CSotD: Now what?

Kevin Necessary offers the first of a planned sequence of cartoons going through the stages of grief, and he seems to speak for a lot of his fellow political cartoonists, as well as a lot of civilians.

Kyle Bravo expresses much the same feeling on behalf of those outside the trade, who face different challenges than coming up with regular graphic statements about it.

Garth German mocks the flood of experts explaining how the Democrats lost, and he’s right: There are all sorts of ways a blind person can describe an elephant, depending on which part is being fondled, and it’s not that they’re wrong about that part, but they fail to add it all up.

There are also a lot of cartoonists trying to pinpoint a specific point, and it’s futile. Again, it’s not that they’re wrong about the thing they point out, but each is, as the logicians say, necessary but not sufficient.

And as German suggests, it’s time that we all — analysts and bloviators and cartoonists and civilians — move past the search for a magic reason and deal with the question “Now what?”

Not that there isn’t time for a laugh or two. Today’s Candorville (KFS) reminds me of 1968 — a lot of things remind me of 1968 — when George Wallace was running a rightwing third party candidacy.

I was in Indiana, which was a Copperhead state in the Civil War and still has a strong conservative streak today. Some of my long-haired friends went into the local Wallace HQ and asked for buttons and bumper stickers, in part to blow the minds of the campaign workers there but also to be able to jokingly take up Clyde’s point that the revolution would come sooner once things genuinely hit rock bottom.

Wallace didn’t win, of course, but now we’ve got a fresh chance to test that theory.

I don’t buy Nick Anderson (Tribune)‘s suggestion of Putin pulling the strings on puppets, but, first of all, this cartoon ran before Trump began populating his Clown Cabinet, and, second, I don’t doubt that there is going to be a serious issue of security among the aforementioned clowns.

But it’s hard to read Putin at the moment and it seems he may have been content to sow chaos rather than to obtain any direct benefit, though it has been speculated that the broadcast of Melania nudes on Russian television was a signal of who owns Trump’s backside.

And if you’d like to read an over-the-top discussion of that, click here but that’s only for amusement purposes and not necessarily a reflection of my considered opinion. It’s like those ads that show cars being driven by madmen with a disclaimer telling you to buy the car but don’t drive it like this.

Anyway, I assume Putin is delighted but I also think he’s willing to sit back and watch things unfold, since they’re likely to go in ways he will enjoy.

And having dinged Anderson for that earlier piece, I’ll let him speak to the filling of the Clown Cabinet with this parallel between Trump’s pet-loving campaign strategy and his appointment of the puppy killer, which hadn’t occurred to me.

I was mostly thinking of Noem as having played Vanna White while the bossman twirled and gyrated for half an hour, plus her role as a prominent covid denier. That combination makes her appointment less surprising than it ought to be.

And here’s an important point: There’s little sense, as German says, in trying to analyze specific reasons for where we’re at, but there’s also little need: Cartoonists are hardly at a loss for material.

Kristi Noem as head of Homeland Security is a straight line no self-respecting comedian would pass up, unless it’s to pick up instead on Little Marco as Secretary of State or a Fox talking head as Defense Secretary or a guy who’s waiting for Jesus to return and take control of the Middle East as Ambassador to Israel.

All of which makes Clyde’s theory of a coming revolution seem less speculative, but we’ve got a lot to survive before we get there.

Meanwhile, cartoonists should enjoy the cascade of bizarre material, because if rational appeals to logic and overall condemnations had any impact, we wouldn’t be in this situation.

It’s hard not to laugh at Paolo Calleri (Cartoon Movement)‘s depiction of our situation, and, moreover, there’s no reason not to, except for the humiliation of the entire world laughing in our faces now instead of behind our backs.

Still, while some of us laugh, other Americans will be offended and it may strengthen their determination to see Vladimir Putin in Kiev and condos going up on the beach in what used to be Gaza. Neither of which is funny, neither of which seems far-fetched at the moment.

Clay Bennett (CTFP) echoes Kevin Necessary’s Stages of Grief concept, but concludes with an alteration in the list that suggests he may have reconsidered his recent epitaph for democracy, from which I dissented yesterday.

Whether democracy is dead or simply pining for the fjords is an open question, and while we can’t hope that the Amateur Hour unfolding in Trump’s eccentric planning will collapse under its own weight, we can make an effort to rally enough disenchanted voters to rob him of Congressional majorities in the 2026 midterms.

We know, as John Deering (Creators) shows, that we can’t count on the justice system putting any real constraints on Dear Leader. Not only has the McConnell Supreme Court bestowed him with monarchical power that caused the Justice Department to wind down its prosecutorial efforts, but now the judge in the case where he was convicted is putting off a decision on sentencing, or possibly not sentencing.

Dave Whamond points out that Steve Miller isn’t hiding plans to betray the trust Latinos inexplicably placed in the Leopards Eating People’s Faces Party, but the deportation process isn’t likely to get under way in time to impact the midterms.

But Steve Brodner offers a solid outline of how preparations are being made for a resistance by professional politicians and pragmatic planners to directly resist or make end runs around Dear Leader and all his works and all his pomps.

We’ve been down this road before. We can walk it again.