Symbolic Logic

Victor Harville, 4/6/11:

Amazingly, congressional Democrats and Republicans appear to agree on one thing. Sadly, Harville didn't tell us what that was.

Introducing Spokesman Cole Lumpyhead

Hap Pitkin, 4/6/11:

This cartoon is absolutely true.

Sadly, it's also dull, crude-looking, and unfunny. It's true that you can't have everything, but you've gotta hope that an editorial cartoon at least attempts a joke, somewhere.

Who Died and Made You Einstein?

David Cohen, 4/6/11:

Remember the movie Tremors? Cohen does.

He doesn't make much of an effort to tie it into anything, but he definitely remembers it.

Dr. Seuss Day Was LAST Month!

Paul Berge, 4/6/11:

Most of us are focusing what little attention we can spare for the goings-on of Congressmen on the ongoing budget battle, which threatens to "shut down the government." (Spoiler! Most of the government, including the most important bits, will not be shut down.)

Berge, on the other hand, seems to think the Employment Non-Discrimination Act has a prayer of passing in the currently, heavily right-wing Republican, Congress. It must be nice to be so optimistic.

Frankenstein's Bankers

Randall Enos, 4/4/11:

The rich are a separate race: stooped by the weight of their evil habits, with skin as green as their money and an unquenchable thirst for the blood of poorer, better men.

Note that He Can't Even Spell "Doctrine" Correctly

Jeff Darcy, 4/4/11:

Darcy's point, translated: the President is a doody-head.

This passes for sophisticated political discourse in our fallen age.

Return of the Barter Economy

Rick McKee, 4/4/11:

McKee works out of Augusta, Georgia, where they're playing a little golf this week.

Gas in Georgia is running a little under $3.50 a gallon, which some in more heavily taxed states may find shocking -- that it's seen as so high, I mean.

As Safe as a Very Safe Thing

Signe Wilkinson, 4/5/11:

The Philadelphia school system used to have a school safety advocate, and there's a push to reinstate the office.

Wilkinson, though, seems to believe that if parents would just tell their children to "behave themselves," all of the problems with violence in urban schools would disappear.

Tomorrow, she'll show us how to bring fairies back life by clapping our hands, and, later in the week, details on how to balance the budget using leprechaun gold.

Cote de Sang

Tim Jackson, 4/4/11:

There's a bloody civil war going on in the Ivory Coast that the Western media isn't pay much attention to -- probably because the locals are even darker-skinned, and have vastly less oil, than the more fashionable revolutions to their north.

Let He Who Is Without Sin...

Stephen Rustad, 4/4/11:

Deliberately performing an action that you know will cause violence, and likely death -- and which you have promised not to do -- is not evil, because there are worse things in the world.

But there are worse things than rioting and killing innocents along the way, as well.

Real Men Burn Fossil Fuels

Henry Payne, 4/3/11:

The USA has never subsidized gas-powered automobiles or the petroleum industry -- no, perish the thought. Ignore the Eisenhower Interstate System and avert your eyes from all of those cheap drilling rights on federal land!

Going Commando

Ted Rall, 4/4/11:

The only possibly reason for wanting PFC Manning to be naked is raw prurient interest on the part of his immediate captors, and has nothing to do with a suicide watch. (Or with being randomly, nastlily, punitive.)

Justice Is Looking Pretty Haggard Lately

Bob Gorrell, 4/4/11:

True justice -- a phrase which here means "obtaining the outcome that we pre-determined" --  can only be found in secret military tribunals.

Because the Constitution wasn't meant to apply when it's inconvenient.

A Little Early for Good Friday, Isn't It?

Bill Schorr, 4/4/11:

Women vote as a monolithic block, based entirely on funding for reproductive rights. Or so some Democrats fervently wish; it would be nice to have half of the population in your back pocket like that.

Divinely Windy

John Cole, 4/3/11:

Continuing to do your job in dangerous conditions is just like committing suicide with a bomb-loaded airplane.

There may, perhaps, have been a more appropriate way to express the idea that the Fukushima Dai-ichi reactor workers are very brave and devoted than by comparing them to poorly-trained and over-zealous wartime terrorists from a period that Japan has spent three generations to move past.

But, hey! It's a Japanese word everyone recognizes, right!?

Hello, Cupcake!

Martin Rowson, 4/1/11:

Gadaffi is playing footsie with British PM Cameron -- a reference to the alleged BP deal? -- while a diminutive Sarkozy stabs him in the hand and someone unspecified (Obama?) leaves the room.

In a proper American editorial cartoon, all of those elements -- not just the people, but the cupcake, the fork, the tablecloth, and even the chairs -- would be carefully labeled. One can only hope civilization will eventually extend to the other side of the Atlantic.

Nuclear Waste Is Only Several Million Years

John Sherffius, 4/1/11:

Nuclear waste, you would be surprised to hear, is actually made of gorgeous diamonds!

Hideously radioactive diamonds, yes, but nothing is perfect.

Or so Sherffius would have you believe.

Bridge to Nowhere

Lisa Benson, 4/1/11:

There is no such thing as an energy source that isn't a fossil fuel -- it's petrochemicals or nothing at all.

And these aren't the droids you're looking for, either.

The Great Moustachio

Anne Cleaves, 4/1/11:

It's not very well publicized, but the Tea Party movement is sharply in favor of job-sharing.

And stage magic, of course.

Seller Beware

Nate Beeler, 3/31/11:

Housing is, suddenly, a very illiquid investment, which is completely unlike what houses have been throughout history, when they were traded freely on the day market.

Happiness Is a Warm Sweater Puppy?

Mike Peters, 3/31/11:

Abercrombie's clothes for teen girls all contain falsies? Or maybe super-growth hormones?

This strikes me as the kind of thought that men of a certain age have when lounging in the part of the mall where they really don't belong -- a thought that should stay unuttered.

The Decline of the West

Jeff Koterba, 3/31/11:

Kids today! If they're not hyperactive, they're completely inactive, amirite? Not like when we were kids! Why, we didn't come home until the streetlights came on! And we didn't need these fancy "Internets" and "televisions" and "indoor plumbing," either!

And did I ever mention how it was ten miles to school, through the snow, uphill both ways?

To Ask and Ask Not

Kevin Siers, 3/30/11:

The Bay of Pigs invasion model is what we want from our presidents: rushing into a confusing situation with unbounded hope, a muddled plan, and an endless belief in our own righteousness.

Calculation, intelligence, caution, a measured response -- those are for wimps.

Speak Softly and Punch Out Foreigners

Chuck Asay, 3/31/11:

So if Reagan ordered airstrikes on Libya but never committed ground troops, and Obama ordered airstrikes on Libya but hasn't committed ground troops, then the difference between them is....?

Oh, right, Reagan is a Republican, and thus whatever he did was correct, and Obama is a Democrat, and thus whatever he does is wrong. Sorry; I forgot.

(One might also question the way GWB walks away, nonchalantly, in panel 4, which is the precise opposite of what his administration actually did in Iraq.)

Get out the Shotgun

David Cohen, 3/31/11:

The US's problem right now is that it's invaded too few countries, and hasn't extended its power enough.

Just one more, Mr. Creosote, it's wafer-thin!