Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones, But Predator Drones REALLY Sting

Jerry Holbert, 9/27/12:

So, in this metaphor, how exactly would we characterize the multiple death-strikes our football captain, Israel, has made on the teacher's nuclear scientists?

Or would that just be too confusing to work out?

You Can Almost See His Fist Clenching As He Draws

Michael Ramirez, 9/27/12:

Why do you persist in holding political opinions that Ramirez has repeatedly told you are false?

Don't you know that he just knows better than you?

The Triumphant Return of Out-of-Context Theater!

Glenn McCoy, 9/27/12:

McCoy's future is entirely made up of repressive anti-religious bigots, because that's the kind of freedom America was founded on.

What? You say it's only anti-Islamic bigots that are acceptable? Well, maybe a few Sikhs get killed by accident, and who the hell cares about the Jains, right? And Hindus are practically pagans, so they don't count. And only the really right-wing Jews are our kind of people. And who gives a crap about Shintoists amirite? And some of those Protestants are so wishy-washy and liberal that you can't count them as Christian....

Night of the Jogging Dead

John Deering, 9/27/12:

Obama is coming up from behind Romney, who has been in the lead for -- um, there must have a been a day or two when he was clearly in the lead, right? -- and he's so far to the left that he enacted a GOP think-tank's health-care plan and managed to be more militaristic than GWB.

Also, we have always been at war with Eastasia.

Dreaming of a White President

Chip Bok, 9/27/12:

Regular people are horrible cretins who must be avoided at all costs, and who should be kept from voting if at all possible.

Also, Bok wants you off his lawn pronto.

The Time Has Come To Say Fair's Fair

A.F. Branco, 9/27/12:

Yes, the entire world is in the grips of a horrible crisis -- along the lines of WW III, from appearances -- and President Obama could stop it easily, but he'd rather be a TV celebrity.

(Also, he's a socialist gay Kenyan sleeper agent, you know.)

Harald V Is Not Amused

Bruce Plante, 9/27/12:

Um...was King Carl XVI Gustav in town, and I missed it? Did Obama stand up some reigning monarch recently in favor of his many glamorous TV appearances?

Or am I just getting as confused as I suspect Plante was?

I Ha' My Doubts About Thee

Eric Allie, 9/25/12:

Remember: even when the news is against your guy, the wise editorial cartoonist can pull out that old standard, "everyone in the media is biased 'cept thee and me," and get through another day.

Reporting on dumb things your guy did is proof of bias, isn't it?

Nuanced Thinkers for Romney?

Glenn McCoy, 9/26/12:

Catholics think and vote in lock-step, always doing precisely what their secret masters in the Vatican demand, just as right-wingers like McCoy complained about when JFK ran for President fifty-two years ago.

Watch Your Step

Joel Pett, 9/25/12:

Sure, the violence fomented by The Innocence of Muslims was bad, but other, completely unrelated things are even worse!

And they're connected because Internet, that's why!

Ay Caramba!

Gustavo Rodriguez, 9/25/12:

The Latinos who are for Romney aren't "our kind" of Latinos, and therefore they are No True Latinos.

Oliver Twist Wants More!

Terry Wise, 9/24/12:

Children on welfare are all unnaturally numbers-savvy, sneaky, clutching, demanding sorts, and they should all be thrown into the workhouse where they can learn the joy of back-breaking toil.

First as Tragedy, then as Farce

Ken Catalino, 9/22/12:

I feel sorry for Catalino: his audience knows it should hate Karl Marx, but isn't so clear on who he is.

It must be tough working for people like that every day.

People Who Are Not Me Are the Problem

Michael Ramirez, 9/23/12:

No organized violence has ever been perpetrated by people following any belief system other than Islam -- no Christians, Jews, Hindus, Communists, Nazis, capitalists, or socialists ever have turned to violence to achieve their ends.

Oh, and no nationalists, either.

Stuff Branco Is Upset About, Thrown Into a Picture

A.F. Branco, 9/21/12;
If you put a bunch of talking points into the shape of a patriotic icon -- for example, the flag of your country -- it looks just like an editorial cartoon, even if there's no joke or discernible point to it.

Battle Angel Rand-ita

Joel Pett, 9/21/12:

I am not nearly as sure as Pett is that turmoil in foreign places means that our foreign-aid policies are working.

In fact, I can't quite see his point here: that, if we'd followed a Rand Paul-ian "cut off the foreigners" policy, things would be worse, in some unspecified way? Or that we have followed a Paul policy, and that's why things are chaotic?

Because "the current situation sucks, so perhaps the current policy has something to do with that suckage" is a not unreasonable argument.

The Bondage of Irrational Fears

Kate Palmer, 9/22/12:

Absolutely! Potentially offensive depictions of religious leaders whose followers have proven to be quick to take offense -- such as Jesus, or Mohammed, or Moses, or Sun Myung Moon, or L. Ron Hubbard, or Joseph Smith, or David Koresh, or Zoroaster, or Brahman, or even Buddha -- need to be outlawed for the good of the public.

And then we can think about whether the same rule should apply to political leaders with hair-trigger followers....

Doofus Defeats Truman

Chuck Asay, 9/22/12:

"The buck stops here" does not mean, as we've been told for the past three generations, that the President takes responsibility for the actions of his government and is the final authority.

Instead, it means that it's the US President's fault whenever anything happens anywhere in the world.

Timmy failed that big math test? The buck stops with Obama.

China and Japan rattling sabers over a bunch of islands no one else in the world can bother to care about? Obama is personally responsible.

Try it yourself -- it's fun and easy!

There Should Also Be FOUR Coffins

Michael Ramirez, 9/20/12:

It is morally wrong for a President to do anything frivolous when Americans have been recently killed in terrorist attacks -- thus, reading My Pet Goat to schoolchildren while 3,000 Americans burned to death is the most horrible act imaginable.

Everyone Else Sucks Except You and Me

Terry Wise, 9/20/12:

Yes, old people on Social Security and families with poverty-level income and young children -- the two groups that make up the majority of Romney's 47% -- are evil moochers who should be forced to get a job (or another job, if appropriate).

And the fact that those groups don't pay federal income tax has nothing to do with the Bush tax cuts and associated tax expenditures.

In the Land of Confusing Metaphors

Lisa Benson, 9/20/12:

So...Romney's balloons are bigger, but you have to blow them up yourself...and they won't have helium in them, so they'll just lie on the ground. (Also, that girl needs to be careful, or she'll get her whole head stuck in it.)

Is that supposed to be better?

Romney...is Not Left-Handed

Chuck Asay, 9/19/12:

The Romney we see -- the one out there talking about how high the trees are, that corporations are people, and that he doesn't care about 47% of the population -- is deliberately holding back, because he would awe us all with his Super-Saiyan-like fighting prowess were he to unleash his full power.

Buffalo Bill Calling Lazy Rider

Henry Payne, 9/19/12:

This, presumably, has something to do with a recent statement by Teamsters Prez. James Hoffa (the second of his name) that Romney "wants to annihilate organized labor."

But that's part of Romney's platform -- crushing unions, see them driven before him, and hearing the lamentations of their women -- so I hardly see that as a slam on him. Or how it's equivalent to calling Romney Kim Jong-Il (or whoever Paul Pot is -- maybe Payne means Pol Pot?)

Any Questions?

Steve Greenberg, 9/19/12:

Anyone who likes to drink, smoke, or check out "artistic" dancing women had better vote Republican.


Also, if you like your pickup -- or any car other than a Prius.

And I see that the Democrats have also once again forgotten to put the word "God" in their platform.

Greenberg certainly makes a compelling case....

Vote For the Guy Who WIll Kill Fewer Foreigners

Ted Rall, 9/19/12:

President Romney -- he of the scary saber-rattling towards Iran, among other things -- would be substantially less bloodthirsty than Obama currently is.

Meeting a Man Who Isn't There

Eric Allie, 9/18/12:

It is very unusual for a President to miss any briefing, since he has so very few of them.

Why, the last time a President did that, it was August 6th, 2001.

He Forgot to Draw in the Flies and Dashiki

Steve Breen, 9/18/12:

Anyone who complains about the oversized role of Wall Street in the economy and political world is an evil commie flag-burner.

No exceptions.

Waving the Bloody Flag

Terry Wise, 9/17/12:

Muslim extremists are lying about why they're attacking America, for secretive, nefarious reasons of their own.

I mean, it's not like other insults to Islam or Mohammed, like an American burning a Qur'an or some Dutch cartoonists caricaturing the Prophet, led to similar riots in the recent past, now is it?

A House Divided Against Itself Cannot Stand

Lisa Benson, 9/17/12:

You know, I could be wrong, but I think Lincoln also had something slightly negative to say about a group of people -- a bunch of conservatives, as I recall -- who decided they could "master both Congress and the courts" by taking their ball and going off to play their own game. I don't recall that ending well.

Also, way to go for Benson in the "avoiding drawing anything" sweepstakes for this week. This one will be hard to beat.

One-Track Minds

Gary McCoy, 9/14/12:

Radical Islamists -- whatever that means when it's at home -- will want to kill people no matter what happens anywhere else in the world.

Therefore, it's a waste of time worrying or obsessing about them, and it would be impossible to blame anyone (such as, for example, a sitting President), when they do manage to "kill the infidels."

Religions of Peace

Mike Lester, 9/15/12:

Muslims are all absolutely identical in ideology and equally dangerous to the USA; therefore, we have to kill absolutely all of them to be safe.

And Obama's not going to get there doing it one at a time....

If You're Not With Us, You're Against Us

Ed Gamble, 9/16/12:

When individuals in a country take dangerous, provocative, damaging actions against a foreign nation -- for example, when a random American filmmaker deliberately tries to incite violence by insulting the religion of a billion people -- that is proof that the nation in question is itself now hostile.

Or perhaps the lesson is that diplomacy is hard, and relies on dealing with countries with radically different social and political structures from our own, which does not always work out in precisely the way we want it to.

You Blockhead!

Roger Harvell, 9/16/12:

The politician most caught off guard, shown as least prepared, and most damaged by his reaction to the Libyan attacks is President Obama.

Any impressions you may have otherwise, Harvell insists, are simply wrong.

But What Has He Done For Me LATELY?

Chuck Asay, 9/13/12:

Obama did divide America: he flagrantly stole mainstream Republican positions on healthcare, war-mongering, and financial bailouts, forcing them to move far to the right in order to be sufficiently anti-Obama!

And the economy is so much worse now, with its high corporate profits and rebounding Wall Street, than it was in early 2009, when we were losing 600,000 jobs a month.

And if he'd just gut the entire discretionary budget, like Ryan wants, then poor people wouldn't be able to depend on the government for anything!

Please Hold Your Violent Protest For a Un-Symbolic Day

Ed Gamble, 9/13/12:

Yes, both Afghanistan and Pakistan are in the "Mid-East."

And when a couple of Americans make a film to deliberately stir up violence, that's just free speech and has nothing to do with America as a whole, but when a couple of foreigners get stirred up into violence, it's an indictment of their entire countries. TL;DR: white people good, brown people bad.

This Was No Boat Accident

Lisa Benson, 9/13/12:

Everyone currently unemployed is doomed.

So we might as well just start eating them now, while they're still fat.

Feed Me, Seymour!

A.F. Branco, 9/12/12:

You've got to keep the brown people oppressed and under the thumb of some compliant dictator -- nothing good could ever happen if you let them choose their own governments.

A Word from the Fox On the Sourness of the Grapes

Bob Gorrell, 9/11/12:

Today, Gorell takes the bold stand that our kids don't need teachers, anyway -- they can just learn on the streets, like he did, or in a boot-blacking factory.

Just Wait: He'll Start Typing Hamlet Any Minute Now

Paul Fell, 9/11/12:

That's right -- the sole reason for America's dysfunctional political culture is a TV news network only available on cable. Politicians themselves bear no responsibility -- and neither do voters.

Mitt I Love You But We Only Have 14 Hours To Save the Earth!

Rob Smith, Jr., 9/10/12:

...and then replacing it with something extremely similar -- since the original was based on right-wing plans from the Heritage Foundation -- that doesn't have the stink of liberalism on it.

And if that wastes two or three years, who cares? It's not as if anybody dies from lack of health care!

Only LIBERAL Zombies Have Green Hair

Terry Wise, 9/10/12:

People who vote for the candidate Wise does not like are not just brainless, but actively fraudulent.

They're also very badly drawn, but perhaps that's not their fault.

Zeus-ing It Up

Chip Bok, 9/7/12:

At last! An explanation for why miracles are so much rarer over the last, oh, three millennia than they were in Biblical times: God has no power at all indoors.

D'ya think this explains why TV evangelists build such big churches, maybe -- they're thumbing their noses at the Big Guy?

Yahweh, We Need To Talk

Mike Lester, 9/7/12:

Seriously! All of this horrible weather -- droughts and hurricanes and floods and so forth -- plus the horrible economy, and this "God" person refuses to do anything about it.

Lester at least is bold enough to declare that Americans need to be on the lookout for a new deity, one who will serve our needs.

Almost As Important as the Plank on "Quality of Life"

A.F. Branco, 9/7/12:

The most important thing for a political party in a secular society to do is to signal, via its almost-completely-irrelevant platform, that most of its diverse members vaguely believe in a superior being of some kind, and to codify that tepid belief in nonspecific language.

Failing to do so would be a horrible affront to the various conceptions of the Deity that members of that party might have, or not have. Really.

You Know He's Lying Because His Lips Are Moving

Clay Bennett, 9/7/12:

I see two possibilities.

The hopeful one is that this is a local cartoon, and that someone in Chattanooga, where Bennett cartoons from, is lying about being a Republican. I have no idea who that would be.

The alternative is that it's yet another "my honorable opponents are all lying doody-heads" cartoon, which I'm leaning towards.

Dick Locher Rides Again

Dick Locher, 9/8/12:

You see, TV is the boob tube, and thus the mother of that infant -- still in the breast-feeding stage.

And obviously TV is just the same as big government, because shut up already.

No Cattle

Jeff Stahler, 9/6/12:

It is news when delegates to one political party's convention wear colorful clothing and hats, because the other party never does anything like that.

Today's Racism Test

Chuck Asay, 9/6/12:

....what? I'm sorry, someone just blew this really shrill whistle incredibly loudly, and I lost consciousness for a second there.

What did I miss?

Oh, And Mr. Sea Lion Has An Opinion As Well, Don't You, Mr. Sea Lion!

Russell Hodin, 9/6/12:

This just in: Californians can speak to whales, they just don't want to.

Also, lefties still lead in the all-important "my cartoons are wordier than yours" sweepstakes.

If It's For WOMEN, It's Not Health Care!

Gary McCoy, 9/5/12:

Yes, the only use for "the Pill" is contraception.

And Fluke was testifying about her own experience, not that of someone else.

And Gary McCoy's comprehension skills are vast and impressive.