Given the sudden disruption of the 2024 Presidential Election, I thought it only fair to present takes in opposition to my normally progressive point-of-view.
Christian Adams gets to lead off because several overseas views have been unclear, perhaps because they’re not getting a full spectrum of the chatter here.
It’s true that Harris represents a reboot and fresh start, but to suggest that Biden is the Forgotten Man not only flies in the face of what is being said about his decision to step aside — the tributes have been many, including from Harris herself — but also ignores her campaign’s foundation on the success of the Biden/Harris Administration.
It’s less a voice of opposition than one of not getting it. As noted yesterday, there’s a lot of foreign commentary at Cartoon Movement calling the move a Biden failure rather than a recasting of the race.
Bob Gorrell (Creators) echoes that viewpoint on this side of the Atlantic, and it’s a fair assessment from a GOP perspective. Obviously, the Democrats didn’t plan to recast the ticket in the middle of the race and, just as obviously, there was a great deal of intra-party pressure on Biden to step down.
Still, while to insist that the party and its followers have been revitalized is a subjective observation, the fact that Harris’s apparent nomination has brought in, as I write this at 5 a.m., more than $81 million in fresh donations is an objective indicator of how the “failure” is playing out.
Biden-as-failure will play well with the party faithful — and keeping them aboard matters — but it’s unlikely to sway the undecided, who can plainly see the enthusiasm coming from the Democratic side.
Chip Bok (Creators) echoes the kick in the ass concept, but his intentions are unclear.
Had he cited the Democrats’ rejection of Bernie Sanders in favor of Hilary Clinton in 2016, he might be suggesting that Bernie could have won and Hilary didn’t and that dumping Biden now is another fatal error.
But in 2020 the Democratic choice of candidates led to victory, despite all the “Stop the Steal” claims. I very much doubt Bok is predicting that the ticket change will lead the Democrats to the White House in November.
Then again, I can’t explain what he does mean.
I was surprised to see Bill Bramhall, a progressive voice, express doubts about Harris’s capability, though her candidacy disintegrated in the 2020 campaign, and if he’s pointing out the four short months she has to get things lined up before November, fair enough.
It’s also fair to pour a little cold water on all the excitement and point out that Trump remains a formidable opponent. King Kong swatted down a lot of biplanes before succumbing himself.
Still, I can’t help remembering how it all ended:
Police Lieutenant: Well, Denham, the airplanes got him.
Carl Denham: Oh no, it wasn’t the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast.
Beauty, charisma, whatever.
Mike Lester (AMS) updates the aeronautical technology and suggests that the Democrats are putting Harris in a Japanese Zero, presumably to carry out “a day of infamy,” and he’s not wrong to point out the shock this shift has caused, though calling campaigning against Donald Trump a dastardly attack on America seems more a partisan rallying cry for the MAGA crowd than a likely appeal to the undecided.
Yamamoto’s famous quote, “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve,” does not appear to have ever been said by him.
On the other hand, while the US didn’t turn things around in four months, they didn’t take a whole lot longer. As that Wikipedia article says
It would be wise for both sides to put the champagne and confetti aside until November 6.
Juxtaposition of the Day
Varvel and Stantis offer one of the more respectable reactions, that Biden has handed off an incurable disaster.
You could argue that polls indicated a tie, within the margin of error, and so the Biden/Harris campaign wasn’t in complete disarray. However, things were obviously going badly, and it’s reasonable to raise doubts that Harris can reverse things in four months.
Given that undecided voters often want to align with the winning side, claiming that the Democrats haven’t got a chance is a good attack that might bring some swing voters over to the GOP.
On the other hand, Harris has four weeks to establish her message before the DNC Convention in August, and not only is there nearly always a bump in approval following a convention, but the timing of Biden’s withdrawal has deflected attention from the RNC’s recent gathering.
Tom Stiglich (Creators) echoes Mike Johnson’s ridiculous talking point, that delegates are locked in and cannot legally change their choice when the convention meets. Aside from polls showing overwhelming support among Democrats for the change, delegates are not required — by party rules or, certainly, by law — to vote for the candidate they initially supported.
There doesn’t seem to be any upside in making this absurd claim, and I expect it to disappear shortly. But I’ve been wrong before.
Juxtaposition of the Day #2
Summers and Payne descend to personal insults, and it’s not clear if these cartoons — though dated for Monday — were done in response to Sunday’s events or were about the mounting pressure.
Neither, however, references Kamala Harris, and if personal insults are cheapshots to amuse the cult, I suspect we haven’t seen anything yet.
Lisa Benson (Counterpoint) references Harris with a number of accusations, starting with the GOP’s favored-but-false inflation claims and what will be a major attack point on Harris, that she was tasked with addressing the border crisis. Crossings are down and the GOP tanked border legislation in order to maintain it as a Trump campaign issue, but refuting it won’t be easy, particularly with reports of a new caravan being promoted as happening in fear of a Trump victory.
Benson also attacks the concepts of DEI (hiring women and minorities), ESG (investing in responsible corporations) and being woke, which means caring about the less fortunate.
Mike Beckom (Counterpoint) is less specific about what is wrong with Kamala Harris, except that it’s making Democrats weep in anguish and, as said, pony up $81 million to show how dismayed they are over their new candidate.
Again, he’s not trying to win over liberals and progressives. Preaching to the choir is a different skill set.
And here’s an expert on that:
Miz Conway, she done claim dat Harris iz lazy an’ dat she mumbles. Ah speks we’ll be seein’ more o’ dat kinda talk rat soon.
In the meantime, here’s a guy who must have learned to drink diet soda at Yale.
He’s not racist. He’s just gone uptown. They drink the sweet, full-calorie stuff, back where he claims to have come from:
drawn/filed Friday July 19. Joe dropped out Sunday.
Well played.
It looks to me like the Democrats are reacting positively, and the Republicans are whining that it’s somehow cheating.
Which makes sense, since they just had a whole convention attacking Joe Biden, and their whole election strategy was to just keep saying that Biden was old. And now, THEIR candidate is the oldest major-party candidate to ever run for the Presidency.
But some of these cartoons seem to imply that the Republicans are HAPPY to be running against Harris, and I don’t see it.
I know many, many Republicans who are happy the nominee is Harris now. The less visible but still popular Conservative “non-mainstream media” that I consume has plenty of people excited that it’s Harris, too. That’s just anecdotal evidence, of course, but still. Fox News makes everything sound like a 5-Alarm Fire.
Trump, you know, has the utmost respect for Black women, and is certainly NOT terrified that another one, especially a former prosecutor, is going to join the line of them who have routinely had his guts for garters. (Or that too many of the huge throng of undecideds who apparently thought that Joe was cognitively impaired due to age have suddenly found a candidate whom they find more than an adequate substitute, owing to her nearly identical positions on the issues to the guy they’d have unhesitatingly voted for had he just had the will and temerity to stop being old.)
I suspect Mr. Lester is suggesting a kamikaze mission.
Making the speech balloon yellow is … something.
That was my read of the cartoon, also.
Good take.
Mike routinely uses colored speech balloons –especially yellow– in his strip, Mike du Jour. https://www.gocomics.com/mike-du-jour/2024/07/09
Fair point. Apologies for suggesting anything untoward. I would have used a different color, under the circumstances.
On the plus side Ms. Harris may have locked up the math vote…
https://m.xkcd.com/
For future reference that should point to yesterday’s xkcd (#2962).
I too thought “kamikaze” rather than “Pearl Harbor” when I looked at Lester’s cartoon. I’m sure Kamala’s ancestry had nothing to do with his choice of imagery – her Asian ancestors came from a different part of Asia.
Once again Bok, Lester, and Benson have some of the worst takes I have ever seen.
But the whole idea of Harris taking the wheel of a sinking ship is absurd, Biden may have had some stumbles, but his presidency has been anything but disastrous.
The left’s reaction to Harris taking over for Biden has been largely positive, so it seems that most of the “crying donkey” toons are from people who are clearly out-of-touch or are else simply expressing what they hoped would happen rather than reality.
Strange times are ahead, but I am cautiously optimistic that people are more sick and tired of Trump than they are unwilling to vote for a woman of color. Here’s hoping Harris isn’t Hillary 2.0
Here are the rules for Canadian general (Federal) elections:
“The election or campaign period must be at least 37 days and no more than 51 days, and election day must fall on a Monday, with certain limited exceptions. Since 2018, in the case of a fixed-date election, the pre-election period starts on June 30 before the date of the election; during this time, political entities are subject to spending limits under the CEA.”
Three months is more than enough time for an election campaign. Spending limits would be nice in the USA.
When I lived near the border, candidates got air time to make their case, but I don’t remember any ads.
The far right are just so far wrong. What a motley collection of predictable, knee-jerk, lame-ass responses to this new, genuine threat to their house of hate and the witless, artless, abusive stooge that fronts it. This is the best they got? Huh.
Why yes, that is the best they have. It’s not like they can argue using actual facts.
I wonder if Lester’s cartoon is meant to cast Harris as a kamikaze.
I also wondered if Adams was portraying Harris- or Pelosi ?
re: Mr. Clay Jones loss of a client post:
Months after it appeared I was made aware that Mr. Jones while criticizing one of my cartoons published my wife’s dui-manslaughter conviction from 4 years ago along w/ her photo on his blog dated May 1, 2024. Here’s the link:
https://claytoonz.com/2024/05/01/preferential-contempt/#more-56334
-ML