© Chris Britt
At The Las Vegas Review-Journal:
Regardless of political affiliation, I highly doubt that Republicans, Democrats or independents favor the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This Saturday syndicated cartoon by Chris Britt stating that the entire GOP is in support of the invasion is disgusting and offensive.
Steve Kelly, © Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
At The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:
I was shocked when I saw the drawing of Vice President Kamala Harris on the Feb. 6 editorial page. I had to look twice to be convinced the drawing was of our vice president. For the Post-Gazette to agree that this drawing is acceptable for printing is indicative of a larger attitude toward women and the vice president. This is a monumental sign of disrespect for this Black and South Asian American woman who is serving our country during difficult times domestically and internationally. She is a beautiful, refined woman who is known for her tailored pantsuits and her signature string of pearls. Her proportioned physique looks nothing like that in the drawing, and her hair is always well-coiffed…
Adam Zyglis, © The Buffalo News; Cagle Cartoons
Does Adam Zyglis actually equate the left’s call to cancel Joe Rogan with conservatives’ objections to such anti-white hatred propaganda as the 1619 project and critical race theory? And it’s not like Rogan is the first celebrity that the left has attempted to cancel. To hear the left tell it, the people we have to worry about are the “white nationalists” in our midst, a tiny, poorly-defined group who are supposedly a threat to democracy and much more dangerous than any foreign terrorist organization. Zyglis’ unserious virtue-signaling reveals a one-sided, intellectually lazy view that reflects poorly on the paper he works for.
Late February saw that Tim Newcomb cartoon still a topic.
© Tim Newcomb
VTDigger ran an essay by Bill Schubart defending cartoons in general and Tim’s in particular:
Today, we are seeing the chilling impacts not only of our calling-out culture, but also self-appointed critics culling books from school and community libraries, pseudo-educators seeking to control what we teach about our checkered history …
This dismal trend is misguided …
By the way, the virulent reaction to Newcomb’s cartoon did not come from the right-wing of Vermont politics…
In mid-February The Oregonian editor Therese Bottomly addressed concerns about newspaper bias:
In this case, the reader cited a discrepancy between a business article and the accompanying caption. The article said a woman, whose story was illustrating the effect of the loss of child tax credit payments, had “left” her job at the start of the pandemic when her employer would not let her work from home. The caption with the photograph said she had “lost” her job.
© Glenn and Gary McCoy
Though it did touch on a comic strip:
I recently received a reader complaint from someone who was offended by the mention of “suppositories” in “The Duplex” strip. If you are in the habit of reading the comics with your grandkids, there are some things you’d probably rather not have to explain.
My typical response, as with all media, is that it might be best for adults to screen it before sharing with young children.
Two weeks later she was back, editorial cartoons being the topic:
Drew Sheneman, © The Star-Ledger
After I wrote recently about bias, several readers complained about a political cartoon that had appeared in The Sunday Oregonian.
Political cartoonists have long been published in newspapers, often providing some of the sharpest and most pointed commentary. Opinion material takes a position and expresses a point of view. News reporting, meantime, sticks to the facts.
… Another reader wrote of the cartoon: “(I assume) it was chosen to simply project the abstraction of Republicans as unfeeling and dismissive….,” arguing it was a “false depiction” of events.
… I can see, however, how some readers took the cartoon the way they did. But cartoons are not intended to be taken literally – quite the opposite. Often, the cartoonist draws a figure, symbol or object as a “stand-in” for a point of view or larger group. The elephant, Sheneman said, was a symbol for “Republican apologists” who would seek to downplay events of that day.
On a different topic – The Daily Telegram notes eminent changes to Gannett newspapers:
Starting this Saturday, March 5, I’m hoping that Daily Telegram readers will be willing to embrace changes being made to their paper.
The biggest change will be that there won’t be a print edition on Saturdays any more. There won’t be home delivery, and papers won’t be available at stores on Saturdays. This change is being made at Gannett papers across the country that have had editions seven days a week. The Telegram is among the first group that will drop the Saturday print edition.
Of course…
The comics are all in the e-edition, too, as are the puzzles.
So stock up on those dry erase pens and you can still do the crossword on your pc.