Feb 28, 2013

I Will Never Be Good...and That's Not Bad

Tim Jackson, 2/27/13:
So...the GOP is "gonna wreck" the spending cuts? Or maybe the sequester itself?

Does that make any sense at all? Or did Jackson just get so caught up in his metaphor that he forgot Ralph was the hero of that movie?

Nyuk Nyuk Nyuk Nyuk

Ed Gamble, 2/27/13:
And the third whammy is...businesses want customers?

That's a whammy?

I think Ed lost sight of his plans midway through today's cartoon, that's what I think.

Over Macho Grande

Scott Stantis, 2/27/13:
The sequester is a life-saving mechanism which needs to be triggered -- it won't happen automatically and it wasn't specifically designed, two years ago, to do maximum damage to the priorities of both major American political parties in order to force them to make the deal that they subsequently failed to do.

In other news, it recently rained on the sun.

Feb 27, 2013

The Cycle of Stupid

Ed Hall, 2/26/13:
If only there were some kind of alternative to a society of people all commuting individually in inefficient automobiles -- some kind of mass transit to move large numbers of people at once!

Sadly, such a thing is only a dream.

You Gonna Take That From HIM?

Bob Gorrell, 2/26/13:
Actually, over the past four years, federal spending is as close to flat as it's ever been. Sure, there were two big wars, an unfunded Medicaid expansion, and the bailout of the entire financial sector before that -- but, even there, the big problem was the massive drop in revenue (from a certain president's tax cuts in 2001 and 2002) that drove up those deficits.

But let's not let the facts get in the way of a cartoon or anything....

Feb 26, 2013

The Great Red-Carpet-ivator

Henry Payne, 2/25/13:
Daniel Day-Lewis never drops character.

Either that, or Lincoln has had some bad experiences with theaters in the past....

Those Three Dirty Words

Bob Gorrell, 2/25/13:
Governments should obtain funds through some other means than taxation -- perhaps piracy? -- and just sit on those funds, without using them to do anything.

Thus, the ideal government is Smaug.

Feb 25, 2013

Slightly Unattractive People ARE Evil!

Lisa Benson, 2/23/13:
California needs more money to cover its responsibilities -- so, logically, it must need to raise taxes.

A bold statement for Benson!

Pry the Chardonnay from His Cold, Dead Hands

Mike Lester, 2/22/13:
Any form of restrictions on private gun ownership -- for example, of fully automatic weapons -- will immediately lead to the complete outlawing of guns and then to an huge criminal boom as citizens make "bathtub Uzis" and go to speakeasy gun ranges.

And, since fully automatic weapons have been tightly regulated since 1934, this all happened three generations ago.

Not Even Touching the Dark-Skinned Snake Charmer Imagery

Michael Ramirez, 2/22/13:
As we all know from basic economics, when you reduce demand for a particular good (say, for example, crude oil), by providing alternatives (such as solar power), then the price will automatically go...up?

Anyone want to buy Ramirez a used copy of Wealth of Nations so he can bone up?

The Subtle Homoeroticism of Wrestling

Chuck Asay, 2/22/13:
Everyone else's go-to sport to complain about the IOC was rhythmic gymnastics -- which, we must admit, is hand-selected as both easily mockable and perfect for cartooning -- but Asay, always the rebel, prefers to complain about the existence of badminton, or perhaps tennis, which have the disadvantage of being real competitive sports that lots of people like and know how to play.

He also does it about a week after everyone else, but this kind of greatness just cannot be rushed!

Lowering the Boom Times

John Cole, 2/22/13:
Gosh, maybe we should have invested in some high-speed rail and alternative fuel technologies when we had time, shouldn't we?

Feb 22, 2013

Oh, That TEA Must Be Bitter Indeed

Clay Bennett, 2/21/13:
When there's no actual media stories that you feel like cartooning about, there's always the other option: just draw something defaming your usual political punching bag, call it a day, and hit the links.

Feb 21, 2013

Now He's Not Saying They're All Savages, But....

Chuck Asay, 2/20/13:
There are so many murders among African-Americans because they are all godless heathens.

Here, let me pull out the important chart for you:

In case you can't read the tiny type, the ethnic group with the highest rate of reported church attendance was "Non-Hispanic Black."

Hm. Must be something else killing all of those people....

He's Shoveling SOMETHING, All Right

Terry Wise, 2/20/13:
Global warming means it's never cold anywhere ever again!

Where We're Going, We Won't Need....

Scott Stantis, 2/20/13:
Stantis would be happy to live without roads, police, firefighters, the military, clean food & water, and Chicago's mass-transit system -- just try him!

Once again, the right-wingers are straight-out calling for anarchy.

Feb 20, 2013

Price Controls Now!

Lisa Benson, 2/19/13:
Increased demand for a good in limited supply -- for example, from increased economic activity -- will lead to a price rise for that good until demand is suppressed enough to match supply.

Why does Benson hate the free market so very, very much?

Feb 18, 2013

The Person That Turns Over the Most Rocks Wins the Game

Rob Smith, Jr., 2/16/13:
There is a crisis, but Smith won't tell you any more than that it exists.

But, boy howdy, it's a Big Red Crisis!

Not Wind Like a Watch, But Wind Like the Air

Chuck Asay, 2/15/13:
It's an unconscionable travesty that honest, hard-working rate-payers have to pay money for electricity generated by wind, when electricity generated from burning coal and oil is utterly free!

No, wait....

Some People Think They Can Outsmart Me

Kerry Waghorn, 2/15/13:
The newest playable character in Team Fortress 2: Secretary of State John Kerry!

No, seriously -- what else could the stack of hats mean?

What This Country Needs Is a MAXIMUM Wage

Gary Varvel, 2/15/13:
I assume that Varvel and his fellow newsroom staff at the Indianapolis Star are voluntarily cutting their wages to the federal minimum in order to save jobs, strengthen the economy, and decrease poverty and government dependency, right?

Because what kind of hypocrite would cartoon something like this under any other circumstances?

Feb 15, 2013

The Worst Thing About the Government Is That It Exists

Jerry Holbert, 2/14/13:
Ah! For the dream of a government that doesn't take in any revenue or spend any money!

What do we call that again"

Oh, yes -- anarchy.

Please Help -- Can Only Afford One Bullet

Steve Breen, 2/14/13:
Oh, no! The biggest military in the world might actually get slightly smaller -- but still much larger than any two or three other countries put together -- when two wars end!

How horrible!

The Slipperiest Slope of All

Terry Wise, 2/14/13:
I'm not entirely sure but...I think this is a pro-drunk driving cartoon.

Props to Wise for picking the really unpopular side, I guess. He'll need something to prop up that diaphanous unspecified-things-will-get-worse-somehow excuse for an argument he's got going on here.

Oh, and that woman is out of a Harlan Ellison story -- she has no mouth and wants to scream!

Feb 14, 2013

Upon This Rock

Glenn McCoy, 2/13/13:
The very most important piece of Catholic doctrine -- far above "love thy neighbor as thyself," vastly superior to "judge not, lest thee not be judged" -- is "never ever let a company pay for anyone's birth control."

And thus Obama is the most anti-Catholic president ever.

Free-Fire Zone

Lisa Benson, 2/13/13:
Why, if we registered guns and required them to be insured and maybe even forced their owners to pass a licensing test, they would be as heavily-regulated as automobiles! And we all know no one can maintain a car under such crushing government control!

Getting Warmer

Ed Gamble, 2/13/13:
If it's ever cold anywhere, at any time, that means there's no such thing as global warming.

Ignore those predictions of more extreme weather and greater precipitation -- that'll just confuse the Great American Booboisie.

His Nemesis Returns Once Again!

Terry Wise, 2/13/13:
So... Wise assumes his audience has no idea what day it is? This explains much.

Also note that this cartoon was published on a Wednesday.

Feb 13, 2013

Waving the Bloody Shirt Once More

Lisa Benson, 2/12/13:
The Benghazi inquiry is a stifling covering stopping Obama from concentrating on anything else, and it dropped on him suddenly and with force...wait. Is there anything about the metaphor Benson is using here that bears even the slightest resemblance to the real world?

Habemas Popemobile

Deb Milbrath, 2/12/13:
There is no established succession plan for the Catholic Church; they have no idea what to do to choose another pope if they lose the one they have.

C'mon -- Ratzy wasn't even the one who started the Popemobile!

Feb 11, 2013

Dutch Treats

Ken Catalino, 2/10/13:
If only we were willing to stop spending money on the poor, sick, and old, the government would have plenty of money!

And where's the waterfall marked "military spending," anyway?

God Moves in Petty and Self-Righteous Ways

Steve Breen, 2/8/13:
The sky-god that Breen personally believes in is absolutely real, unlike everyone else's sky-gods, which are completely false.

And he can prove that because his sky-god performs miracles to deface billboards.

Bomb Them Back Into the Stone Age

Chuck Asay, 2/8/13:
Veterans are the worst people to make serious military decisions, since they don't have the bold visionary vigor of the chickenhawk!

I'm the God! I'M the God!

Glenn McCoy, 2/8/13:
It's rare that any political cartoon makes me chuckle out loud, and doubly so when Glenn McCoy does so. But this one did it -- maybe because I'm checking it out on a Sunday afternoon -- and so it gets posted here without any sarcastic comments.

Feb 8, 2013

As Usual, Mom Doesn't Know How To Use "The E-Mail"

Dave Granlund, 2/7/13:
Nature, unlike deliveries from the USPS, happens continuously without human intervention.

No, that's what this cartoon literally says -- that nature happens more often than mail delivery. Um, and....?

But Can He Tell It From His Ass?

Steve Greenberg, 2/7/13:
When you force an organization to pre-pay its retirement health care for decades ahead, and also forbid it by law from making a consistent profit, it is astonishing when its budget doesn't balance.

Gosh! Must be time to privatize!

Great Minds Drone Together

I actually like these two cartoons -- in contrast to most of the flabby drone cartoons that have cropped up this week -- but they do both say exactly the same thing.
Bob Gorrell, 2/7/13:
Nate Beeler, 2/7/13:
Beeler gets the nod on points: his drawing is more amusing, and he twists the knife with the Nobel Prize there.

You Should See the Cheerleaders

A.F. Branco, 2/7/13:
The very worst insult Branco can think of -- the one he hurls at his worst enemy, that black man in the White House -- is that he is insufficiently masculine.

Because to be like a woman is the worst possible thing in the world.

Feb 7, 2013

Bush's Drones Only Killed a COUPLE DOZEN People

Michael Ramirez, 2/6/13:
Torturing US citizens for vague ends is totally OK, but using high-tech machinery to blow them up is horrible!

...unless a future Republican president does it (and you know they will), because then Ramirez will insist that its necessary for the defense of sweet, sweet liberty.

Or GTFO

V.C. Rogers, 2/6/13:
Somewhere, the most important local-government issue is that too many women are showing off their mammalian development. It must be really nice to live somewhere with no other problems.

Also, since that image will be haunting my nightmares, I am compelled to share it with you folks as well.

Feb 6, 2013

Let He Who Is Without Sin Cast the First Stone

Chuck Asay, 2/5/13:
All gays are filthy perverts who should be drowned immediately.

No, seriously, that's what he just said.

Does the Title Have Anything to Do With Cartoon?

Jeff Stahler, 2/5/13:
You know, Shakespeare wrote a play called Richard III, all about that very same guy!

It would take only ten seconds of Googling to find an online version, and troll for quotes directly related to your subject matter!

But, hey, go with a lazy Hamlet reference, if that's your thing....

Bad Caricature Theater Presents

Joe Heller, 2/5/13:
It is strange and noteworthy when a political figure only spends a few years as a broadcaster and then goes on to do other things -- why, that's never happened before!

Also, the whole lazy connecting-two-things-that-have-nothing-to-do-with-each-other thing.

Other Media Are Evil!

Clay Bennett, 2/5/13:
If you disagree with Bennett politically on anything, it must be because you're stupid.

Bennett is quite fond of "all those guys are" cartoons; in recent memory he's accused Republicans of being liars, called the Tea Party babies, and several times claimed his opponents are clearly stupid.

Feb 5, 2013

Duck Season!

A.F. Branco, 2/4/13:
Silly President! Don't you know that guns are to protect against black people?

Also, the whole it's-impossible-to-be-pro-gun-unless-you-go-full-NRA thing.

Feb 4, 2013

Har. Har. Har.

Henry Payne, 2/3/13:
It's really hard to be laziest political cartoonist on a Sunday, when most of your compatriots don't even bother to file a cartoon.

But Payne manages to come up with something even lazier than not cartooning at all -- a stunning achievement.

If Only a Program Covered EVERYONE'S Health Care With Low Overhead!

Lisa Benson, 2/2/13:
Those horrible uninsured people are forcing out honest employed sick people -- oh why can't we repeal Reagan's law that forces hospitals to care for everyone, and let the poor die in the gutters like they're supposed to?

He Didn't Say!

Bob Gorrell, 2/1/13:
"...because, even though all of those things are indisputably true, my old GOP "friends" have heart attacks whenever they are said in public."

Seriously? Iran doesn't have a stable government that its people mostly like? Our policy on Iran is to conquer them and sow salt in their fields? There's no Israeli lobby that intimidates politicians? We need to keep a vast nuclear arsenal to fight off the Soviet Union of 1986?  Iraq is a peaceful democracy? Really?