CSotD: Nil Nisi Bonum Et Cetera
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Cathy Wilcox brings some class to the topic of Lindsey Graham’s death. We’ve seen a flood of cartoons from cartoonists who didn’t like or respect him and were eager to depict him in the fires of Hell or being rejected at the Pearly Gates.
Cartoonists could save some effort by creating a Pearly Gates template so they could just sketch in the Dear Departed each time they pulled out that tired old chestnut. But aside from the lack of creativity involved, there’s a lack of dignity in flaming a dead person you didn’t like. The old expression is “De mortuis nil nisi bonum dicendum est,” “Of the dead, nothing is to be said but the good.”
But, of course, political cartoonists have an obligation to depict truth and to exercise judgment. They also have an obligation to put food on their tables, and editors love Pearly Gates cartoons in which some beloved dead person is welcomed to heaven and even moreso if they are greeted by another beloved dead person.
Wilcox shows that you don’t have to stuff your critical judgment into your back pocket in order to make a point about someone you didn’t like or respect. The idea that nothing but good is to be said of the dead is far too sweeping a concept, and I’d prefer to say that nothing untrue should be said of the dead, but you don’t have to be a jerk about it.
Juxtaposition of the Day
Matson and McKee skip over the Pearly Gates aspect and focus on the here-and-now, and specifically how Dear Leader managed to make Graham’s death all about himself. It’s particularly effective because they don’t have to explain it. We already know that Trump has no sense of empathy and an enormous self-centered ego. It would be news if he didn’t make something be all about himself.
McKee is more specific than Matson, but Trump handed him the gun by declaring that, in his last conversation with Graham, the Senator expressed his support for the Save Act. He said it was likely Graham’s last telephone call, but it wasn’t because he called me later and promised me that I could have a pony. Honest!
Wolverton evidently felt that Graham’s death was overplayed by the news, and it’s true that the story led on radio, television and online, but Graham was a major player in American and world politics.
When Rep. Tom Kean (R-NJ) went missing for three months, it was a curiosity, but most people had probably never heard of him until then. That story could play at the end of a newscast, but Graham’s death was only rivaled by news of the Iran War, which goes back and forth so often that it is not exactly news when the weathervane swings around yet again.
Which brings us to Chevy Chase’s original “Francisco Franco is still dead,” a satiric commentary on the nightly updates that went on seemingly for weeks as the Spanish dictator lay on his deathbed. Graham’s death, by contrast, was fast and unexpected.
If Sen. McConnell’s office were issuing daily updates on his health, that might better mirror the Franco coverage that SNL was spoofing, but, instead, the jokesters and commentators are riffing on the lack of information. His office, and his family, might contemplate the advantage of being open and not provoking such mockery.
Over on Xitter, you’ll find that, as Espinoza charges, the bots, trolls and occasional real people are up in arms over the way liberals are celebrating Graham’s death, but they’re always up in arms over something, the site being a screamfest of illogical rage.
In this case, Espinoza doesn’t have to invent anything except the imaginary conversation, which seems a fair commentary on the hypocrisy of their fury.
On a similar note, conservatives continue to make hay over the disastrous Graham Platner nomination. Given how critical the Senate race in Maine is for Republicans to maintain their majority or for Democrats to seize it, there’s no surprise in seeing Republicans exploit the bizarre situation and withdrawal.
And, BTW, having ICE shooting civilians in the streets of Biddeford is hardly a boost of Susan Collins’ campaign, given her record of supporting hard-line security.
However, while Platner’s nomination doesn’t speak well for the Democratic Party’s ability to screen candidates, it’s hardly as clear a tale as the Republicans are making it.
Margaret Sullivan has an excellent column in the Guardian in which she analyzes the roll-out of scandals and, as an experienced journalist, points out that it’s easy to look back and see what they should have known, but that gathering of information doesn’t always align with the deadlines you might prefer. Hindsight indeed is 20/20, but reality doesn’t necessarily work that way. It’s a good look behind the scenes of how news happens.
And if relying on primaries rather than carefully selecting candidates in smoke-filled rooms left Maine Democrats with Platner, Michelle Goldberg has a horror story of how Colorado Republicans have used the primary system to nominate Victor Marx, a gubernatorial candidate who is unique in a way that makes people back slowly out of the room.
As Goldberg observes, it took some digging to uncover Platner’s flaws, but Marx was bizarre on the surface, and she goes on to list other candidates, both Republican and Democrat, who have been elevated by the primary system despite being so far off the mark as to seem unelectable in a sane world.
If we still had one.
Meanwhile, back at the Mother Country, cartoonists are thrilled that, when Nigel Farage dropped out in order to run for office again with a clean slate, he found himself running against Count Binface, a comedian dressed as a superstar garbage can.
Major parties refused to participate in the election, leaving Count Binface as one of Farage’s top competitors. At least Vermin Supreme never threatened to actually win.
Nil Nisi Bonum for this bloke
DD Degg has a good write-up on the late Pat Oliphant, but I’m adding this because, when I lived in Colorado, he was the Post’s local cartoonist. What a privilege to encounter him over breakfast!
Cathy Wilcox reports that the Australian Cartoonists will screen this movie at their conference in October:
Mike Peterson has posted his "Comic Strip of the Day" column every day since 2010. His opinions are his own, but we welcome comments either agreeing or in opposition.
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