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 super’sized installment of RWCW covers a sizzlin’ eleven-week period. RWCW - less punctual than a pizza, but with a longer memory than your MSM! While some of these cartoons might have you saying, “Oh yeah, I remember that!” what may be more distressing is seeing the cartoons that could have been just as easily drawn yesterday as two months ago. (Still, I hope this installment proves to be more than a “historical document.”)

 

IRAQ

Ah, the standard GOP line, if nicely visualized! Lisa Benson asserts both that the surge is working and the Democrats want to “surrender.”

But wait a sec! Scott Stantis depicts Bush driving, and recklessly! Which is it, huh?

I’m with Stantis on this one. For starters, Benson could read the recent NYT op-ed by current servicepeople in Iraq, “The War as We Saw It.” A sample:

The claim that we are increasingly in control of the battlefields in Iraq is an assessment arrived at through a flawed, American-centered framework. Yes, we are militarily superior, but our successes are offset by failures elsewhere. What soldiers call the “battle space” remains the same, with changes only at the margins. It is crowded with actors who do not fit neatly into boxes: Sunni extremists, Al Qaeda terrorists, Shiite militiamen, criminals and armed tribes. This situation is made more complex by the questionable loyalties and Janus-faced role of the Iraqi police and Iraqi Army, which have been trained and armed at United States taxpayers- expense.

Conservative cartoonists churn out white flag cartoons like there’s no tomorrow (but no tomorrow due to Islamofascistoliburals, dammit, not that global warming hoax stuff!), and so we have to feature at least one per installment. This one by Chip Bok isn’t even original. Still, it’s representative of conservative attitudes in the charges it levels: The Democrats want us to “surrender” in Iraq - they and most of the American people and many Republicans, I guess - and they want to do so despite how wonderfully things are progressing in Iraq.

We’ve been over this many times, but conventional “victory” and “defeat” haven’t applied for years in Iraq. The conventional war is long over, the occupation began, and a civil war on top of several other horrible conditions exists. Even Bush’s top brass has repeatedly said that a military “victory” is impossible if not meaningless, and the only solutions to Iraq’s current woes are political in nature. Assuming “success” is even possible in Iraq at this point with an American presence there, it might help if the issues weren’t constantly framed this juvenilely.

Benson delivers her point clearly here, even if it’s erroneous. Reid is “playing” general and out of touch? This as opposed to draft-dodging, bubble-boy, Commander Codpiece George W. Bush, who discarded his old generals who told him things weren’t going swimmingly in Iraq and brought in a new crew that would implement his new, brilliant plan? Fine, criticize the Dems, but it’s pure hackdom to pretend that second-guessing Petraeus is “undermining the troops” and invalid. This is Bush’s plan. Most Americans, and most military personnel, question it. And Petraeus’ big report in September is being written by the White House. Please.

Sigh. One need only read the papers to know things aren’t going well. Considering that the White House has already decided on the verdict (”there are problems, but we’re making real progress!”), why do we need to go through this fiction? Bush is trying to run out the clock and pin Iraq on the Dems. To Paul Nowak, only Democrats play politics. This is despite the Bush administration’s lies about pre-war intel, their revisionism about pre-war statements, and their consistent refusal to accurately depict what’s going on in Iraq. It’s one thing to have a debate on policy, but starting in the same overall reality helps.

I don’t mind charges of politics so much as I mind them being so one’sided. Petraeus may be a swell guy, but he’s not an independent voice. As it stands, he’s liable to become Bush’s latest fall guy. As William Arkin puts it:

Does the death of at least 250 Iraqi civilians, the deadliest single incident of the war, coming four years into the fighting and seven months after the surge was announced, actually signal progress for the U.S. strategy in Iraq?

Listen to the military commanders and spokesmen, and to the new cadre of Petraeus propagandists, and you may get that impression. The theory, in part, is that the attack is intended to distract Congress and the American public from the progress being made in Baghdad and elsewhere, and that it is a kind of “last gasp” for al-Qaeda in Iraq.

Don’t be fooled. Nothing much has changed in Iraq — especially politically.

This strikes me as an awfully inaccurate and rather tasteless metaphor, but as Jonathan Schwarz points out, bad analogies (and metaphors) are defining characteristics of conservatives. First of all, our occupation in Iraq is not remotely like a baseball game. However, if it were, there would be several teams playing on the field at once, some shooting at others with guns, and it would be inning 14 or so, not 1!

Iraq is also not a football game! And if it were, there would be five teams on at once, shooting at each other, and it’d be triple overtime… oh, you get the idea. More to the point, Asay here is insisting the surge is working. It may be in a few areas, such as the Anbar province, but not overall.

Kudos to the Iraq soccer team! However, this sports metaphor also breaks down. Al Qaeda is not the major threat in Iraq, either to American servicepeople or Iraqis. And all Iraqis do not share the same interests.

Speaking of weird metaphors - this is an odd one from Gary Varvel. Notice the subtext, though. He ignores that recent NIEs indicate, in accord with common sense, that our invasion and occupation of Iraq has made us less safe. It’s less clear if he’s suggesting that Iraq had something to do with 9/11, but he’s in that general territory. (Varvel should be careful - those TUMS appear to be made in China.)

Wait, there’s a successful democracy in Iraq? A new world is in sight? What is Ramirez smoking? Does he read the news? He could try Questiongirl’s latest “Meanwhile, Back in Iraq,” for instance.

Every conflict is World War II to the GOP! They never seem to consider WWI, Vietnam, the American Civil War or the insurgency in Algiers, all of which are more relevant here. Bush is not Churchill, of course, despite his own vanity and the PR of his backers (he’s closer to Ambrose Burnside). But this “lesson” simply doesn’t apply, except for a general “resolve” moral, perhaps. Churchill was much smarter than our administration, but he also didn’t preside over a civil war. He faced a major threat of conquest we do not. His best and only course of action at the time was a military one, whereas the only hope for “success” in Iraq is political and diplomatic, and those solutions are not directly in our hands.

So wait, who’s not Churchill again? Besides Bush… Is it Reid, or Lugar?

Asay contends that the surge is working. Again, it may be in a few areas. But he’s cherry-picking. That’s not the case overall, and Al Qaeda is not responsible for the majority of deaths in Iraq.

In Paul Nowak’s world, democrats are evil people who wish ill upon others and cheer their misfortunes. Count the number of partisan projection attacks in this installment from him; there are many.

Points to Lisa Benson for originality, and one school of thought is that the American presence in Iraq is staving off disaster, even if things aren’t getting better (Benson can’t seem to make up her mind). A more accurate cartoon would depict the turkey being savaged by the coyotes, with the soldier attacked too while trying to help, and coyotes biting each other as well. (I believe the military term for this is a “Coyote Foxtrot.”)

Sigh. I really get tired of this sort of crap. It’s just not that hard a concept that one can be patriotic and question the government. In fact, a cornerstone of our founding is questioning the government. Similarly, it’s really not that hard to realize that one way to support the troops is by ending our occupation in Iraq. Again, this attack is juvenile.

Hey! That’s a Persian rug! Doesn’t Michael Ramirez know that Persians aren’t the same as Arabs?

Seriously, this is more of the same BS as Catalino. Withdrawal is support for the troops, just not Bush’s agenda! I’m sure many American personnel would like a magic carpet to fly away home.

Rightwing hack Eric Allie also accuses Democrats of wanting Iraq to get worse. There may be a few. However, I think they pale in numbers to the Republicans who know Iraq is in dire straits but are still afraid to buck Bush publicly.

As always, Digby deserves to be read in full, but her analysis in “Surging To The Handoff” of the current shell game is dead-on:

Those of us who have been closely observing this train wreck from the beginning know exactly what this escalation was about: it was an effort to keep Iraq from completely falling apart just long enough to get Bush out of office. Prior to the election, a “surge” wasn’t even on the agenda. In fact all we heard about was how the army was on the verge of being broken, (which it is.) Bush and Cheney brushed off the Baker Hamilton Group’s tepid compromises because their driving motive at this point is not to “succeed in Iraq — which they can’t even define since the neocon wet dream of Kumbayaa on the Tigris didn’t pan out — but to save face and (perhaps) preserve the myth of GOP national security strength. That’s what they do. It’s what they’ve always done.

To that end they’ve hired professional propagandists and political operatives to spin tales that keep the media and the congress just enough off balance that they continue to give them the benefit of the doubt. If the presidency changes hands in 2008, as it is likely to do, there will be no more such benefit of the doubt, we know that.

We have watched how these people operate for more than six years now. There’s no mystery about what’s going on. Iraq is a failure in every way and the Bush administration’s only real strategy now is how to make the Democrats pay for it. Period.

Points for creativity, but here Allie falsely charges that the Democrats could help Iraq if only they wanted to and weren’t intent on harming Bush. He asserts that Iraq is just fine - it’s those damn Dems that are screwing everything up! Nevermind that Bush called things exactly as he wanted for about four years and still calls the shots. Nevermind that Iraq is in dire straits. As long as we’re playing “Fix the Metaphor/Analogy” (as we often do), why not a cartoon of a screaming man on fire while Bush refuses to turn on the hose?

Here Allie goes really weird! Does this mean he accepts the characterization “Darth Cheney”? I completely agree with Allie that Cheney is the evil one and the Dems are more akin to Skywalker! As to the “surge,” let’s go to a recent McClatchy newspaper article (linked in Digby’s post):

Despite U.S. claims that violence is down in the Iraqi capital, U.S. military officers are offering a bleak picture of Iraq’s future, saying they-ve yet to see any signs of reconciliation between Sunni and Shiite Muslims despite the drop in violence.

Without reconciliation, the military officers say, any decline in violence will be temporary and bloodshed could return to previous levels as soon as the U.S. military cuts back its campaign against insurgent attacks.

That downbeat assessment comes despite a buildup of U.S. troops that began five months ago Wednesday and has seen U.S. casualties reach the highest sustained levels since the United States invaded Iraq nearly four and a half years ago.

Violence remains endemic, with truck bombs in two northern Iraqi villages claiming the largest single death toll of the war - more than 300 confirmed dead and counting. North of Baghdad, another truck bomb destroyed a key bridge on the road linking the capital to Mosul, the first successful bridge attack since June.

And while top U.S. officials insist that 50 percent of the capital is now under effective U.S. or government control, compared with 8 percent in February, statistics indicate that the improvement in violence is at best mixed.

U.S. officials say the number of civilian casualties in the Iraqi capital is down 50 percent. But U.S. officials declined to provide specific numbers, and statistics gathered by McClatchy Newspapers don’t support the claim.

The number of car bombings in July actually was 5 percent higher than the number recorded last December, according to the McClatchy statistics, and the number of civilians killed in explosions is about the same.

Chuck Asay never ceases to astound me with his belief that reporting changes reality. In his world, Harry Reid, the Democrats and the media are to blame for the overwhelming unpopularity of our occupation in Iraq. Apparently, people can’t figure it out on their own! And things are really going great! Clap if you believe in the “surge”!

This isn’t a bad design by Eric Allie. However, Al Qaeda, the political party in Iraq, probably doesn’t have operational ties with bin Laden’s Al Qaeda. Even if they did, that’s the least of the country’s problems. Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda aren’t popular enough with Iraqis, and they’re not among the major physical threats to Americans.

Several cartoonists went with this general gag. Many Americans civilians and military are pretty steamed over this, for good reason. Meanwhile, Bush and Congress are both on vacation here. That said, sadly, it’s questionable as to whether the fractured and weak Iraq government could get that much done anyway. (Not that any of that’s any comfort to the troops in Iraq.)

Umm… Bob Gorrell depicts the Iraqi government as a drunken bum. Lovely. It’d be hard to be impressed by the Iraqi government. However, they didn’t create this mess.

With all of the things afflicting Iraq, Paul Nowak is blaming Congress?!? That’s the problem with the Iraqi government? Wow, even Gorrell’s wino looks like a sophisticated take compared to this. Lord knows, if Nowak had his way and Congress was still in Republican hands, everything would be just great, as it has been for the past four and half years!

Henry Payne seems to be a bit more sympathetic toward the Iraqi Army and their equipment woes.

Brian Fairrington captures the mood of many Republicans on Capitol Hill.

Bok questions Bush’s guts! (What is the real reason Pace was dumped? Some suspect that it’s because he publicly challenged the administration’s repeated unsupported accusations against Iran.)

Cox and Forkum’s cartoon is actually pretty funny. They’ll never be happy unless everyone is hysterical about the Islamic menace. Even those scary Mexicans are as dreadful as that! Cox and Forkum also forward the unsupported propaganda on Iran. Let me reiterate: it’s quite easy for adults to recognize Iran as a threat and a challenge without buying that they’re an imminent threat to us and the world. Nor is it necessary to accept unquestioningly that the Iranians are the chief culprits responsible for supplying arms in Iraq. The U.S. has directly or indirectly armed almost every faction in Iraq at this point. Our erstwhile allies the Saudis are specifically arming the Sunni insurgency in Iraq, who are responsible for the vast majority of American deaths.

Okay, I get Gorrell’s point, and I highly doubt that all the insurgents are lovely people. Many might well be thugs regardless of the situation. However, they’re not cockroaches. They’re human beings and this is their country. Bremer disbanded the Army, dissolved the temporary Iraq governing council and conducted an extremely over-zealous de-Baathification (all ideas of the unfailingly wrong neocons), putting about a half million angry, shamed, unemployed and armed men on the streets. That significantly swelled the insurgency and lost a tremendous number of “hearts and minds.”

Holbert ties our wasteful expenditures abroad to our neglect at home.

Yeah, it’s an oversimplification, but this one of a small percentage of Mike Lester cartoons I can agree with. Pretty well done. Of course, I agree with another Harry Potter-Iraq comparison more:

Nicholas Kristof asked readers to offer literary or historical parallels to the Bush administration and Iraq. He writes in his New York Times opinion column (subscription required): “A reader named Melissa S. e-mailed to say that she explains Iraq policy to her 8-year-old son in terms of Harry Potter characters: ‘Dick Cheney is Lord Voldemort. George W. Bush is Peter Pettigrew.’ Don Rumsfeld is Lucius Malfoy, while Cornelius Fudge represents administration supporters who deny that anything is wrong. And, she concludes, ‘Daily Prophet reporter Rita Skeeter is Fox News.’”

(As I said it that post, I wish Bush could at least rise to the level of moral complexity that Harry Potter achieves.)

Umm, go to hell, Chuck Asay. It absolutely matters. The same reckless idiots who got us into this mess and attacked those that tried to give them wise counsel (they also repeated blamed those people for their own mistakes) are still running the show and apparently haven’t learned much, if anything! They even want to double down in Iran! That’s why it matters!

More to the point, Iraq was a secular society before we invaded! It wasn’t held by “radical Islam”! And who started the war? Gosh, who can say, really? Is Asay really this stupid, or is this pure hackdom? Really, how many inaccuracies can he fit in one cartoon?

To return to the same Digby post:

The moral failure was in invading Iraq. It was the original sin from which all these horrors have sprung. To even imply that the majority of Americans who now want to rectify that terrible decision by removing ourselves from the situation will be morally responsible for this mess is an outrage.

I love these lectures and feelings of “disgust” coming from people who apparently still maintain that it was perfectly fine to ignore international law and invade a country for no good reason and turn it into a chaotic hellhole. No moral culpability required for that, no admission of guilt, but lots and lots of sanctimonious posturing about how we will have blood on our hands if the US admits its mistake and withdraws. The obtuseness of that position takes my breath away. We already have so much blood on our hands that it’s dripping into everything we touch.

[...]

But let’s set aside the moral criminality of the situation and take a clear-eyed look at what a perfectly idiotic thing it was to do on a strategic level. They set this geopolitical horror show in motion when they decided to invade Iraq and destabilize the middle east at a time when there was a very compelling sociological force gaining power throughout the region. It couldn’t have been more stupid for our security, for the stability of the global economy, for the sake of the perception of American power and military effectiveness. The failure is not just what’s happened inside Iraq, although that’s huge. The failure is how it’s scrambled the geopolitical game plan in ways they clearly didn’t anticipate when they were holding court with Chalabi and Makiya and making plans for their personal Monticellos and Mt Vernons in Mesopotamia. People who make mistakes like this are clearly incapable of making the kind of tactical and strategic decisions to succeed at anything. What more do they have to do to prove it?

There will be no solutions — if there even is such a thing at this point — until these incompetent megalomaniacs are out of power. We’re in a holding pattern, nothing more.

Again, read the whole thing (I’m still leaving out great stuff). The best cure for officials spouting bullshit is someone callling bullshit on them.

Varvel depicts the most legitimate fear about withdrawal. We have for some time been asked to choose between the best of very bad options. However, in many ways America’s presence in Iraq is exacerbating the problems there, and many experts believe the best course is to withdraw.

Stantis deserves credit for being one of the few cartoonists to tackle the complexity of the situation in Iraq and the rest of the Middle East.

If only! (Maybe the occupation will get cancelled, like another HBO series, John From Cincinnati.)

I’ve always sorta liked the fable about the frog and the scorpion, and Ramirez’ art is good as usual. That doesn’t mean this cartoon is apt. As we’ve discussed in earlier installments, Iran doesn’t want a strong Iraq, but it’s not really in their best interests if it’s in utter chaos, either. I also reject the demonization of Iran - it’s not as if the Iranians are inherently evil and destructive, even though Iran’s government bears close watching. The two best aspects of our occupation in Iraq for Iran are the great propaganda opportunities it gives them (the U.S. invading a Muslim nation most of all), and obviously that our military is so tied up there.

 

IRAN

If only Iran didn’t exist, everything would be hunky-dory in Iraq! Anyone reading newspapers can hear the Bush administration’s saber-ratting to attack Iran, despite a lack of hard evidence for the charges they’ve leveled - which would not be sufficient cause for war even if true. But we’ve been over this many times.

For some more up to date posts debunking Bush and Cheney’s Iran game, check out three fairly recent posts by Glenn Greenwald:“Michael Gordon trains his stenographer weapons on Iran,” “The NYT’s growing pro-war fan club” and “The ongoing journalistic scandal at the New York Times”.

Iran does not have nuclear weapons. There is also no need to let them have them. But never let facts or common sense get in the way of alarmism.

Cox and Forkum have long been the most robust members of the “Bomb Iran!” club among cartoonists. Talking is appeasement, you see. Diplomacy versus military action is inherently a failure.

This is the only time I’ve ever seen Cox and Forkum acknowledge that Americans have died in Iraq. Of couse, they only took this radical step for a very important cause. Urging us to “Bomb Iran!”

Cox and Forkum show rare accuracy here, in a cartoon that’s nominally about Iraq. We’ve armed just about everyone. This sort of undercuts their “Bomb Iran!” campaign, though.

Is Iran an evil mullah-octopus manipulating the region?

Or is it a sewer full of cockroaches? Ramirez can’t decide!

Seriously, Iran must be considered, but the Bushies are over’selling its influence. Attacking Iran will not help Iraq, and as James Fallows has pointed out (and we’ve covered in previous installments), it could easily make things much, much worse. I remain unethused about the cockroach metaphor, but points to Ramirez for his trompe l’oeil.

 

IMMIGRATION

Conservatives cartoonists’ pencils were flying over immigration. I’ve only included a small portion. Stantis’ might be the funniest.

Mike Lester comes up with a good visual gag, but I’m not convinced it’s accurate. I suppose one could argue that Mexico benefits in a roundabout way from an amnesty bill in the United States, but it’s hardly a plot on their part!

Bok’s cartoon isn’t bad, but Democratic lawmakers weren’t nearly as hurt by all this.

Consequently, Benson’s odd but entertaining cartoon here is more accurate than Bok’s.

Umm - Lester often draws odd cartoons. At least he’s rarely cookie-cutter. Here he seems to arguing that we need to deport illegal immigrants because they’re being exploited. His usual approach has typically hinted of, well, xenophobia. It’s a novel argument he uses here, I suppose, especially since most conservatives oppose the sort of labor protections that would prevent worker exploitation.

Many conservative cartoonists went with some sort of Frankenstein or dead thing theme. Mike Shelton starts with the grave robbery…

…While Varvel goes with the animation…

And Glenn picks it up after its death. Many conservative cartoonists also went with Bush riding or flogging a dead animal.

Bok is one of the few who accurately depicts the schism among conservatives on illegal immigration…

…with Varvel being one of the others.

BUSH

It’s interesting to see conservative cartoonists, as well as conservatives in general, gradually abandon Bush. This cartoon embodies a central fiction that Peggy Noonan and many others have been pushing. As Digby and others (including the Sadly, No! gents) have put it, the attitude is: “Conservatism can never fail. It can only be failed.” Therefore, if Bush fails, it must be him, not conservatism. Of course, this is a lie. While Bush is not a Goldwater conservative in many respects, he’s absolutely a conservative, merely a dim, belligerent, authoritarian, evangelical type of conservative.

There are plenty of great posts on this in the liberal blogosphere, but if you doubt it, consider - how many Republican presidential candidates have truly distanced themselves from Bush? Few, and on few issues, such as immigration. Almost all are in favor of us staying in Iraq indefinitely, favor torture, favor a suspension of habeas corpus and unchecked executive power, favor warrantless wiretapping, favor wars of choice, favor tax cuts for the rich and corporations, favor insurance companies over citizens and favor keeping American health care roughly as it is, favor eliminating or privatizing social security and other social programs, favor cutting arts funding, favor banning abortion, favor military force over diplomacy, and favor tough talk over wise leadership. There’s a question as to how sincere they are in these beliefs, but Bush and the modern Republican party are virtually identical.

Asay apparently wishes Bush had flip-flopped his two approaches.

Gorrell questions what Bush has accomplished…

And Shelton employs a beloved cartoonist’s gag.

Eric Allie has a pretty good gag here. But let’s remember, most of the GOP don’t like Bush because of his lack of success, not because of his ideology. There are many indications that privately, many more Republicans don’t support Bush’s plan in Iraq anymore, but publicly, they’re too cowardly to act.

Many cartoonists went with a theme similar to this one.

Mike Shelton even throws in a pop culture reference.

Bush’s supporters do seem to be dwindling…

…And this innocuous Holbert cartoon is pretty funny.

Meanwhile, speaking of the true power in the executive branch, Bok seems to have been the only conservative cartoonist to target Cheney on this issue.

CONGRESS

Many, many conservative cartoonists ran with a cartoon on this general theme. However, the numbers are deceiving. “Congress” includes Republicans and not just Democrats, and the GOP Congress had horrible approval ratings as well. Still, it’s fair to say that the Dem leadership has lost popularity on top of that - and they deserve the hit after allowing that atrocious FISA bill to proceed. However, the key point is why Congress has been unpopular. A late July Washington Post-ABC poll showed:

As the president and Congress spar over war policy, both receive negative marks from the public for their handling of the situation in Iraq. But by a large margin, Americans trust Democrats rather than the president to find a solution to a conflict that remains enormously unpopular. And more than six in 10 in the new poll said Congress should have the final say on when to bring the troops home.

The president has steadfastly asserted his power as commander in chief to make decisions about the war, but his posture is now viewed by majorities of Democrats, independents and even Republicans as too inflexible. Asked whether Bush is willing enough to change policies on Iraq, nearly eight in 10 Americans said no.

Since December, the percentage seeing Bush as too rigid has increased 12 points, with the most significant change among Republicans. Just after the 2006 midterm elections and the release of the 79-point plan from the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, 55 percent of Republicans thought Bush was willing enough to change course in Iraq; in this poll, 55 percent of Republicans said he is not.

Bush’s overall approval rating equals its all-time low in Post-ABC News polls at 33 percent, with 65 percent disapproving. Fifty-two percent said they “strongly” disapprove of his job performance, the highest figure of his presidency and more than three times the 16 percent who strongly approve.

Three-quarters of Republicans approve of the way he is handling his job, but just one in 10 Democrats and three in 10 independents give him positive marks.

As this and other polling data shows, Congress has lost popularity for not sufficiently opposing Bush, not because Americans prefer Bush!

When Asay’s funny, it’s normally unintentional. Here, he accuses the GOP of being corrupt. Okay. Now he asserts, contrary to all polling data, that Americans are unhappy with Congress investigating Bush! Boo-hoo! It’s also hilarious that like many Republicans, Asay pretends that the reason the GOP isn’t popular has nothing to do with Iraq!

Only a hack or an idiot could possibly assert that Congress hasn’t discovered serious wrongdoing by the Bush administration.

Okay. Standard fare from Gorrell. However, bipartisanship and compromise are not always virtues, especially when one party is batshit crazy. There can be no compromise on essential matters such as the Constitution, for instance.

(Ahem. There should be no compromise…)

It never ceases to amaze me how conservatives believe only Democrats play politics. Perhaps they learned this as children worshipping their uncle Ronnie.

Similarly, I have no problem with anyone criticizing the corrupt William Jefferson - but it’s hiliarious how conservatives focus in on the the few Democrats guilty of comparatively straightforward corruption while completely ignoring the scores of corrupt Republicans guilty of far greater crimes. That’s not to mention the astounding hypocrisy of the many Republican sex scandal culprits. (I imagine anyone following the news can think of about a dozen without too much difficulty.)

PALESTINE

Several cartoonists went with this sort of theme…

…With Ramirez going for the chestnut. (Update: Ooh! And Iran’s a key culprit!)

Cox and Forkum could have offered a cartoon depicting the difficulties of politics in the Middle East and how few groups can be considered ideal, morally pure, or what-not. Instead, this seems to be saying, “they’re all the same” or “they all look the same.” This strikes me as not far from “bomb them all and let God sort them out.” Of course, we’ve also armed Israel to the teeth as well as some Palestinian groups. One thing I’ll agree with them on - the Bush’s policies toward that region of the world are pretty flawed.

Apparently, Cox and Forkum simply cannot conceive that any of those hundreds of prisoners might be innocent or guilty of only trivial matters. Apparently they can’t conceive that releasing such prisoners might remove a source of anger at Israel.

Chuck Asay easily breezes to one of the most offensive cartoons of this installment. Personally, I find it immoral to equate a fetus, embryo or blastula with a human being. But fine, there are those who disagree. Asay here is essentially arguing, “Sure, people are dying in Palestine (in part because of Bush’s disastrous policies), but you have no right to criticize this or the deaths in Iraq or anywhere, because you want to keep abortion legal!!!” Hey, if Asay’s pro-life, fine, but it seems it’s beyond his mental or emotional capacity to grasp the most obvious reasoning of his political opponents - or, apparently, to feel compassion for dead Palestinians (not surprising, given his other cartoons on the region). This is just obscene and utterly callous. As if you needed proof Asay is a far right nutjob, here it is.

TERRORISM

I really don’t get Benson’s point here apart from maintaining “vigilance.” Is this an “immigrants breed terrorism” argument or just plain weird?

Hey, where is bin Laden, anyway? Didn’t somebody promise to chase him to the ends of the Earth and capture him “dead or alive”? (And what the hell is up with Ron’s lips?)

Glenn McCoy deserves credit for mocking Chertoff’s irresponsible “gut” feelings about an impending terrorism attack. Of course, Bush decided most things based on his gut - or advice from Cheney and Rove.

This also deserves consideration for the most offensive. Here, Nowak demonstrates his characteristic aggression and hostility. Remember, everyone in Guantanamo is guilty, and we really should just kill them all! Just this April, 82 inmates were cleared but were still being held at Guantanamo, out of roughly 400 prisoners. More clearances have followed. As always, Nowak shows off what a fine human being he is. You know your civil rights and life will be safe in his hands.

WIRETAPS

Ahhhhhh! Give us all your civil liberties! Now! Faster! Faster, pussycat, kill, kill, KILL! I mean, blood and guts and veins in ma teeth, man!

This is the central line of bullshit peddled by all authoritarians, both the power-hungry leaders and their conformity-loving, petrified followers: if you only give us this much more power, and give up these other rights, we’ll keep you safe. Trust us.

This isn’t the first time Ramirez has fear-mongered in this fashion. But these people are not to be trusted. No government agency shoul be trusted to act wisely without oversight. And considering FISA was already a rubber’stamp court that could be sought out 72 hours or even a week after a wiretap anyway, there was never any pressing need to amend it except perhaps on tiny details. As it is, the 4th Amendment has been steadily eroded.

But trust this crew? The Bush adminstration is so incompetent, if they managed a 7-11, the till would be robbed and it would have burned to the ground long ago (and then they would have paid Halliburton 20 billion to rebuild the store with gasoline’soaked popsicle sticks).

Stantis at least seems to remember the Constitution.

He also delivers this lighter piece.

(It’s a bit odd more conservatives didn’t draw pieces on this issue. Was it because the Dems sold out to Bush, to their liking?)

THE SCOOTER LIBBY PARDON AND PLAMEGATE

I’m really sick of debunking l’affair Plame. Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame Wilson are not liars, and frankly, how dare Michael Ramirez smear a woman who dedicated her life and risked her safety for the sake of our country?!? It’s one thing to be a hack, but really, what an ass. He normally has a little more class. What, exactly, did Valerie Plame Wilson lie about, anyway? Not a surprise that Ramirez doesn’t say.

This entire affair is a litmus test for hackdom and sanity, and Ramirez fails it. The Libby champions can read Marcy Wheeler’s Anatomy of Deceit and try to rebut every goddam page with actual facts from legitimate newspapers. Otherwise, they can just shut up rather than spouting the same crap over and over and over again, regardless of how many times it’s been debunked. Case in point: Armitage leaked Valerie Plame Wilson’s identity in a gaffe. So did Rove and Libby, except deliberately. Armitage’s leak does not excuse Rove, Libby, Cheney or the other culprits. This really isn’t that hard to figure out, except for partisan hacks and true believers.

Shelton obviously drew this before Bush acted on Libby’s behalf, but he clearly favored the move.

Uh-oh! It’s Frankenstein’s monster again! This time, he’s the evil Patrick Fitzgerald! Payne drew a few cartoons on this general theme.

When in doubt, slam the Clintons! I don’t have a problem with criticizing some of Clinton’s pardons, but that doesn’t give Bush a pass. Libby’s case is also far more serious.

Umm, how does the number of pardons possibly matter? What’s at issue is whether they’re justified. I’m rather sick of the Mitt Romney school of “pardons are a sign of weakness because all people who serve time are guilty.” What crap. In this case, Libby acted, almost certainly under orders from Cheney, to destroy a woman’s life (and a national security asset) for retribution and to try to undermine a highly credible, accurate critic who exposed a central lie of the rationale for going to war (among other things). In a just world, all of the Bushies reponsible would be in jail.

Here Bok fares a bit better.

And here he aims at the most plausible culprit.

Gorrell implies that Bush caved to pressure.

Sure, Jerry, that’s why 69% of Americans opposed a pardon for Libby, to cite just one of many polls on the subject.

Stantis’ take is much odder. Notice the ‘08 sign in the lower left. Is he saying that Bush’s partial pardon of Libby hurts the GOP presidential candidates, or the opposite? All of them supported Bush’s move, or fudged their answers. None of them condemned it.

ALBERTO GONZALES

Nowak consistently contends that politicians, the media and citizens can only focus on one thing at once. (That one thing for Nowak is generally hysteria over Muslims or how evil the Democrats are.) Congress has tried to act on Iraq and other issues, but there’s been a great deal of obstruction from Republicans.

A no confidence vote would have been a symbolic gesture, but would have forced Republicans to declare their colors. That was its main benefit. Actually removing Gonzales remains much more important, though, and that’s hardly childish.

Speaking of hardcore hackdom - here Allie conflates the objects of his ire. The Nifong analogy is horribly off-base and offensive. The Duke lacrosse players were irresponsible, but not rapists. In contrast, Gonzales and the Bush team have done very nasty things to the Constitution, the rule of law and the principle of good, responsible public service.

Sigh. Since Allie is also part of the alternative reality crew, for starters here’s Gonzales’ top six lies.

Stantis at least delivers a decent joke!

PRESIDENTIAL DEBATES

Ooooooh! Real scary, kids! Reid is being controlled by the evil “netroots!” This would be a somewhat fair partisan attack by Allie you could either view as good or not, except that almost all conservatives attack the (liberal) netroots as much more liberal than the Democratic party. In fact, most of them are quite mainstream, if more liberal than the Democratic leadership. Still, there’s nothing wrong with representative democracy, and expecting politicians to be representative of their constituents!

(This cartoon predates the horrible FISA vote that raises the question of how beholden the Democratic leadership is to the netroots.)

A clever design by Benson, working off the elephant angle. Actually, the YouTube debate had some good questions. The biggest flaw of all the debates to date have been the insistence on short, sound bite answers versus more substantial responses. As for the Democratic YouTube debate specifically, The Washington Post’s Jose Antonio Vargas has a refreshingly pro-democracy piece on five myths about the YouTube debate (1.Journalists ask better questions than citizens do. 2. It doesn’t matter who asks the questions; what matters is that the question is asked. 3.YouTube is for kids. 4.The debate was just another town hall meeting. 5.”Anyone can participate in this debate.”)

Perhaps it’s just that, in another similarity to Bush, the GOP candidates fear dealing with the actual public, unfiltered.

Yeah, that question actually was asked of candidates on MTV back in the day. However, the YouTube debate was much more serious. Also, really, if Gary Varvel thinks a crucial segment of mainstream political reporters aren’t a shallow, vapid, superficial bunch with horrible judgment and little nose for actual reporting, he obviously doesn’t read The Daily Howler.

Common for Nowak, he attacks but gives no reason. Bill O’Reilly’s attacks on Daily Kos are utter BS, lifting comments from threads and claiming they’re representative. Crooks and Liars has many clips on this, but here’s Chris Dodd challenging O’Reilly on his own words.

GOP CANDIDATES

Not a bad design by Henry Payne, but as we discussed earlier, most of the GOP candidates have hardly trashed Bush. In the debate at the Reagan library, they barely even mentioned him!

Ken Catalino’s cartoon is more accurate. Some of the GOP candidates have criticized how Iraq has been handled, but almost all are for staying.

McCAIN

Many cartoonists drew a “McCain in peril” cartoon…

…With Shelton’s probably being the most creative.

Jerry Holbert correctly hones in on one of the chief reasons the GOP base doesn’t like McCain.

Meanwhile, Ken Catalino apparently thinks it’s a kindler, gentler McCain this time around. If he’s talking about his poll numbers, I agree, and McCain does seem lower energy as well. However, most of the resistance he’s gotten from the GOP has been for bucking the party line on torture and immigration.

ROMNEY

Wait a minute! Who’s the transformer? McCain or Romney?

Really, ya need a scorecard to keep up with Romney’s flip-flops. In a crowded field of dissembling, opportunistic scallywags, he may be the worst of the lot - slightly less horrible than Giuliani and some others on actual positions, but far worse on the “authenticity” scale reporters always love.

GIULIANI

Shelton goes to the heavens to depict one of Giuliani’s major problems with the base.

Catalino’s cartoon is pretty odd. Is he saying that Giuliani is a real Republican, while McCain isn’t? But Giuliani is a drunken lush? I suspect Catalino came up with his punchline first, liked it, and really didn’t think through what a bad metaphor it was.

Varvel’s pretty good here.

FRED THOMPSON

Payne accurately captures (as have other conservative cartoonists before him) the biggest appeal of Thompson - he’s not the other guys. Really, the base isn’t happy with any of their front-runners among those declared, and Thompson and Gingrich are lurking. Thompson really should just declare, though. It’s getting pretty silly.

Payne also captures the key selling point of Thompson besides “not the other guy.” Conservatives, many of them authoritarians, love a strong daddy figure. As with Reagan and Bush, they want the image of a tough guy much more than an actual good leader. (Similarly, Giuliani talks really tough but is an idiot on policy - more on that in a later post.) Thompson may be a nice enough guy, but in many ways he’s a fraud, nothing like the image he’s selling and his fans are buying.

Okay, I’m with Fairrington here. Ladies, can you explain this one? Does anyone actually think basset-hound Thompson is sexy, apart from his former paramours and the GOP faithful, err, hopeful? Belle Waring at Crooked Timber has a funny post on this one, “On The Upside, He Looks Less Like Skeletor Than Giuliani Does.” My theory is that middle-aged guys such as Chris Matthews go on and on about what a stud “Aqua Velva” Fred is out of similar hopeful projection - they’d like to think that they’re still studs. (Make up your own impotence joke here.)

DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATES

Allie really crafts a masterpiece of propaganda here, hitting about every smear. Feminizing Edwards, de-feminizing Hillary Clinton and making her a monster, infantilizing Obama. That’s efficient hackdom.

The Clinton-Obama scuffle has been much discussed (with Krauthammer’s piece on it its own masterpiece of neocon, partisan propaganda). Two of the best pieces I read on it were from Hilzoy and from Ezra Klein:

As far as I can tell, the actual dispute here stems from a central ambiguity, followed by some opportunism. I heard that question and assumed it was asking whether, in contrast to the Bush administration, you would open negotiations, and possibly have meetings, with the heads of countries like Iran. I’m pretty sure that’s how Obama understood it. But Hillary heard that, saw an opening, and pounced. And Obama, being a smart politician, didn’t back down, and has instead used the spat to tie her rhetoric to Bush’s rhetoric, with which it shares some similarities.

As usual, we see a political attack designed to eliminate nuance and tarnish an opponent rather than an attempt to elevate the discussion.

OBAMA

I guess Allie is hoping for “You’re a traitor!” and “Nuke ‘em ’til they glow, then shoot them in the dark!” instead. Notice the development of the meme that GOP hacks smear every Democratic candidate with - they’re inauthentic.

Nowak goes with a similar tact, although this is pretty ineffectual. Has Obama been selling himself as “jes folks,” the way Bush did and Thompson is trying? Nowak just seems to be recycling an unoriginal attack, target be damed. Everyone knows only commies and homos eat arugula! (For more on this strategy, check out Geoffrey Nunberg’s book, Talking Right: How Conservatives Turned Liberalism into a Tax-Raising, Latte-Drinking, Sushi-Eating, Volvo-Driving, New York Times-Reading, Body-Piercing, Hollywood-Loving, Left-Wing Freak Show.)

Umm… this also seems to be a straight-up partisan attack, aimed to appeal to Asay’s audience but evoking a “yeah, so?” from liberals and most independents. Yes, Obama is a man of faith, and his faith leads him to support views diametrically opposed to Asay’s. Of course, invoking God doesn’t make Obama right any more than it makes Asay and his crew right. But I read this cartoon and think, “damn straight, and I’m voting for him over any Republican!”

Asay packs a lot of propaganda in four panels here! Let’s see. He says withdrawing from Iraq to concentrate on the “global war on terrrorism” is cowardice. We’ve dispensed with the “talking with our enemies” BS already, but let’s add that diplomacy is a success of foreign policy, not a failure. It’s amusing to call Pakistan our “friend.” It is an ally, but Musharref did seize power in a coup and the country isn’t exactly free. That’s fine for foreign policy realists, but Asay just loves a black and white view of the world, and it’s amusing how he views dictators differently depending on the Bush administration’s stamp of approval. Finally, as we’ve been over many times, Muslim extremists are not going to take over the U.S. (For more on this, see “Lock Up the Womenfolk, the Muslims are Comin’!” Glenn Greenwald’s “The Islamists are coming” and Johann Hari’s New Republic piece on the National Review cruise. Fear of Muslims and brown people - it’s more than an attitude, it’s a way of life!)

I had to look up what the hell Glenn McCoy was squawking about. As I suspected, it was simple common sense: “Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., told Planned Parenthood Tuesday that sex education for kindergarteners, as long as it is “age-appropriate,” is “the right thing to do.”" Obama further was pushing for an opt-out policy for squeamish parents for his proposed bill, which would also debunk the “stork” story. Oh, innocence lost!

This really isn’t that new. In my elementary school, we got the talk in 6th grade, and parents had to sign a permission slip. For at least a decade, many state school systems have had a similar approach, but much less explicit, in first grade or so. The areas your bathing suit covers” is about as frank as is usually gets. The purpose is help inform young children about kidnappers and molesters and how to know when something’s wrong. To take a page from Rove’s playbook - why does Glenn McCoy support child molesters?

This may be the only time Cox and Forkum will ever oppose bombing a Muslim nation. A moment of silence, please.

Henry Payne earns big style points for invoking Dr. Strangelove. Obama has claimed he was misrepresented on his Pakistan statements in the press (his actual remarks are here). As reported, it sounded as if Obama was trying to out-macho his opponents with some reckless bravado. Of course, if we’re going to bomb a foreign land, it might be good to to actually hit the one where bin Laden is versus a country that didn’t attack us. That alone wouldn’t make Obama’s policy wise, though, only more sane than Bush’s. If you read the actual speech, however, it’s much more sensible than it was depicted. Some bloggers, such as Oliver Willis, think Obama’s core points are quite sound. Willis is dead on about the hypocrisy of the right on this, since they’ve been urging for more bombings throughout the Middle East!

Josh Marshall also has an interesting take on Obama’s recent political skirmishes. There’s room for disagreement with Obama, and for fair criticism, but I think this has been overhyped.

What amuses me is both how some conservatives hypocritically pounced while several “serious” pundits praised Obama for being newly “serious” on foreign policy because they thought he was being pugnacious! As Glenn Greenwald observes:

The Number One Rule of the bi-partisan Foreign Policy Community is that America has the right to invade and attack other countries at will because American power is inherently good and our role in the world is to rule it though the use of superior military force. Paying homage to that imperialistic orthodoxy is a non-negotiable pre-requisite to maintaining Good Standing and Seriousness Credentials within the Foreign Policy Community.

Wait, this is in comparison to Commander Codpiece? Hahaha! Steve Benen unpacks the White House’s response to Obama.

This is balance for Ramirez, and I suppose he deserves some credit for it, most of all for acknowledging that Tancredo is a nutjob. It’s sad that Ramirez thinks not using nukes is nutty, too - it’s one thing to disagree, but sorry, it’s a respectable, very sane position. The only argument I’d make is it’s insane to use them, but politically perhaps not wise to broadcast that to other countries. (The counter-argument is that our nuclear stockpile is the biggest impetus for many other countries to get nuclear weapons as well.)

Obama slipped up referring to the “president” of Canada, but this is a minor gaffe worthy of a few jokes, and that’s it. I seriously doubt Obama doesn’t know Canada has a prime minister; this was a verbal gaffe versus actual ignorance. Predictably, the rightwingers are running with this. However, despite the ridiculous claims from them (and Howard Kurtz), this isn’t remotely similar to Bush’s aggressive, defensive ignorance and frat-boy immaturity in this clip. Nor does it compare with Bush not knowing that Iraq contained Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds until January 2003, several months after he had already decided to invade.

HILLARY

It’s time to start the Hillary smear machine! How far back should we go? Hmm, why not dredge up a discredited smear from 2001? No rightwing talking point ever dies!

Or we can go back to the Clinton presidency itself! Gosh, yeah, what horrible years those were! Cox and Forkum’s pitch can only work with hardcore Republicans, because most Americans remember the Clinton years with fondness, all the more so after Bush.

Or we can go back to the 70s! We’ve been over this before, but allowing tax cuts to expire as legislated is not “raising” taxes. Furthermore, raising taxes isn’t inherently bad. The question is whether the tax burden is fair. On the rich, it’s currently far too low, and repealing the Reagan tax cuts is long overdue. (For more on these issues, see the post “Class Warfare.”)

Or we can go back to Hillary’s student days! She’s a commie, I tell you! Or an anarchist! Anyway, she’s bad, former Goldwater girl or not! (Really, doesn’t this smack of desperation?)

Catalino economically combines multiple attacks in one cartoon. Hillary is a panderer, and showed a hint of cleavage only because of this. She’s also a dominatrix into S&M. And Bill is a horndog. Really, couldn’t he called her a lesbian too, while he’s at it?

Wow! Another transformer! Collect the entire set! What’s funny is that the right thinks Hillary is a hardcore liberal. Of the three Democratic frontrunners, she’s easily the least liberal. She’s also got the position closest to George W. Bush on the biggest issue of the day, Iraq.

EDWARDS

This attack will never die. It will never die because far too many political reporters are shallow and most don’t like Edwards, and because rightwingers lack originality and don’t like Edwards. It’s also plays into the consistent rightwing tact of feminizing men and de-feminizing women (as often dissected by Digby and others).

Hey, if Edwards is helping the poor, I could give a damn about what he does with his hair. I suspect he’s done more to combat poverty than the entire GOP presidential field combined.

SICKO AND HEALTH CARE

Similar to the Edwards attacks, Moore has done more to raise discussion of health care in America than any GOP candidate - and certainly has done more to fix it than Chuck Asay or any conservative cartoonist. Asay accuses Moore of not really caring, and of attacking other people. In contrast, the defining tone of Sicko is its compassion. It’s hard not to be moved watching it, regardless of one’s politics. Who today hasn’t experienced or doesn’t know someone with a health care horror story? You’d have to be pretty rich or cloistered not to be familiar with some of the problems. Asay also ignores that Moore gave $10,000 to one of his harshest critics for his wife’s health care. A stunt? Partially, perhaps. But the guy’s wife still got health care, and Moore did it. The same goes for dozens of people for whom he’s advocated.

How many ways can we try to dismiss Moore? Let’s see, there’s a ridiculous attack that he’s not compassionate…

…Or he’s a hack and a liar! Coming from Paul Nowak, this is especially funny, and Nowak serves up his characteristic attack - general smear bolstered by lies. I highly doubt Nowak bothered to actually watch the movie! Moore cites plenty of statistics, and has gone into much more detail on his site. Bob Somerby has pointed out that if anything, Moore undersells his case in how much cheaper the better health care is in other countries, but Moore’s to be applauded anyway. I don’t always like Moore’s style, but I’m really sick of hatchet jobs on him, such as the CNN piece that disingenuously cites elective surgery to try to rebut Moore! Nowak’s got nuthin’ but his hostility, as usual.

Benson’s attack is that the film is just empty and brainless. I doubt she’s seen it, either. Try selling that line of crap to anyone facing a health care crisis.

Meanwhile, Brian Fairrington points out that Moore is fat! Wow! Clever! Actually, Moore has reportedly lost 20-30 pounds, and good for him.

Allie goes for socialism! Aaaaah! You know something must be bad when conservatives demonize it! Why bother looking at those other countries?

Say, come to think of it, who knew that Canada, France and the United Kingdom were all socialist, as Allie must be arguing?

Wow! This is a weak argument, especially for anyone who’s seen Sicko or knows a Canadian. Their system isn’t perfect, but what’s so funny here is that Asay quotes stats and then fabricates a reason to dismiss the Canadian system. Personally, considering the waits I and others typically experience, I’d gladly go for free (and slightly higher taxes). Since Asay didn’t bother to see the film, here’s a clip from the Canadian waiting room section.

The one thing I didn’t like about Moore going to Cuba is I knew he’d be slammed for it. However, his critics will always manufacture something. Still, Moore’s main point is that America hasn’t taken care of its own, and even though Cuba is a repressive regime (and Moore doesn’t claim it isn’t), it still does a better job at basic health care than we do. Stunt though it may have been, Moore also got health care for several people that really needed it, so unless his critics want to pony up for all future medical expenses for those folks, they can just keep quiet.

Creating a single-payer, universal heath care system? Demolishing private health insurance? Where do we sign up? As Moore has repeatedly argued, heath care should not be in the hands of insurance companies.

There are stupid arguments and there are really stupid arguments. Rational adults can disagree about which category Lester’s cartoon falls in. Are you kidding? Documentaries generally don’t make much money. Moore made a doc about health care, not exactly a sexy subject, and it’s done great box office for a doc. It’s not as if the MSM has done enough on the subject! Hey, why don’t we fund the NEA properly and have more free or subsidized arts, including films? Then maybe Lester can have his wish and see it for free!

This is also funny because when Roger and Me came out, Moore went to great lengths to insure that all his investors, and all the people laid off in Flint, Michigan, could go see the film for free. He also aired Fahrenheit 9/11 as a special pay-per-view event in 2004 that he knew would eliminate it from Oscar eligibility, despite the fact that he would almost certainly have won and that would have gotten him still more money. (As it is, it was one of the top-performing three docs of all time as of this year. I don’t know where Sicko falls at the moment.)

I’m assuming Payne is cartooning about his home state of Michigan. I don’t know the details, but he conveys his point of view effectively.

Meanwhile, Gary Varvel again demonstrates a flash of compassion that may get him drummed from the conservative club. Mental illness and homelessness are both problems, but sadly, they often overlap as well. It’s hard to give care to people who will refuse it, and many facilities are not inviting or safe. Meanwhile, facilities out here in Los Angeles and elsewhere are stretched far too thin and others have closed. Sicko covers some of this as well, and there are more articles and personal stories I’ve heard than I can cover here. Paul Wellstone’s mental heath bill, that Bill Frist promised he’d move through, has yet to progress.

THE ENVIRONMENT AND LIVE EARTH

Would you be shocked to learn that many conservative cartoonists went with this general theme to attack Live Aid? These are the same people who like to see Al Gore travel in horse and buggy, Amish’style, across the country to give his lectures. How ridiculous. (And conservatives, you’re still not hip.)

Gorrell captures the heat. (When I was down in South Carolina and Georgia recently, it was 106° - and it had gotten up to 120° in their “heat index.” It has to be dangerous for anyone who has to work outdoors.)

Glenn McCoy obviously hasn’t seen An Inconvenient Truth. There’s a difference between a hot summer and a general trend, between normal variation and long-lasting climate change. The summer is hot. Duh. Granted, there’s comedic license, but has anyone actually seen a weatherman freak out? Are people in general freaking out? There are plently of folks who are concerned, but they have good cause to be.

Henry Payne hates any sort of regulation of the auto industry. Tough. Fuel consumption and pollution are major issues. At least Payne is entertaining, though.

If you were wondering, count Nowak among the wingnut global warming deniers. Although he’s attacking Newsweek specifically, the science is overwhelming. There is no substantial debate in the scientific community about whether climate change (or “man-made” climate change) exists. There are policy debates about the best courses of action. And there’s a political struggle centered on whether the GOP will acknowledge reality. They’re fighting a rearguard action, just as cigarette companies did (and do).

Stantis delivers the funniest of the bunch on the subject.

GAS PRICES

I’ve got no problem with anyone criticizing ethanol subsidies, but it’s a real stretch to blame them for gas prices!

Varvel’s much more on target. Out here in California, there’s a serious refinery bottleneck. Of course, it’s not as oil companies ever try to lower prices, anyway.

I think the customer here should have bought a more fuel-efficient car, but I’m all for this program! Well, except why should CEOs get the fun? And shouldn’t more CEOs be slapped more often?

CHINA’S UNSAFE PRODUCTS

Cartoons abounded on this subject, but Benson’s is nicely creepy.

Catalino’s is also well designed.

And Varvel’s is pretty damn original and funny!

PUTIN

So is Putin mourning the Cold War?

Or heating it up?

Not a bad gag, but the definitive Vader is Cheney!

Speak of the Devil! Funny ’cause it’s true!

Boy, conservative cartoonists liked Putin’s eyes. (Russians laughed over Bush’s “I looked into his soul” bit.) Ramirez sees Putin as desiring the resurgence of the Soviet Union, or at least its power.

Varvel seems a bit more on target if alarmist on Putin desiring new nuke positions.

And Stantis is fairly funny for a cartoon about nuclear holocaust. Personally, I don’t trust Bush’s judgment, nor do I trust ex-KGB official Putin.

KARL ROVE LEAVING

I’m sure more of these will be coming. Cox and Forkum weren’t the only team to go with the Moby Dick metaphor Rove supplied himself. (For more on Rove, here’s a good series of articles by Dan Froomkin.)

Several cartoonists went with this angle.

Bok’s cartoon is pretty good. I doubt Rove will ever tell the true story, though. The truth will come out over time, perhaps after many of the players are dead, and certainly out of power. Rove has made many enemies over the years, and they’re less afraid of him now, but they’re still awfully cautious. A hefty advance and an outbreak of conscience years down the line could make for some fascinating reading.

Okay, yes, Rove has exploited Bush, as has Cheney, but Bush has wanted it that way. Also, Bush is not the talent in the relationship, and the Colonel and Elvis didn’t screw over the entire country or start an unnecessary war. (But perhaps that’s being too literal, huh? )

Ramirez thinks Rove got off scott-free, and he’s got a point.

Meanwhile, Varvel thinks Rove took the arrows for Bush. In some ways, sure, since Bush is far more culpable than any of his handlers would ever care to admit. However, this cartoon fits Gonzales more accurately. Sadly, I think Ramirez is closer to the truth. It’s not that Rove isn’t guilty, it’s that he hasn’t served jail time - yet.

THAT DAMNED MEDIA

It’s more than fair to expect The New Republic to report matters accurately, and TNR correspondent Scott Beauchamp’s credibility is an issue. Unfortunately, some of the Army’s statements are also questionable. It seems clear Beauchamp lied about one element of a story, mocking a disfigured woman, which he now claims occurred in Kuwait, not Iraq. Still, it’d be wise to keep the whole affair in perspective (and rightwing bloggers are still a pretty sad bunch). As to Allie’s charge that The New Republic deliberately was trying to smear the troops, TNR was and continues to be one of the most hawkish publications out there.

Here’s a radical idea - how about a commitment to accuracy in all reporting?

I’m not buying Holbert’s point. Over at Slate, Jack Shafer has been writing up a storm on Murdoch but he might have put it best here:

I oppose Murdoch’s bid because I like the Wall Street Journal the way it is-I don’t love it-and don’t trust him to stay the course. And I certainly don’t trust him to make the Journal better. Journalistic excellence is not in his nature. Exploiting his properties for political gain is.

Bok seems more on target. Several cartoonists went with a similar gag.

Gorrell’s cartoon is pretty well designed. We’ve discussed the Fairness Doctrine before. I have mixed feelings about it, but I always think of Edward Murrow inviting conservative fear-monger Joseph McCarthy to have equal time on his show after he delivered an editorial denouncing him. I don’t buy that the media was worse under the Fairness Doctrine. There is a First Amendment issue, but there’s also the issue that bandwidth is limited, and they’re the people’s airwaves. Similar issues center on limits on media consolidation in markets (and there should be greater limits). I’m not sold for or against the Fairness Doctrine just yet, but the ideals of fairness and equal time are pretty good, and it seems to be mainly an issue of clear, common sense rules and good execution.

Umm, then why is the Fairness Doctrine not law again, if Democrats are such evil, controlling hypocrites? Personally, I’d love it if rightwing talk radio put more focus on being accurate, but that’s never really been their priority. (Perhaps a fact-checking standard would work better? Nawh, the’d be out of business immediately.) Allie is a hardcore rightwing hack, as is his right. But it’s a bit funny to see someone who constantly smears others complaining about being stifled. It’s also funny because Bush, the GOP and other authoritarians that Allie champions have consistently tried to shut down all debate.

Needless to say, Paul Nowak does not read Media Matters for America (or The Daily Howler or a dozen other good media sites). It’s funny but not surprising Nowak leaves off Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, and Murdoch’s empire of newspapers. Of course, the MSM is not liberal, and if they were they wouldn’t have delivered such unquestioning cheerleading for the war, or attacked Clinton, Gore and Kerry so viciously and inaccurately while fawning so much over Reagan and George W. Bush (in the earlier going). NPR and PBS in particular have always received superlative marks for both accuracy and lack of bias from viewers of all stripes. It’s bad form on Nowak’s part to deny reality and then blame that on the media. But then, as Stephen Colbert said, “reality has a well-known liberal bias.”

Asay is a tired hack. Here he makes his weary charge that the media isn’t sufficiently hysterical about terrorism and just doesn’t care. Really, of all the targets to pick, he goes with PBS?!?

Nowak peddles similar BS. Yeah, the media is callous and apparently not sufficiently bigoted for Nowak’s tastes. I always wonder how much these guys believe this crap. With Allie, Asay and Nowak, I think the irrational hatred is pretty sincere.

This cartoon could go up in the Iraq category, but what makes it fit here is the contention that the media is but a tool of the Democrats (hahahaahaha!) and that things are going great in Iraq, but the media just won’t report that. How can we expect to solve the problems in Iraq when 30% of the country and many of those with the most power refuse to even honestly discuss what’s going on? There’s different perspectives, and then there’s the denial of facts.

ISLAMOPHOBIA

Asay typically depicts forsaking bigotry as entering a police state, yet often argues for the virtues of a police state under a nice conservative authoritarian leader, who of course can be trusted.

Fear the Muslims! The Soviet Union is gone, and the Mexicans aren’t everywhere, and we need a new boogeyman!

I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve seen this theme drawn by conservative cartoonists. It’s always appalling. Give us your civil liberties, or die! Oh, and it’s all the fault of Democrats! Really, it’s hard to top this for alarmism and sheer vileness.

Cox and Forkum use a rare splash of color in this one. Islamism is everywhere! In Turkey! In Britain! On the land! In the skies!

Nowak delivers one of his rare funny cartoons. Let’s see how the channel actually is.

THE SUPREME COURT

There are many good posts on the Supreme Court’s decision to essentially overturn Brown versus the Board of Education, but this scathingly sarcastic one by Mark Graber is pretty good at capturing the injustice and obscenity:

By comparison, on this history, George Wallace became the person who best understood that the central principle of BROWN v. BOARD OF EDUCATION was that no “innocent” white person could ever be harmed in the effort to secure racial equality and any person of color who claimed covert race discrimination would have to produce a smoking gun the equivalent of the smoking guns which convinced the Burger Court that the Alabama Constitutional Convention of 1900ish was committed to race supremacy. Recognizing that George Wallace and Strom Thurmond are the true heirs to Martin Luther King, Justice Roberts and his allies feel the need to direct lectures on BROWN to the “bad” civil rights movement in the hope that we may be converted.

There is, of course, something deeply hypocritical about persons who, at best can be called conscientious objectors during the Civil Rights movement, lecturing the actual participants on the true meaning of their cause. But if one remembers that Roberts and Alito were probably hand picked by Dick Chaney (sic), hypocrisy is exactly what we should expect of them.

Those damn dirty hippies in the colleges and those damn slacker kids!

This Payne cartoon is pretty funny. I’m sympathetic to the needs of teachers to maintain basic discipline, but it can be a tricky balance since “students do not leave their rights at the schoolhouse gate.” (I actually took an elective on student rights in high school. Interesting stuff.) My main take on the “bong hits” case is that the principal’s ego got involved, he over-reacted, and could have resolved matters with less fuss.

This Payne cartoon ain’t bad, either.

TAXES

The Democrats are commies, I tell you! Really, it’s hard to take Allie seriously sometimes.

Oh, and if you you believe in fair taxes and universal health care, you’re a wuss. This is one of those cartoons where Allie isn’t lecturing everyone to shut up and do what they’re told by Bush and other conservative authoritarians.

Here, Allie trots out the old chestnut that a higher tax rate, let’s say on the super-wealthy and corporations, would hurt the economy. Needless to say, history and economic studies (apart from those generated by conservative think tanks) don’t support Allie on this.

The super-wealthy will remain super-wealthy under even the most extreme tax rate (say the 88% on the top bracket under Eisenhower, although without crunching the numbers that strikes me as excessive). Let them pay their fair share, which is much more than they’re paying now. (See the “Class Warfare” post linked above for more detailed numbers on the growing inequity of wealth.)

I don’t buy that Benson’s premise is true, but this a funny gag.

Chip Bok’s is also pretty funny.

It’s true that Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid make a huge chunk of the budget. However, the Pentagon’s budget is currently about 440 billion per year, not counting those special expenditures for Iraq and Afghanistan. We could easily afford good social services in the U.S., but conservatives are terrified of that ever happening.

HOUSING

Gorrell’s pretty funny here.

And Ramirez ain’t bad either.

NASA

I really don’t see why Nowak is taking pot shots at NASA. Being an astronaut was and remains one of the most dangerous jobs around. The only reason for caution in this case is because it’d be really good if the astronauts didn’t die on re-entry as has occurred before. Sorry that offends Nowak’s sense of machismo.

NASA has challenged the accuracy of the study claiming astronauts have been drunk on duty, but it’s such a good comedic situation I can’t fault any cartoonist for running with it. Ramirez is pretty good here…

…As is Stantis here…

…and here.

THE MINNESOTA BRIDGE COLLAPSE

Let’s start with the obnoxious set first. Damn, this is offensive. Watch Bush’s press conference the day the bridge collapsed. Bush spoke for about 80 seconds on the bridge before shifting into a talk about pending legislation and an attack on the Democrats. Great spirit of bipartisanship and compassion there by your leader, Eric Allie! But Reid is the problem? Shouldn’t the President of the United States set a higher tone? Conservative hacks will never call him on that (and neither did Howard Kurtz, actually, who accused Dems of going partisan first!).

Asay flings feces of the same shade. Yeah, infrastructure is a problem across the U.S., because so many states and cities punt on maintenance. But it’s monstrous to accuse the Democrats of not caring about human life, only raising taxes for apparently the nefarious purpose of - fixing bridges? More conservative projection from Asay - on the callousness, at least.

Nowak dives straight into the gutter as well.

Stantis captures the anxiety many folks are feeling.

Meanwhile, most cartoonists had the taste to go the route of this good Lisa Benson cartoon.

SPORTS

Conservative cartoonists drew a great deal of sports cartoons! This Ramirez cartoon has a good design.

Umm… this is another odd Lester cartoon. Why the buffalo? The only explanation I see is the obvious one, that Lester thinks it’s cause to celebrate that Vick has been uncovered as a criminal. But Lester hasn’t liked him for some time.

Glenn McCoy’s cartoon ain’t bad.

And Ramirez’ piece here has a nice visual punch.

Several cartoonists went with the asterisk theme, but I thought Holbert’s was the best of them.

Bok delivers a nice cartoon.

And Ramirez offers a great summing up.

Finally, Varvel’s cartoon just cracks me up.

MISCELLANEOUS

Gosh, isn’t the point of weapons inspectors that we don’t trust North Korea? The reason they have nuclear capability at all is due to the blunders of the Bush administration, most of all their terribly sophisticated “let’s not talk to them” school of diplomacy.

Christian saints hated homos, so you should, too! If you guessed that Asay was completely talking from his ass about this supposed legislation, you’d be right.

Asay has more of a point here, in that several Dems are downplaying their support for gay rights - at least gay marriage - in public for fear of alienating voters. That’s a fair charge for some, but not all. Meanwhile, as to “gay unions” being “unhealthy,” Asay is a homophobic dinosaur.

Sorry, this cartoon is even stupider than Glenn McCoy’s bashing Obama for kindergarten sex ed earlier. McCoy was mainly being a hack, while Asay is peddling his usual brand of dim-witted argument as folksy wisdom. This just isn’t an issue. Most if not all counties require a parental signature for teachers to teach sex ed to kids, at least before high school. Other school districts allow parents to opt-out. But does Asay really think teachers are so bad, so warped, that they can’t be trusted to teach kids about sex? Or is he scared that they will teach kids accurately about sex? This is really simple. If Asay and his ilk want to teach their kids about sex, they can go ahead, and fill out the appropriate paperwork to prevent anyone else from bespoiling their little darlings with knowledge of carnal affairs. However, many parents are extremely uncomfortable with this subject, and are happy to pawn it off! I find it surprising Asay isn’t aware of this. He also seems to belong to the parenting school that thinks one can actually keep kids cloistered. Teach them yourself or they’ll learn it on their own. The problems with sex ed in this country isn’t teachers, it’s squeamish parents, as it always has been. (Check out the teen pregnancy rates in Texas, with their lousy abstinence only sex ed courses and purity pledges.)

(Update: I just noticed that “Laura Liberal” has a copy of Heather has Two Mommies on her desk and Today’s Word is “abortion.” In addition to his general ignorance of sex education guidelines, Asay’s worried that teachers won’t denouce homosexuality and abortion with sufficient brimstone. If you look at the blackboard, he’s also accusing the teacher of proselytizing for Democratic presidential candidates - while conservative woman serves dinner to her family. Asay continually reveals more about his own bizarre regressive weltanschauung than on any issue of the day. He’s a fascinating anthropological subject, really.)

Okay, Asay is full of crap here as well. Maybe his liberals are angry b