At the risk of sounding like an incompetent, unpatriotic university president, I think context matters, and Jefferson’s oft-quoted remark about government without newspapers versus newspapers without government deserves some. He was writing specifically about Shay’s Rebellion, but he might have been writing about January 6, except that, while Washington had political opponents, most hard-core Tories […]
I’m starting the day with Nick Anderson‘s cartoon following the release of the Justice Department’s 600-page report on the May, 2022, school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. There have been several other cartoons, but, while I don’t expect a cartoonist to read all 600 pages in time to fire off a timely commentary, I didn’t find […]
Ted Rall (Counterpoint) asks a reasonable question, but one for which there is a reasonable answer: You must crawl before you can walk. A major reason there are only two major political parties in the US is that everyone swings for the fences and nobody wants to score on singles. At the risk of using […]
Jen Sorensen explains the interplay of polarization and bothsidesism. We used to joke about the mainstream media’s obsession with presenting both sides, saying that if someone said Hitler was a bad person, reporters would be ordered to find someone who would say he was good. It seemed like clever hyperbole at the time, but now […]
Starting the day with things we ought not to believe, Ann Telnaes encapsulates the conflicting stories about how the Secret Service accidentally deleted text messages from, golly, of all dates, January 5 and 6, 2021. She includes a nameplate for Nixon secretary Rosemary Woods, for the benefit of those too young to remember Woods’ […]
Since I don’t follow Canadian politics closely, I’m not sure if the Fat Cat in Bruce MacKinnon’s commentary on the plan to raise interest rates is anyone in particular, but it doesn’t matter: The rich powerful guy is making major decisions about global policies and the homeless guy is just worried about his next meal. […]
I woke up this morning feeling really refreshed, but couldn’t tell why until I began going through the political cartoons and realized I’d somehow slept through the past year and missed the mid-term elections entirely. As Steve Breen (Creators) and others have noted, it’s time to start up the 2024 presidential campaign! I’m disappointed, since […]
The current question for political commentators seems to be “Can you walk and chew gum at the same time?” Adam Zyglis drew this cartoon before SCOTUS handed down their abortion decision last week, but it’s a good marker of where we’re at, because, amid all the uproar over that story, there has been a […]
Brewster Rockit (Tribune) is a funny sci-fi spoof. Except when it’s not. Thursday, the January 6 Committee will present hearings in Prime Time, and there are many people who feel this will finally give Americans a look not only at what happened in the Capitol that day but at who may have planned, encouraged and enabled […]
Drew Sheneman celebrates a bit of folly with some bite: The GOP is unwilling to admit that we’re unnecessarily slaughtering children because guns are not an issue of public safety but of political loyalty. As he notes, they are shielded by simply insisting that it’s bad policy to enact gun regulation in the wake of […]
Information — that is, real information — is beginning to emerge from Uvalde, though perhaps too late to ever displace the rumors. But one thing that has been clear almost from the moment of the murders is that, as Ann Telnaes puts it, mass shootings are part of our culture. The outrageous part is not […]
UK cartoonist Steve Bright leads off this chapter of our ongoing discussion of Uvalde with a cartoon about Ukraine. And why not? As Michael de Adder notes, War is war, whether waged between countries or within one. We are re-enacting the similar scene from Saving Private Ryan over and over, as if it were […]
Let’s start by remembering tomorrow’s holiday, and, as often as I disagree with Dana Summers (Tribune), he nailed this one. I hate the sentimental dreck of little kids saluting tombstones, but there’s also no need for squawking that Memorial Day is for remembering the dead, not having barbecues. Summers hits a sweet middle ground by […]
Steve Breen (Creators) sums up everything we know so far about Uvalde: Children were murdered, parents were devastated and we’re hearing a lot of same-old same-old from the top. As noted here the other day, President Biden did step up with a masterful, furious speech demanding to know when we were going to finally do […]
JD Crowe cuts to the chase and sets up our second day of Uvalde reactions. On his Facebook page, he cites a 2015 tweet as the inspiration: “In retrospect Sandy Hook marked the end of the US gun control debate. Once America decided killing children was bearable, it was over.” — Dan Hodges (@DPJHodges on […]