CSotD: Profiles in Discourage

Mannequin on the Moon (AMS) suggests a line that some major newspapers could adopt for the benefit of readers.

I find it annoying when they list a headline on their opinion page that promises a challenging, interesting opinion, but doesn’t include the byline, so that you click on it and discover that, indeed, it’s from someone they pay to be shocking and controversial.

This is not entirely an issue of left and right. I used to dislike Jen Rubin’s work, but under the pressure of the last half-decade or so, she’s become one of my favorite writers, because though conservative in general, she’s too intelligent to fall for authoritarian nonsense and too honest not to call it out.

Ditto with David Frum, with whom I disagreed vehemently over Meech Lake, and who continues to annoy me from time to time but in a challenging way. I’ve no objection to being challenged. I just don’t like having my intelligence insulted. And I often agree with Frum, so perhaps he’s changed or perhaps I have.

But when Kathleen Parker announces that Kamala Harris only got her position because she’s good-looking, I have to wonder if Parker was hired sight unseen, because I’ve read better-written columns by less attractive people, and I’ve felt that way about her since long before Harris had a public profile.

Meanwhile, good looks don’t explain the roster of Foxworthy trolls both the NYTimes and Washpo keep on their editorial pages in what I assume is an attempt to balance out the more insightful writers in their stables.

Imagine a sports team that felt for every all-star on their roster, they should field a player who puts his helmet on backwards and trips over the chalklines on the field.

Anyway, Mannequin on the Moon made me laugh.

Given my appetite for dark humor, so did this Juxtaposition of the Day, which is so long and diverse that I’m treating each one separately.

Guy Body achieves a level of wiseassery that can be a little hit-or-miss, but this commentary on the Ukrainian offensive was not only the first I saw but remains the funniest. It’s not necessary for an editorial cartoon to be funny, but as long as it makes a coherent point, there’s nothing wrong with humor.

Obviously, this is an exaggeration, but, at the same time, Putin has been so confident in his efforts that what the Ukrainians have achieved is a major blow to a major ego.

Patrick Blower was more straightforward, punning on a Russian classic in order to illustrate a bit of karmic justice. It suffers a bit from the fact that we perceive East being to the right and West being to the left, while layout demands that the action flow towards the center, but the clarity of intent is so strong that we should simply assume we’re viewing this from the North rather than from the South.

And here’s a pair that I will treat as a

Juxtaposition of the Day

Morten Morland

Nick Anderson — Tribune

These are both humorous, and both paint the counteroffensive as, alas, more an annoyance than a genuine threat, but we all like to see the rich toff get his hat knocked off with a snowball, and however the offensive turns out, it’s good to see the Russian bully get a bit of his own back.

They also show an element of shocked surprise that seems realistic, which makes the fantasy settings work.

Tjeerd Royaards exploits the difference between the big, clumsy At-Ats and the fast, maneuverable snowspeeders, which somewhat echoes the previous two cartoons, though without their pie-in-face humor.

It over-reaches a bit, since the destruction of the At-At was a sign of the Rebel Alliance’s movement towards victory, and I think the limited achievements shown in those two cartoons above are more realistic, but that may be prejudice on my part, since this scene in the movie was the point where I realized I’d paid to have my kids watch a two-hour-long toy commercial.

Ella Baron offers a far more nuanced view, which is that when the bear sneezes in Kursk, Putin gets spattered in the Kremlin. The bear seems allergic to sunflowers rather than ill, but the premise remains the same, since whatever military success this counterstrike enjoys, the psychological impact brings us back to the days of the destruction of the bridge in Crimea and the sinking of the Moskva.

If Kyiv can return to delivering those blows, the impact on Russian troops may be less important than the impact on Russian morale and on Putin’s authority.

Guy Venables takes a light approach, but anyone familiar with the Russian people knows the depth of their roots within the black soil of Mother Russia. In both the Napoleonic War and World War II, Russia suffered grievously but was determined to outlast its invaders at any cost.

That doesn’t speak well for the notion that Ukraine can achieve an actual military victory, but the Afghans eventually drove the Soviet Union out, and whatever happened to that nation?

Or, in the word of e.e. cummings, “how do you like your blue-eyed boy, Mister Death?“

Speaking of futile warfare, it appears that the US and other allied nations may be close to a solution in Israel’s war, but Ella Baron sees Netanyahu as standing in the way of a ceasefire, playing the strongman in a nation conflicted over the ongoing war.

She may be right. Her cartoon was drawn before Anthony Blinken’s trip to the area, but despite saying he agrees to the potential ceasefire, Netanyahu reportedly continues to throw up roadblocks.

As Alan Moir demonstrates, however, Israel only blows up Hamas militants and has no intention of harming innocent Palestinians. Assuming that any such people exist.

Steve Brodner would beg to differ, and this is one of a series of pieces he has done based on the reports by an American doctor attempting to treat patients in the midst of what certainly seems like indiscriminate bombing and destruction.

It’s pretty graphic stuff, but it could be worse.

It could be happening to you.

In which case, as Michael de Adder suggests, a nice man with heel spurs would explain to you why it isn’t so bad.

Gee, I wonder who explains these things to the Gazans?