CSotD: The Whole World Is Wretching
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Our nation’s cartoonists are divided between those who see the ascension of Trump as a disaster and those who consider it a shining moment, but I’ve found little support for the fellow among foreign cartoonists. Morten Morland (UK) captured the swearing in with Trump about to press the plunger carried by Melania, in her Natasha Fatale hat, while Elon Musk plugs his ears and JD Vance opens his mouth to equalize the explosion.
The positive aspect of this grim prediction being that it’s an Acme plunger, suggesting that Trump’s ambitions are foolish and likely to blow up in his face.
Sharon Murdoch (New Zealand) depicts the Inauguration of the Broligarchs, suggesting that Trump won’t be solely in charge, which is one of the elements we should all be keeping an eye on.
Trump has a well-established history of betrayals, but he also has a long history of frantically pursuing wealth, and his bros will find out which is dominant: His narcissism or his greed.
But, certainly, Murdoch is correct that he has established a broligarchy, and we’ll just have to see if he sticks to it.
Meanwhile, she includes Musk’s Nazi-like salute, which is still being debated.
The question, according to Cathy Wilcox (Australia) being whether a Nazi-like person who embraces Germany’s Nazi-like RfD party is a duck, or only walks and quacks like a duck.
She is either being deeply sarcastic or honestly withholding judgment, but if he is, in fact, not an ugly duckling but about to emerge as a graceful swan, he’d better get a move on.
Whether Wilcox is undecided or just being sarcastic, Graeme Keyes (Ireland) has no compunctions about calling it as he sees it, with commentary about Musk’s (alleged) drug use and his mangling of Xitter, which is getting quite a bit into a visually simple cartoon.
Meanwhile, Wilcox pipes up again, and more specifically this time, saying that there’s far more confusion going on in America than merely the intentions of The Man Who Would Be President, and whatever separation of powers we once had now seem seriously compromised and tangled by the man who is president.
Much of that tangled confusion, according to Martin Rowson (UK) can be seen in the flood of executive orders, which, he notes, indicate a return to the heyday of American Imperialism, which not only included absurd renaming of the Gulf of Mexico and an assault on the sovereignty and dignity of Athabascan people in Alaska, but changes in American citizenship and border policies as well as a review of foreign trade likely to result in tariffs and a trade war.
While Trump has only skimmed the surface of foreign relations with his first batch of executive orders, he has made enough other declarations of intent against Greenland and Panama that it does seem his love of William McKinley — apparently based on the tariffs of the robber barons — may also be in part based on the acquisitions resulting from the Spanish-American War and that of Hawaii.
Meanwhile, down in South Africa, Mother Anderson frets over the potential for Dear Leader to notice the potential wealth he’d gain by absorbing Madam & Eve‘s nation.
And while there’s been no such threat, South African Brandan Reynolds suggests that Trump is going to pretty much get whatever he wants, given the ring-kissing and boot-licking from his own political party and from major media and other normal sources of healthy dissension.
Australian cartoonist Greg Smith (Cartoon Movement) notes that one of those executive orders took the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement, putting America alongside Iran, Yemen and Libya as the sole non-signatories, plus he has ordered an end to development of wind and solar power, increased gas and oil development and he wants to do away with incentives and mandates around electric cars, all of which will result in accelerating climate change.
The resulting global health effects will have to be overseen by the World Health Organization. Trump has cancelled American participation in that group as well.
It’s inevitable that, when someone threatens the environment, First Dog on the Moon (Australia) will step up, but First Dog does more than that, as the Raccoons of the Resistance go through a laundry list of Trumpy things they find objectionable.
Incidentally, there are no raccoons in Australia, except possibly in zoos. There were some, but they shot them. Both. Too bad they weren’t able to corral the cane toads, rabbits and foxes so readily, though, as First Dog’s piece explains, there’s a different invasive pest that they’re focusing on at the moment, or at least he is.
And still on the topic of feral, invasive threats, Pat Hudson (Australia) comments on the release of the January 6 criminals, which is likely more of a threat in this country than all the way down there, but what happens in the USA tends to have impacts well beyond our shores.
It’s not clear just what that impact will be. Trump promised not to pardon the violent offenders, and Pam Bondi, in her Senate hearing, pledged to review each case before anyone was pardoned, but we all know what road is paved with good intentions or possibly with deliberate lies, because Dear Leader, as Hudson says, simply released all the deplorables, including those who assaulted police officers.
He also pardoned Ross Ulbricht, whose release does have significance beyond our borders, since Ulbricht’s Silk Road platform allowed drug dealers to complete massive illegal trades around the world.
Trump himself is a crypto tycoon, which I guess explains why he’s so adamant about stopping South and Central Americans from bringing fentanyl across our border but has no hesitation to put Ulbricht back on the streets.
Marian Kamensky (Citoyen du monde) sees Trump as an unleashed monster, trampling liberty, justice and democracy underfoot.
By contrast, Guy Body (New Zealand) sees Trump not as a monster but as a brat who not only doesn’t measure up to his predecessors in the White House, but isn’t even trying to.
And Martyn Turner (Ireland) questions Dear Leader’s central concept that America was once great. Rather than seeking to improve day by day, Trump seems bound and determined to revive our nation’s most regrettable moments.
Isolationism and imperialism only work in combination when “isolationism” means “Who cares what they think?”
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