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Blog Newsletter Syndicate

Ilhan Omar

Minnesota congresswoman Ilhan Omar has become a gift to Republicans and a favorite on Fox News. She seems to be unaware of anti-Semitic tropes and stumbles into repeated, ugly slurs against Jews. Many Democrats defend her and an awkward attempt to condemn her statements was so watered down in the House that it was laughable.

Editorial cartoonists have a special responsibility regarding anti-Semitic clichés given the history of Nazi cartoons leading up to the Holocaust. At Cagle.com we have received many ugly cartoon tropes from worldwide cartoonists over the years, particularly from Arabic language cartoonists and Latin American cartoonists.  When I talk to the cartoonists about it, they tell me that they were unaware, that it wasn’t their intent; they are generally happy to take the cartoons down and they tell me they appreciate being told about why their cartoons were offensive to an American audience. The most common images depict a Star of David representing Judaism, rather than the Israeli Flag representing Israel, and use images that equate Jews with Nazis, that show Jews crucifying Palestinians as they “crucified Christ,” Jews as rats, as spiders, Jews killing babies, or like vampires drinking baby blood – the whole Nazi panoply of Der Stürmer clichés in cartoons gets repeated frequently around the world, and these cartoonists aren’t used to hearing any push-back from their local readers. Nancy Pelosi seems to see it in the same way with Omar, who Pelosi thinks simply wasn’t aware and hasn’t been educated about the bigotry.

Whatever the reasons are behind Omar’s ugly comments, she is a gift to Republicans, Trump and Fox News. My cartoon from last week shows Democrats wrapped up in Omar’s hijab, to the delight of Republicans.

 

 

Here are some more Omar favorites from last week. This one is from Steve Sack of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune …

This is from RJ Matson

 

This is from Nate Beeler of the Columbus Dispatch …

 

This one is from Rick McKee of the Augusta Chronicle …

 

This is from Taylor Jones

 

And this one is from Dave Granlund

 

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Blog Syndicate

The New House Speaker, Paul Ryan

Today the house Republicans voted to make Paul Ryan the new house speaker, replacing John Boehner who seems to have taken a responsible turn in negotiating a spending bill.

Paul Ryan was Mitt Romney’s running mate, and he has a history as a budget-cutting-wonk. He also had longer, puffier hair the last time around, which was much more fun to draw.

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Blog Syndicate

Republican Nooses

The Republicans infighting in congress is pretty crazy – enough for another noose cartoon. 

I seem to draw a lot of nooses. I draw lots of wordless cartoons and a noose is a good, simple, graphic threat. Here are the Republicans with a caduceus noose, from when they were trying to stop the government over and over, to protest Obamacare.

And here’s a more recent Trump tongue noose, when everyone, including me, thought that Donald Trumps provocative statements would knock him out of the presidential race – I was wrong; I guess I was playing too loose with that noose.

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Blog Syndicate

Republican Leadership Puzzle

The Republicans in the House of Representative are a real puzzle – so I decided to go with that for today’s cartoon. Perhaps this a little obtuse. I think that readers who are familiar with my work would be able to decipher my GOP elephant from just a tiny little puzzle piece, but this cartoon may go over the heads of many readers.

I thought it was possible that some readers (particularly elderly readers who love old-fashioned jigsaw puzzles) might actually cut the little pieces out and assemble the puzzle – and it actually works! SPOILER ALERT — scroll down to see the solution … or, is that really the solution … ?

AssembledGOPpuzzle

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Blog Syndicate

Republican Disarray!

The Republican battles for Speaker of the House make great theatre. Here’s my new one – a battle royale.

Here are a couple of oldies that I reposted because they seem so appropriate right now.

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Blog Cartoons Syndicate

John Boehner – No Mas!

House Speaker, John Boehner, just announced his resignation. I’m sorry to see him go, he’s a great character, although I didn’t draw him very often. Most of the cartoonists color him orange because of his unnatural tan, and I jumped on the bandwagon with that. Lucha Libre! (The color here is off, he’s not really that day-glow orange in the print version – I have a little compassion, at least in print.)

I also notice that politicians who are heavy smokers do a good job hiding their cigarettes whenever the cameras are around, so I make a point of giving those guys a cigarette in my cartoons. I did that for a while with Obama, but since he’s made an effort to quit, I quit giving him cigarettes also – although I notice that some conservative cartoonists still give him cigarettes.

The other thing to do with Boehner is to draw him crying. I suppose I should have given him a tear in his eye – just as I should do with the Statue of Liberty. Here’s a crying, quitting Boehner by my buddy, Rick McKee.

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Cartoons

Obama Trips Over the Capitol

143705 600 Obama Trips Over the Capitol cartoons