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 two weeks, 4/16/07-4/29/07. The biggest topics were the Virginia Tech shootings and a Supreme Court decision on abortion - but there’s always time for conservative cartoonists to attack prominent Democrats and - Rosie O’Donnell?!?

THE VIRGINIA TECH SHOOTINGS

Here’s Michael Ramirez’ entry.

Glenn McCoy sums it up pretty well.

Bob Gorrell poses a similar question.

Here Gorrell expands to larger questions of violence in general.

Henry Payne delivers a simple memorial…

…and here depicts Cho.

Gary Varvel captures the feelings of many a parent…

…Just as Scott Stantis captures the feelings of many Americans.

Varvel also uses the VT mascot for a cartoon…

…As does Lisa Benson, albeit with a bulletproof vest.

Ken Catalino also references body armor…

…As does Chip Bok.

Many cartoonists also referenced Iraq.

As Henry Payne points out, we can lose track of how horrible the death count in Iraq really is.

I’m with Chuck Asay for the first part, but then he wants to arm all college students with firearms! I do think there’s an added horror to killings at a school, and I thought the students of Baghdad Technical University made a touching gesture by expressing their condolences to the students at VT. That is not to say that we should lose track of the violence in Iraq and the rest of the world, and that we shouldn’t question all of that violence as well.

Mike Lester’s cartoon is pretty odd. “The Passive American”? Um, what part of pre-emptive war is “passive”? How is not going around with a handgun all the time “passive”? How is not bringing a handgun to class “passive”? Does everyone have to be packing heat at all times to please Lester?

Catalino’s cartoon here is a bit odd. It appears he’s saying he doesn’t want to pray for such killers, or give them mental healthcare, he just wants to kill them and send them to hell.

Jerry Holbert satirizes the predictable reactions of public figures.

Stantis does a nice job with the same theme.

Eric Allie tries the same, but he seems to ignore that most people said Cho was nuts, he was mentally ill, etc.

Brian Fairrington isn’t shy about blaming “the entertainment industry.” This is despite the fact that it doesn’t apply in Cho’s case! This also ignores that plenty of people watch movies and TV and don’t kill people. It’s a really ridiculous argument that guns don’t make that killing part a little easier.

Mike Shelton also apparently favors arming students! There’s room for legitimate disagreement on gun laws in our society. There are states, and campuses, where students can and do carry concealed weapons. Speaking as a former teacher, I think it’s a horrible idea, and anyone who’s had to break up student fights would agree. Here’s an assertion that should not be a news flash: Guns have no part in education (barring weapons trainings programs and the like!). They don’t have a part in grocery shopping, either. Carrying a gun around in ordinary life is, for sane, responsible people, possible protection for a low probability, emergency situation. Some states want that, but it’s hardly the only approach, and I would argue not the most sensible one.

Mike Lester also wants to arm students.

Paul Nowak seems to think there’s something radical and unusual in not having guns on a college campus.

Paul Nowak dispenses his usual straw men here. No one was arguing the crap his ridiculous cartoon liberal is spouting.

Mike Lester makes a ridiculous argument here, but is at least funny. However, he’s spouting BS, denying essential context. He’s talking about “largest death tolls” to invoke 9/11 and the Oklahoma City bombing - as if the main argument, or only argument, for restricting guns was that they could be used by terrorists in mass killings! In the United States, there were 8,299 deaths from handguns in 2004 alone.

Normally Mike Lester would be on solid ground attacking Americans for being unaware. However, I doubt anyone missed the news about Virginia Tech. Furthermore, American Idol even referenced VT on their program.

Mike Lester and many other conservative cartoonists questioned NBC and other networks airing any of Cho’s video footage. Lester goes with a streaking theme…

…as does Eric Allie.

Glenn McCoy also scolds the media. There’s an argument to made that NBC and the other networks shouldn’t have aired any of the footage. There’s room for sincere disagreement on this. Out here in L.A., the coverage was restrained and tasteful, which I assure you, is not their natural inclination (Anna Nicole). The fear is that some disturbed individual will become a copycat killer. I found seeing the footage gave insight into Cho, and possibly warning people who know people similar to Cho they need to intervene. It’s fair to criticize the networks, but it’s far from a cut-and-dry issue. (Howard Kurtz has a good article on NBC News president Steve Capus and the Imus and Cho video decisions.)

Bob Gorrell bangs the same drum…

..as does Henry Payne.

Sadly, many conservative cartoonists just could restrain themselves and drew cartoons linking Cho’s murders to abortion. Abortion is an issue provoking sincere, strong emotions in people on every side of the issue. Still, personally, I find this cartoon appalling. Asay’s entitled to his opinion, but calling an abortion a “killing” is laying it on pretty thick. Asay also completely and willfully ignores that Cho could have been stopped, merely by enforcing Virginia’s very lax gun laws! Some day, perhaps Asay will make an honest argument.

Bob Gorrell may be even nuttier here. He may just be really stretching in shameless fashion, or maybe he’s completely ignorant of female anatomy and what an abortion entails.

Even allowing for comedic exaggeration, I find Payne’s cartoon a bit odd. Bazookas have never been legally available to citizens. Meanwhile, “partial birth abortion” is a term invented by the pro-life/anti-abortion movement, not used by doctors. I think it’s fair to say that anti-gun advocates do want to chip away at gun rights, and the pro-life/anti-abortion crowd want to chip away at reproductive freedoms. However, there are substantial differences between the two issues, and the NRA and NOW do not wield anything close to the same power in American politics.

Glenn McCoy plumbs new levels of tastelessness.

His brother Gary substitutes the Devil for Death, but may be even more tasteless. Um, Gary? Not only is a human being not a fetus or an embryo, but they’re called “murders,” not “post-birth abortions,” you ass.

Still, everyone else pales in comparison to Brian Fairrington here (thanks to Charles Brubaker for pointing this one out!) Yes, it’s a straw man, and a grotesque one at that, and like the other tasteless cartoons above, it’s reminiscient of Mike Lester’s Most Offensive Recipient from RWCW #2. Still, this is the most offensive cartoon of the week to my mind, despite stiff competition. It even rivals John Derbyshire’s callous blather that “at the very least” the Virginia Tech students should have counted the shots from Cho and rushed him while he was reloading. (It’s a nice touch that Fairrington draws this presumed feminist as older, frumpy and with hair on her arms.)

Daryl Cagle features more cartoons on the VT killings here.

SUPREME COURT “PARTIAL BIRTH” ABORTION BAN

I suppose Gorrell’s cartoon could be seen neutrally, but he’s already shown where he stands. Plus, honestly, isn’t politics supposed to deal with important subjects? Funny, there’s something I don’t see in the cartoon - the mother.

Lisa Benson depicts this as a victory for “fetus-Americans.” (It also seems to suggest that the dissenting judges don’t like babies, doesn’t it?)

Gary Varvel goes with a similar tact…

…As does Scott Stantis…

…As does Michael Ramirez. Heaven knows an unwanted child will know a lifetime full of bliss, especially thanks to all the wonderful social services favored by all conservatives.

I’ve read several good pieces on this decision. Emily Bazelon examines the truth behind conservative claims in “Is there a Post-Abortion Syndrome?” William Saletan contributes a good piece on the role of ultrasound in these battles. Dahlia Lithwick ponders “The Real Anthony Kennedy” and observes that:

…Kennedy not only intruded on the private, intimate, and autonomous choices of pregnant women, but did so because he thinks these women aren’t trustworthy enough to make them. “Whether to have an abortion requires a difficult and painful moral decision,” he writes in Gonzales. “While we find no reliable data to measure the phenomenon, it seems unexceptionable to conclude some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life they once created and sustained.” That regret might later cause “severe depression and loss of esteem.”

The logic of Casey has now been stood on its head: The government must protect women, not against “undue burdens” the state has placed on their intimate freedom, but against their own bad choices. In Roe, the court protected medical privacy; in Casey, it guaranteed autonomy; in Gonzales, it speaks as what lawyers call parens patriae, the protector of children and the incompetent.

In trying to reconcile Kennedy’s dual visions of privacy, two possibilities emerge: Either he simultaneously holds two vastly different constitutional notions of privacy and autonomy-one for gay men and one for pregnant women-or all this has nothing to do with the Constitution.

Never one for subtlety, Glenn McCoy delivers this cartoon. (Funny, I doubt he’s a vegetarian.)

In “Father Knows Best” Lithwick notes that for Kennedy:

His opinion blossoms from the premise that if all women were as sensitive as he is about the fundamental awfulness of this procedure, they’d all refuse to undergo it. Since they aren’t, he’ll decide for them.

[…]

Nobody disputes that whether or not they decide to go through with an abortion, women face a heart-wrenching choice. But for Kennedy only those women who regret the decision to abort illuminate some deeper truth. And Kennedy’s solution for these flip-flopping women is elegant. Protect them from the truth. “Any number of patients facing imminent surgical procedures would prefer not to hear all details,” he concedes. “It is, however, precisely this lack of information concerning the way the fetus will be killed that is of legitimate concern to the state.” In Kennedy’s view, if pregnant women only knew how abhorrent the procedure was, they’d always opt to avoid it. But as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg points out in dissent, Kennedy doesn’t propose giving women more information about partial-birth abortion procedures. He says it’s up to the Congress and the courts to substitute their judgment and ban the procedures altogether. (”I’m sorry Bianca, there is a procedure out there that may be safer for you, but some day, you will thank me for sparing you from it.”)

And McCoy also delivers this one! McCoy implies that anyone who performs an abortion is a cruel sadist, not a health care provider or a compassionate doctor.

This Court has yet again ignored its own precedent to make a far right ruling. Kennedy’s line that “respect for human life finds an ultimate expression in the bond of love the mother has for her child,” is highly sentimental, and implies that fathers can’t have comparable love for their children, women without children are missing out, and every mother does or should love her child (and I suppose it also means that every mother has the mean to support it). There’s no question that the Court is trying to discourage abortion, and it seems to be in furtherance of a Leave It to Beaver view of the world. As Lithwick writes, “It’s hard to fathom why Kennedy has so much more sympathy for the women who changed their minds about abortions than for those who did not. His concern for Inconstant Females might be patronizing in any other jurist.” (…Were Kennedy not one to agonize over every decision, Lithwick further explains.)

Gary McCoy’s “from the mouth of babes” shtick would work better if he weren’t such a blathering idiot.

Did you notice that not a single one of these conservative cartoonists considered the mother and her feelings? Getting an abortion can be a difficult decision, but it’s up the woman, and doctors should offer their best medical advice rather than being forced to conform to the rightwing’s idea of medical counseling.

The old dilemma applies: In a burning lab, there’s a crying infant and some frozen embryos. You can only save one or other other. Which do you save?

According to the “fertilized egg is the same as an embryo is the same as a fetus is the same a human being” school, the embryos or petri dish or whatever should be saved. But few if any human beings would act in such a fashion, and for good reason.

It’s not as if this blog post will convince the pro-life/anti-abortion movement to renounce their ways. However, “safe, legal and rare” is the position that makes the most sense to me. No one celebrates an abortion. They may feel relief, but it’s not a sadistic or joyful occasion. Abortion rights and reproductive freedoms are another matter. The conservative commitment to life ends at birth. It also makes no sense to oppose abortion and also oppose accurate sex ed and birth control. It also wouldn’t follow that so many pro-lifers would push for war and the death penalty. Some opponents of reproductive freedom are sincerely distraught by the idea of abortion, but as a whole, their movement is motivated by a desire for social control, not a reverence for life.

HARRY REID

It’s hardly surprising Reid got flack for saying the war is lost from conservatives. Of course, as we’ve been over countless times before, “victory” and “failure” hardly apply to Iraq now, and Bush can’t even tell us what “victory” would entail. The situation in Iraq can’t even accurately be called a war anymore, and that’s been the case for some time. We are occupying a foreign land in the middles of a civil war. The majority of Americans and Iraqis want us gone. Even the top generals have said a military victory is impossible (or inapplicable) now. Only a diplomatic and economic solution will work, and our presence may make that impossible as well. (John Aravosis has a nice short post on some of this.)

How many more times can Ramirex trot out Iwo Jima? (A lot.)

Ah, you see, all Democrats are cowards! It’s their instinct to surrender! Just as, err, it’s Bush’s instinct to be stupid and stubborn! Really, “surrender” does not apply in this situation.

Look, I know in a visual medium, a white flag is hard to pass up, but can’t conservative cartoonists think of anything else?

Apparently not.

Um, nope. (The irony is that it’s the Bush administration that’s been spreading the propaganda in denial of reality!)

Mike Shelton at least shows some orignality with the same gag.

Meanwhile, Gorrell goes minimalist.

Benson at least avoids the flag.

As does Holbert. Actually, the end is not near - Reid is trying to end the occupation and prevent the end of the lives of our troops.

Meanwhile, Ramirez delivers a bizarre cartoon. Reid is a cross-dressing traitor, I tell you!

IRAQ

Ramirez shows more visual flair here.

While Catalino does not. Ewww! (Hey Ken, all the cute women are Dems. Not having your face twisted into a contorted hate face helps.) Really, withdrawing troops isn’t atttractive? This is compared to Bush’s “send ‘em into the meat grinder and pray things magically get better” approach?

This isn’t a bad cartoon. I’m not sure it’s a bad idea, either!

Catalino gets it almost precisely reversed. The Democrats are trying to make sure no more troops die! Bush is content to keep sacrificing them for his ego. I suppose the real difference is Bush isn’t blowing himself up - he’s pushing other people in to die for him.

This cartoon illustrates why Paul Nowak is such a repellent rightwing hack. He can’t even argue coherently. First of all, it’s a monstrous charge to say that the Democrats celebrate the death of anyone, especially the troops! Second, the Democrats are trying to pull everyone out, remember? They’re also pushing to make it happen before next year’s presidential election! But to Nowak, if you really care, you keep sending troops to die. Okay.

Nowak’s similar here. Um, “sabotage” doesn’t apply. “Adding” timelines - well, someone has to do it. Again, Iraq cannot be won militarily at this point, and other forms of “victory” may well be impossible at this point for Americans. This cartoon also falsely assumes that Iraq is key to the global war on “terrorists” and that, contrary to the latest NIE, we’re safer as a result of staying there. Actually, we’ve created more enemies.

Scottie, Scottie, Scottie. Suuuure, we all know that magically, Al Qaeda isn’t able to attack us in the United States simply because so many of our troops are committed in Iraq. Heaven knows our army being stretched thin doesn’t make us more vulnerable, and our presence in the Middle East has made us lots and lots of friends. There have been some other recent pieces on this subject, but let’s link Froomkin’s post again: “They Won’t Follow Us Home.”

THE DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES

Jerry Holbert delivers a good cartoon criticizing the shallow horse race coverage we often receive.

Not a bad gag!

What makes this Asay cartoon particularly amusing (unintentionally) is that Obama is quite the Christian, and a great deal of the coverage on him has featured that. Of course, many Democrats are religious!

I’m not thrilled about Edwards’ $400 haircuts, and it’s fair to rib him over those, but I don’t know where the hell Payne is going that he can get a good $8 haircut!

Straw man. Edwards reimbursed the campaign for all such costs. Contributors have not paid for them. Hilzoy has a good post dissecting the haircut issue. (Edwards, after all, was having the stylist come to him, which is one of the chief reasons for the high cost.)

Bok hits the same subject, but is pretty funny!

THE REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES

Catalino seems to be accusing Giuliani of both pandering and enjoying cross-dressing a bit too much for his tastes.

Glenn McCoy delivers an accurate and good cartoon! (I guess his batting average radically improves when he’s depicting Republicans.)

Fairrington apparently doesn’t think McCain’s chances are good.

BORIS YELTSIN DIES

This is a dark cartoon, and considering Putin and Yeltsin’s relationship, and that Yeltsin was out of key power, inaccurate. But it is darkly funny.

The same goes for this Stantis cartoon.

Yes, drunk on democracy ain’t so bad! (It’s amusing that conservatives and the press were so eager to crow that “Reagan won the Cold War” and then the Pope John Paul II did! Funny how the Polish resistance, Gorbachev and Yeltsin never factored in those same accounts.)

PURGE-GATE

Mike Shelton delivers a great cartoon on Gonzales…

,,,Meanwhile, while Payne is trying to say that the Bushies shouldn’t have to explain their unethical moves, he’s at least funny! Of course, The Apprentice is a model of transparency compared to the Bush administration!

By the way, while there were many good dissections of Gonzales’ performance before Congress, one of the best was Dan Froomkin’s “The Gonzales Clown Show.”

ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

Asay pulls a straw man here and perpetrates a false equivalency as well. You can’t tell us with a straight face that Al Gore is opposed to better health care in Africa! Meanwhile, Bjorn Lomborg is an outlier scientist, a global warming denier popular with the right because he’s at odds with almost the entire scientific community.

Sheryl Crow’s fine trying to limit paper product waste, but urging the use of only one to three pieces of toilet paper per bathroom visit is um, taking things a wee bit far (apologies, I just noticed that pun). I suppose she could back bidets instead.

Jay Leno used this same gag.

I’m reminded of a story told to me by one of my buddies back in junior high who was into all things military. He read some account of the British army stationed in Africa or India. Soldiers had to request toilet paper from the quartermaster for each trip to the latrine! In one case, a soldier went to the quartermaster and was granted only three pieces of toilet paper. When the soldier questioned this, the quartermaster insisted it was generous: “One up, one down, and one polish.”

Yes, Paul Nowak, all those newspapers and magazines sprung into existence merely to cover this story. They wouldn’t have existed otherwise.

POP CULTURE

The thing is, Rosie improved The View’s ratings!

Um, same thing, Lisa Benson. Perhaps Walters is happy to see Rosie go, but ABC is not.
,

Glenn McCoy isn’t getting his targets mixed up. It was Roseanne Barr who grabbed her crotch.

I’m not a fan of Rosie O’Donnell. I find her shrill. But when has she said anything comparable to Imus?

Really, you would think Rosie O’Donnell was public enemy number one! It amuses me that Republicans try to paint O’Donnell as some Democratic spokesperson. She isn’t. The same can’t be said of figures such as Ann Coulter, who’s a keynote speaker at major conservative functions.

The same goes for Alec Baldwin! It’s fair to call him a liberal, but it’s not as if he’s an official Democratic spokesperson or paid pundit. (Still, frankly Bush is a rude, thoughtless pig!)

Ah! And Michael Ramirez comes full circle! This is a pretty good punchline.

Personally, I’m pained by Baldwin’s behavior. He’s a brilliant comedic actor, but his tirade against his 11-year old daughter was unconscionable. I’m glad he’s apologized, but the guy needs anger management courses or something.

Not a bad gag - still, fluffy American Idol raised millions for charity!

OTHER

The concerns about Wolfowitz go far beyond him getting a plum gig for his girlfriend.

I was trying to avoid any more Imus cartoons since this is a long installment as it is, but ya can’t pass up Godzilla!

I thought this Holbert gag was quite clever. (Shades of old SNL sketches!)

So far, Holbert is the only conservative cartoonist to comment on the testimony of Jessica Lynch or the Tillmans! His criticism is also right on target!

Likewise, this Holbert cartoon is clever and on target. If he keeps this up, he’ll be drummed out by the other conservatives!

Um, I guess Nowak doesn’t bother to watch the news. I’ve hear the Dow reported every day, several times a day. Hey, that’s great, but there’s still the question of a living wage and other financial assaults on the middle class.

Bok gets points for originality, although this is a creepy cartoon. However, the AMT was designed to try to prevent rich people from avoiding payment of their share of taxes (even though that share is far too small at present).

The only reason I ran this Stantis cartoon is because of its persistent, BS GOP talking points. “Wimpy foreign policy” apparently involves diplomacy versus pre-emptive wars of choice. As for higher taxes, we dispensed with some of that BS back in RWCW #17.

Meanwhile, Gary McCoy arrives pretty late to the party with this preposterous 4/14/07 cartoon, in which we learn that Gary apparently only imbibes National Review, Weekly Standard, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, and Rush Limbaugh, all of which are severely factually challenged. Um, Gary, Plamegate in large part showed how the press was willing to suck up to the Bush administration. Well, never let the facts get in the way of a hackneyed attack!

LOCAL/NON-POLITICAL

Detroit-based Henry Payne notes Toyota’s ascendency.

Meanwhile, I thought this cartoon was pretty funny!

Well, in this installment I thought conservative cartoonists were all over the place. Many are to be applauded for noting the Virginia Tech murders. While I disagree with them on the abortion issue, I can’t really fault them for voicing their approval of the Supreme Court decision - as long as none of the same cartoonists spout off about “activist judges” later on, since the current court is quite “activist” in terms of overturning precedent, and by that standard, the two most “activist” judges have been Thomas and Scalia.

What I do object to is combining the VT killings with the abortion issue. I find that extremely tasteless in addition to being intellectually fraudulent. Adult human beings are not fetuses. Even if one opposes abortion, one should be able to recognize that many women agonize about such decisions. Cho might have been in agony in some sense, but apparently he didn’t agonize over his decision to kill as many of his fellow students as possible before killing himself. Murder is not abortion. I’ve said in other blog threads that I can’t respect anyone (such as John Derbyshire) who doesn’t show at least some compassion for the VT victims. I find the arguments that concealed weapons could have prevented Cho’s killing to be insane (there still would have been some sort of body count) - but not monstrous. However, I find the abortion-VT cartoons pretty callous towards the VT victims (not to mention women contemplating getting an abortion, but I’m more concerned about the Blacksburg community and the victims’ families here). Finally, I find the arguments of Derbyshire, Steyn, D’Souza and some of the usual hacks idiotic at best and monstrous at worst.

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!