CSotD: The Morning After
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This was my idea, too, and I had no intention of doing election-results cartooning today, in part because I was tired from a stint at the polling place and in part because I was tired of the whole thing, and in the largest part because I didn’t expect a lot of cartoonists to get their wrap-ups out by morning.
But they did and so here’s a sample of what I found this morning.
Bennett sums things up with class. Obviously, there’s some hyperbole here. Most of the losing candidates seemed to hit the mid-40 percentages, so a strictly journalistic cartoon would show quite a few unhappy people exiting that theater, not just one. But it’s a cartoon, not a photograph, and the sense of relief this morning is palpable.
Anderson’s piece was the first I came across and it provoked a smile, not only for the general sense of relief the outcome offered, but for tying in all the bizarre ass-peeping we saw in the last days of the campaign.
I’ve seen serious analytical pieces suggesting that Trump’s increasing lack of discretion and focus is a sign of impending dementia, but it isn’t that much of a change from the indiscrete, unfocused things he’s said from the start.
Dizzy Dean didn’t actually say, “It ain’t bragging if you can do it,” but his original statement was more nuanced: “(W)e don’t brag. Whenever we say we’re going to do something we go out and do it.”
I don’t think people resent sincere failure so much as they resent empty bragging and broken promises.
Trump promised to accept the results, but he’s promised lots of things.
Juxtaposition of the Day
Rall can find the flaw in any diamond, and his reaction combines realism with pessimism. I guess the obvious pop-culture reference would be to Eeyore, but Eeyore was just depressed.
I prefer Hardy Har Har, who predicted “It’ll never work” for every one of Lippy the Lion’s elaborate plans. Either way, anyone who came into the midterms expecting a massive reset was utterly unrealistic, and you’d be foolish to expect the economy and the jobs market to suddenly do a 180 degree turnaround this morning. Rall’s character is right, except it will be two years before things genuinely shift.
Espinoza flies off the handle in the opposite direction of Rall, but he’s right that the elections have shown that the people can speak up despite being surrounded by those who would repress them. However, while the president can veto everything that lands on his desk, he won’t have a compliant Congress to pass his dream plans, or to sit quietly while he usurps their powers.
In the meantime, watching Trumpies get subpoenaed will be fine entertainment.
Lalo Alcaraz offered a tribute and prediction, given that his strip had to be submitted prior to the election. Having spent nearly two decades out West, I have a strong association between the Chicano and the Farm Workers movements and the chant, “The People United Will Never Be Defeated.”
Hudson takes a viewpoint that is more realistic than Espinoza’s extravagant image, but no less optimistic, since Congress will now have a majority that can bring about investigations and testimony that could even provide some immediate justice. We might not only see the Epstein files opened but find out what is in those boxes in the bathroom at Mar A Lago.
Who knows where things might end up? As Milt Priggee says, he’s like a turtle on a post — you know he didn’t get there on his own.
However, let’s not be unrealistic. Both the Watergate and Iran Contra hearings took place before Rush Limbaugh unleashed rightwing talk radio and Fox News went on the air. Barroom philosophers grumbled, “They all do it,” but both Gordon Liddy and Oliver North were tried and convicted before the new conservative media emerged to turn them into heroes.
There were serious reforms after Watergate, but most have since been swept away, and whatever outrage may be triggered over the next few years will similarly be blunted and countered by the powerful media available today.
McKee blends the Arch of Triumph with the general lack of triumph the midterms suggest, to which I’d add that Trump’s appeal to the court to get his arch back on schedule included a vain attempt to secure permits by tomorrow.
He’s still got two months with a GOP congress, but if he can’t cut through the legal issues, that may not matter, particularly since any Republicans who are continuing in the next session may be keeping their backs to the wall, which ties into the more metaphorical aspects of McKee’s cartoon.
I get annoyed with the way “Lame Duck” has been altered to mean anyone no longer up for re-election, which includes every president for his entire second term.
The term began back in the days when presidents and the new congress were inaugurated in March, creating a four-month period in which all sorts of mischief could be legislated and signed by the “lame ducks” who knew they were leaving office.
Well, we’ve got a genuine lame-duck congress for two months, and Trump needs to make the most of it, though I refuse to call him a lame duck until November, 2028.
On the other hand, Luckovich does have fun with rumors that the bulges in his trousers are caused by an artificial exoskeleton that keeps him upright.
The press was awfully kind to Woodrow Wilson and FDR about their disabilities. We’ll see if Trump gets the same discrete treatment from people he continuously insults.
Don’t skip today’s video:
Fox News and its imitators aren’t the only outlets at which some rumors and opinions are verboten, and Ann Telnaes isn’t the only cartoonist to walk away from corporate censorship.
Cathy Wilcox also walked away — after 37 award-winning years — from a newspaper that stopped supporting her and began micromanaging her work and spiking opinions, on orders from the boardroom instead of her editor. Above is her memory of the good old days, and here’s a significant discussion of the changes since, in newspapering and in corporate censorship.
It is very much worth your time:
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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