was immoral, then did not apologize but instead said “I should have focused more on my support of the policy and less on my personal moral views.”

I’m not thrilled about Pace’s views, but I’m not surprised. Still, Pace is not going to change entrenched views overnight, social norms change over time, and social dinosaurs die out. It’s perfectly fine to challenge Pace on his views, but I’m honestly more concerned about what he does. Private bigotry is one thing; dismissing someone from their job for being gay is indefensible.

Gary McCoy obviously shares his brother Glenn’s raging homophobia. Didn’t you know all gays are into S&M bondage? This is also a pretty sad straw man. We are not in Iraq protecting free speech. More to the point, no one has attacked Pace’s right to free speech. They have questioned his judgment, and his bigotry. Pace was allowed to say what he said, as idiotic as it may be, and as bad as that was for someone in his position of power. Other people are allowed to exercise their freedom of speech to condemn him. For instance, Gary McCoy is free to draw a homophobic cartoon rife with the most ridiculous stereotypes possible. I’m free to mock him for being terrified of gays, his lousy drawing, the lameness of his humour, his complete failure of logic (or disingenuousness) and his lack of basic understanding about the Constitution and civil liberties. Ain’t America great?

HILLARY CLINTON

This cartoon is pretty silly - ever hear of Richard Mellon Scaife? It’s hardly as if there wasn’t a concerted effort to destroy the Clintons. But the artwork is nice.

Okay, how many BS talking points can you spot? Clinton was a “Goldwater girl.” I don’t think I’ve seen anyone contest that one! Since my last search, I found a more definitive account about Hillary’s love of the Yankees since girlhood. Nope, it’s not a pander. Greg Sargent debunked Robert Novak’s pathetic attacks on Hillary Clinton for saying that as a teenager she was “privileged” to hear Martin Luther King, Jr. speak.

(Just to be clear, I’m not a huge fan of Hillary Clinton, but that’s irrelevant. Every candidate should be covered accurately. That shouldn’t be a partisan issue, but of course, there’s a great, steaming pile of BS out there.)

Mike Lester says Hillary Clinton’s such a panderer, she’ll start dealing meth just for street cred, or props for giving it up. Wow, you can’t trust a woman like that!

Henry Payne trots another prime example of a GOP talking point that’s complete BS. This really is not hard to figure out. Hillary Clinton was not “affecting a Southern accent” throughout her speech. She was quoting a hymn. When I heard the sound clip, even out of context, it was obvious she was quoting something!

Greg Sargent did a great job covering this one. Here’s “Yet Another Wingnut Sliming Of Hillary Proven To Be Bogus” on 3/5/07, “Behold Your Media: CNN’s Paula Zahn, ABC, MSNBC All Push Bogus Hillary “Drawl” Story” on 3/6/07, and the kicker, “CNN Didn’t Think Hillary’s “Drawl” Was Significant — Until Matt Drudge Said So.” Yes, although he’s a complete hack and consistently wrong, Matt Drudge rules the MSM world.

Let’s state the obvious - these hacks simply don’t care if what they say is true or not, and that’s been proven repeatedly.

Of course, Gary McCoy ran with this bogus story…

…As did his brother Glenn…

…While Mike Lester targeted both Hillary Clinton and Obama. Remember, the important thing for you to remember is that they’re inauthentic. They’re fake. They’re panderers. And the best way you can punish them is to vote for Nader, or a Republican.

By the way, where were the prominent Republicans celebrating civil rights? Remember, don’t vote for a fake, when you can vote for someone who despises you and your kind openly! Bigotry - ain’t nothing like the real thing, baby!

AL GORE

Henry Payne hates him some Al Gore! First, he’s a sore loser…

Then he’s promoting falsehoods under the guise of science… (Really, what the hell is up with these climate change deniers?)

Then he’s a hysteric…

Then he’s a hypocrite! (More on this in a bit.)

Mike Shelton accuses him of being a stiff… pretty tame.

And he gets points here for invoking The Day the Earth Stood Still! Now, this could be taken as Al Gore being from another planet - but the metaphor of the film suggests that Gore is an enlightened fellow here to save the planet Earth. I think Gore might get a good chuckle from this one.

Gary McCoy accuses Gore of being a hysteric…

…As does his brother Glenn, over two weeks later. (Of course, Gore has been a futurist for a long time, and always pushing for innovation.)

Speaking of exaggerations, Holbert repeats the old BS line that Al Gore said he invented the internet. (The reason to challenge BS when it appears is it solidifies into conventional wisdom and the collective memory.)

Demonstrating his typical mastery at crafting an argument, Paul Nowak accuses Gore of hypocrisy without being specific. The design ain’t bad, but I suppose he assumes all his readers listen to the same programs he does… (more in a sec) But hack Nowak is all about the attack, not explanation. I think if he ever fact-checked something, he’d die.

Chip Bok says Gore’s a hypocrite as well! Umm… what’s his great crime here? Can’t someone can’t relax in a sauna, now? I love the typical GOP attack that anyone wealthy, who gives to the poor or is active in some cause, is a hypocrite. The argument seemes to be, rich conservatives who openly despise the poor are preferable to rich liberals who give at least a little to the poor… or something. Gore’s incredibly active in positive causes, when he could just hang out in his mansion and sit in a hot tub. This slur is pretty laughable.

All right, let’s get into the specifics of the manufactured story that spurred most of these cartoons. Matt Drudge floated a story about Gore’s energy use at his house in Tennessee. In typical Drudge fashion, this aided the GOP but didn’t pass muster.

Seeing the Forest does a nice overview. The group who started this tale is an astroturf organization funded by the ultra-conservative, oil-company funded American Enterprise Institute and National Taxpayers Foundation. Hey, if they want to criticize Gore, fine, but why are they hiding behind the astroturf group?

Keith Olbermann also covered this story. It turns out Gore pays a higher electricity bill than usual because he’s paying for carbon offsets and green power. He continues to invest in energy’saving measures. How exactly is he a hypocrite?

Mike Lester adds his typical aggression to the same bogus attack. (Oh, and believing in global warming is being “brainwashed” and Al Gore is an elitist who despises “the common man.” That latter part is a real compelling argument for anyone who’s studied the Bush administration’s economic record.)

Al Gore saves energy by flying commercial, as opposed to flying the private jets he surely could. But his Republican foes seem to think he should travel the world in a horse and buggy!

These attacks are just ridiculous. Good lord, have these people seen the pollution stats on Air Force One, for example, or corporate jets? I wonder, if all of Gore’s critics had his success, would they be donating proceeds to charity or investing in green power? Would they be promoting any cause without being paid? While the man may not be a saint, I haven’t seen a single one of his critics fit to recycle his non-glossy paper. (Although if they did, it would be a nice start. )

GLOBAL WARMING

Mike Lester’s cartoon is preposterous but funny!

Whereas Cox and Forkum are just preposterous. Huh? Scientists are bowing to peer pressure to speak about global warming? This projection is just hilarious! Do these guys think scientists roam in packs down the halls of research institutes, chain smoking and pushing the weaker scientists into lockers for not towing the line about man-made climate change? (It’s all a big racket, just like that new-fangled “evolution” scam!)

Shall we recall that the American Enterprise Institute, the same folks bankrolled by big oil who funded the astroturf attack on Al Gore, these same folks were offering $10,000 cash to any scientist willing to dispute the U.N. Climate Panel? When you need to bribe people to spout your point-of-view, it’s generally not a good sign.

ISLAMOPHOBIA

Cox and Forkum are perennial contenders for most Islamophobic cartoon of the week. Remember, kids, civil rights are only for the people who look and act like you!

What the hell is Nowak squawking about now? Is he raising the spectre of Muslims taking over Minnesota and turning it into a mini-theocracy? We do not live in a theocracy, and the Constitution protects people of all religions and no religions. The Midwest can survive Nowak’s bigoted hysteria just fine, thank you very much. Have a beer and a brat and simmer down.

THOSE DAMNED DEMOCRATS

Lisa Benson’s cartoon is at least pretty funny…

…While Glenn McCoy is a bit delusional if he truly thinks Bush is bending to the Democrats’ every whim.

THAT DAMNED LIBERAL MEDIA

That damned liberal media is suppressing the glorious news in Iraq, as they have for the past four years, which is why… umm… we’re still there, four years later!

Umm… I honestly wasn’t sure which category to put this one in. Anyone have a clue as to what it’s about? My best guess is that Mike Lester is creating a false equivalency plus straw man attack here. Coulter used a gay epithet, as mentioned earlier, but liberals hate Fox News, and they’ve violent! Violent, I tell you! Really, does this make any sense?

DEMOCRATS REJECT FOX COVERAGE OF NEVADA PRIMARY DEBATE

Lisa Benson goes with a variation on fox in the henhouse… clever, if inaccurate.

Eric Allie does what he always does - accuses the Dems of being cowards. Yeah, we all know how John McCain and George W. Bush have lined up to be interviewed by The Nation, Air America, and Keith Olbermann on Countdown.

In “Playing to the Freepers,” Digby examines the crackerjack coverage Fox News provided for a 2003 Democrat debate. In “Legitimate Beef,” Digby did a nice summing up and linked many of the best pieces on the defeat of the debate proposal, including this piece by Matt Stoller:

We argued that Fox News is not a news channel, but a propaganda outlet that regularly distorts, spins, and falsifies information. Second, Fox News is heavily influenced or even controlled by the Republican Party itself. As such, we believe that Fox News on the whole functions as a surrogate operation for the GOP. Treating Fox as a legitimate news channel extends the Republican Party’s ability to swift-boat and discredit our candidates. In other words, Fox News is a direct pipeline of misinformation from the GOP leadership into the traditional press.

Thankfully, Fox News immediately proved our point with a press release after the debate cancellation that made the following remarkable claim: “News organizations will want to think twice before getting involved in the Nevada Democratic caucus which appears to be controlled by radical, fringe, out-of’state interest groups, not the Nevada Democratic Party.”

We luv you guys, too. Good riddance.

SUNSHINE WEEK

Here’s more information on Sunshine Week. If ever an administration needed it…

Bob Gorrell delivers a pretty good, on-target gag here!

THE MARKET

Many conservative cartoonists drew cartoons on the stock market hit. Mike Shelton had one of the best visual gags for it…

…But Stantis’ was fantastic.

BLOGS

Yeah, anonymous commenters on large blogs really say a lot - especially in comparison to the constant cesspool that is the rightwing blogosphere. Here’s Glenn Greenwald, with one of many posts on this subject.

Good lord. Enough of the false equivalencies. Melissa McEwan and Amanda Marcotte have never, to my knowledge, written anything remotely as hateful - or as idiotic - as Ann Coulter. A previous installment went over the Edwards bloggers in greater detail.

Gary Varvel’s a little more hip here! Of course, the guy who made the Apple mash ad (would that be applesauce?) isn’t a “blogger” per se, but his work certainly hit the blogs and it’s all part of that citizen participation in the national dialogue that entrenched idiots of the punditracy fear so much.

OTHER

Paul Nowak doesn’t trust North Korea. Hmm, then maybe it would’ve been better to stick with the Clinton plan, which kept inspections active and prevented North Korea from building nuclear missiles? Yes, that same approach Nowak’s repeatedly derided?

Henry Payne is either trying to say that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is one baaaaaaaad dude, or that some of the plots he confessed to may be hype. No argument here. on either count!

Lisa Benson isn’t happy with the GOP presidential nominees. Sorry, Lisa, they’re all Republicans and they’re all yours!

This cartoon from Michael Ramirez is quite original and clever!

Is there anyone really pushing for reparations for slavery these days? I don’t know of any major figures. Mike Lester continues to lead the charge - umm, in some direction - on race. I swear, those people, you offer them an apology, you even offer them some money, and they get all uppity and just want more…

This Mike Lester entry is probably the most tasteless cartoon of this installment.

More straw men. Rose O’Donnell is quite a blowhard, and certainly is not the spokewoman for the Democratic party that the GOP likes to pretend she is… she certainly isn’t analogous to Republican spokeswoman Ann Coulter, a headliner at CPAC. And O’Donnell has never said anything I could find about giving terrorists more hugs. About her being moronic? Like I’ve said before, see, we can find common ground!

This Gary Varvel cartoon is pretty funny.

This Scott Stantis cartoon from 3/5/07 is pretty striking. Reader Charles Brubaker had linked it in the last RWCW thread - it just didn’t fall in the date range covered by that installment. But here it is. Stantis is generally one of the least partisan of conservative cartoonists, and credit him for his humanity and compassion.

LOCAL/NON-POLITICAL

A clever piece from Payne!

As is this one.

So, to sum up, conservative cartoonists did pretty well with Walter Reed, to their credit. However, they almost entirely ignored Coulter’s calculated provocations yet ran with manufactured, bogus scandals on Hillary Clinton and Al Gore. It was a mixed bag when it came to “Purge-gate,” but some conservative cartoonists at least acknowledged there was a problem… while some really plunged into the gutter on Plamegate. Most cartoonists had at least one redeeming moment, but at least one cartoonist never deviated from hackery throughout.

Daryl Cagle has a series of interviews with cartoonists up on his website. Currently, you can hear Mike Lester and Gary McCoy explain about a dozen cartoons apiece. I haven’t gotten a chance to listen to all of the segments, but I like the idea of the series.

As usual, feel free to vote for the most offensive cartoon(s) of this installment in the comments, and check out Bob Geiger’s most recent round-up of editorial cartoons for a palate cleanser. See you next time!