Friday, May 23, 2008

Cartoon for May 24

Drawn largely in response to Hillary Clinton's victories in West Virginia and Kentucky.

Posted by at

36 comments:

  1. The Reverend Mr. SmithMay 23, 2008 at 9:18 PM

    Beautiful.

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  2. AnonymousMay 23, 2008 at 11:18 PM

    I'm rooting for Hillary Clinton because, 1) she's qualified to be President, 2) I'm fed up to HERE with the American-citizen BULLIES and the freaking New York Times pulling out all the stops to force Hillary to roll over just because Barack Obama is everyone's orphan puppy. Look how FAST the bullies jumped on Hillary's last 'controversial' comment. These Obama-lovers/Hillary-bashers are the same people who rolled over for George W. Bush, who bought Bush's used car with no wheels, no engine, a cardboard steering wheel and no papers. Makes one wonder if the virulent Hillary-bashers would do the same to their mothers or sisters if THEY were running for President. Probably. The Republicans THINK they can win easily if Hillary is the Democratic candidate. They are counting on the woman-bashing voters and pea brains. How little the Republican Party has changed, if at all. My country made me sick and ashamed by letting Bush hijack the White House twice. Now I's sick and ashamed that the same pinheads are trying to beat up on a qualified and combat-tested woman. And save the sniper jokes, folks. Hillary stood next to her husband during his governorship and Presidency when the Republican Party did everything short of assassination to get rid of Bill and Hillary Clinton. For SHAME! Remember this, too, fellow 'Mericans. Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, only backwards and in high heels. Grow up!

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  3. AnonymousMay 24, 2008 at 6:56 AM

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confederate_States_of_America

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  4. Marcia pappasMay 24, 2008 at 7:33 AM

    At least they're sending a positive message to all the little girls.

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  5. Kevin MooreMay 24, 2008 at 9:20 AM

    Did Ginger Rogers have servants?

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  6. Aggie DudeMay 24, 2008 at 10:21 AM

    ...and you know how much those West Virginia boys like little girls...

    I agree with the first commenter on many points, though I'm a classic example of an Obama supporter (young, highly educated, academic). I think Hillary has gotten pummeled and it's been really unfair. I think the Republicans know that deep down this country is too racist to vote for Obama, but they won't say anything about it yet.

    I don't think it's because they think Hillary will be easy to beat, I think Hillary would walk into the white house just on demographics alone. I think it's a combination of racism and Clinton Hysteria Syndrome that makes the rednecks prefer her to Obama, and Republicans blindly think she's a reject.

    I want Obama to win the nomination for one reason: This country needs to toe the line on race and truly ask itself if it'd rather have 4 more years of George W. Bush or vote for a black man. I think they'll talk themselves into the first choice, but I want to see those numbers, and then see all these "hard working, white Americans" dwell in the economic toilet.

    The reality is that Appalachia is not, and has never been, relevant to the country aside from extraction industries, that is why they didn't even get electricity until the 1950s.

    Obama doesn't have a class problem, he has a redneck problem. However, he won across the south, and the big states he probably will pick up in the general election are NC and VA.

    Love the cartoon, Ted, but if you keep showing me images of the confederate jack you're going to condemn me to staying in exile.

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  7. Seth WarrenMay 24, 2008 at 1:11 PM

    Crass stereotyping, Ted? I expected better from you.

    Anonymous 5/24/08 2:18 AM nailed it.

    And Aggie Dude, Obama has an arrogance problem. The more I'm exposed to him, the more I'm convinced that he is the George W. Bush of the left. The media is shoving Obama down our throats - just like they did with GW. Obama is declaring victory prematurely (presumptive? More like presumptuous nominee) just like GW (aided and abetted by the mainstream media). Furthermore it is little things like Obama's verbal gaffes - 57 states, great lakes in Oregon, Sunshine FL (the town is Sunrise), calling a reporter "Sweetie" (anyone remember GW giving the German chancellor an unwelcome backrub?). Also, Obama's denial of reality: he lost in West Virginia and Kentucky not because everyone there is a racist but because he doesn't campaign in states he thinks he can't win! He didn't even try for those states. By the assumption that losses in WV and KY equate to racism, I guess that means NY, PA, OH, NH, CA, MA, IN, MI and FL are chock full of rednecks as well? I don't buy it.

    This country does not need to "toe the line" on race. I will not vote for Obama because of the content of his character; I don't care about the colour of his skin. If he is the Democratic nominee, the party just turned me into a write-in or third-party voter.

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  8. KevinMay 24, 2008 at 8:20 PM

    No way Obama takes NC and VA in November. McCain can lock up the veteran vote, which is what, like 8-10 percent of all registered Tarheels? And not too shabby in VA either.

    Anyway, I could give a fuck about either Barack or Hillary. Neither one will help me in any way, shape or form. Their economic policies, even though they try to sell them as progressive, are STILL pitched over my head. I'm almost thirty, a college graduate, and I've never had a (civilian) job with health insurance, one with a union, or one in which I made over $10 an hour. Are Barack or Hillary going to introduce 1) a living wage, 2) universal free healthcare (and not just for babies, dammit!) or 3) economy-wide pro-union laws? No on all three counts. Look, I have a lot of sympathy for laid-off factory workers...it's just that even their unemployment checks are still bigger than any salary I've ever earned. "Redneck" is a derogatory term for a working-poor southerner, and if Hillary was honest about her love for them (hint: she's not, you rube) then that'd be just great. But in general, no one but the Green Party has ever tried to help the working poor WITHOUT patronizing us.

    Besides which, Cynthia McKinney (the presumptive Green candidate) is both black AND a woman. I'll stand back while your heads explode like sci-fi robots.

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  9. IncitatusMay 25, 2008 at 12:36 AM

    Aggie, Appalachia has been very relevant to folk music, as Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, and a few other commies more interesting than you knew all too well.
    Ted, thanks for yet another superb, non-prejudiced, progressive sterotype.

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  10. AnonymousMay 25, 2008 at 7:50 AM

    To Hillary loving Anonymous:

    Are you crazy? Hillary sucks because of her early and continued support of the war, among other reasons. I'd like to think that Obama gets more support from people who pay attention to policy, not gender/race politics. Hillary is purported to be better at getting the "regular folks" vote. If that's the case, is it because "regular folks" are simply ignorant?

    Ted Rall's swipes at Obama for being a "blank slate" are right on target. We don't know how bad Obama is going to be, but we already know that Clinton has a career built on being in bed with Wal-Mart and military-industrial complex.

    All this gender/race baiting is nauseating. As a white man, I'd gladly vote for an Africa American AND a woman, if the said black woman had the politics of Cynthia McKinney.

    -Dave

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  11. Aggie DudeMay 25, 2008 at 9:01 AM

    ....relevant to politics dude. Woody Guthrie and other commies spoke of the egregious inequality and corporate theft in Appalachia, and yet the people of Appalachia, like so many other groups in America, don't seem to ever connect the dots as to why they're suffering.

    Too many voting blocks in American political culture are like a battered spouse who perpetually rationalizes why they should stay.

    As for folk music, definitely relevant...but Dylan came from Minnesota...so I think it's a feeble argument to say that this makes Appalachia somehow ESPECIALLY relevant, as important folkies came from all over.

    As far as your snipe against commies, American grass-roots communism (really just socialism) is not authoritarian, totalitarian, or abusive, because it's true to the heart of why communalism is important. I take issue with the idea that "reds" get all lumped together as the quintessential bogeymen.

    As for Obama being another George W. Bush...anyone running for President has a healthy sense of their own ego, but the proof of the pudding is in the eating, and I don't think that comparison really holds up on qualitative assessment of policy stances.

    As for those wonderful hard working Americans, those common folk, this is American anti-intellectualism at its best...we can't trust intellectually gifted people because they're going to sell us to the commies...

    We live in an Idiocracy

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  12. The Reverend Mr. SmithMay 25, 2008 at 9:17 AM

    I have to point out, though, that Kentucky was NOT a Confederate state and in fact, West Virginia was formed when western Virginia seceded from the mother state to stay in the Union. Southern/Appalachian stereotyping bugs me. The Northeast, Midwest and West Coast are more segregated (and probably more racist) than the South, in my experiences. That being said, I saw a Confederate flag on a truck in Pittsburgh the other day, so misguided rubes are everywhere, of course.

    Suggested reading: The Redneck Manifesto by Jim Goad. Today's poor white trash are descended from people who were brought here in chains (and weren't sold into slavery by African slave traders, either).

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  13. AngeloMay 25, 2008 at 10:03 AM

    There seems to be a lack of historical perspective in our discussion. The record shows that these states are full of dimwits and dummies.

    1)West Virginia and Kentucky went to Bush in 2000 and 2004.
    (remember 2004 anyone?)
    2)In '96 Clinton beat Dole by less than one percent in Kentucky, but lost soundly in W.Virginia.
    3) 90% 0f the counties in "Appalachia" voted for Bush in 2004!!!
    4) My great great grandmother was living in Sicily during the civil war. Her daughter did not believe we went to the moon, but she knew that slavery was not that long ago!
    Integration is less than a generation old, and it had to be FORCED upon WV and KY. 150 years is two lifetimes. 40 years isn't even one.

    The amount of racist voters in those states is not insignificant when turnout is high. The amount of idiots remains constant.

    Ted's comic was too kind.

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  14. EdwardMay 25, 2008 at 1:53 PM

    It's not surprising there are Southern Democratic racists. After all it was the Democrats that fought to keep blacks in slavery and passed the discriminatory Black Codes and Jim Crow laws and gave us the KKK. MLK was fighting racist southern Democratswho stood in the school house doors, turned skin-burning fire hoses on blacks and let loose vicious dogs. Republican Eisenhower tried to push through the Cicl Rights Act of 1957 and sent troops to Arkansas to desegregate schools. Eisenhower also appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to the U.S. Supreme Court, which resulted in the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision ending school segregation.

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  15. danMay 25, 2008 at 2:04 PM

    i just want to recommend "deer hunting with jesus", as long as y'all are checking out jim goad.

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  16. AnonymousMay 25, 2008 at 2:22 PM

    Ted, once again you have proved your brilliance. Bro, not Hoe is so funny I about pissed myself. The offer for free beer still stands, if you ever get over this way. Bring the Texan, transplant and Angelo, we will have a laughing good time!!!! Beers on me.

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  17. AndersMay 25, 2008 at 2:25 PM

    The people of the South will never be truly Free until they strike the Andrew's cross from their Confederate flags and let them fly pure and red.
    Too bad about the illiteracy; Slums of literates are the breeding grounds of socialism.

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  18. AngeloMay 26, 2008 at 2:26 PM

    edward,

    pop quiz

    1) Who said the following about Earl Warren's appointment to the Supreme Court?:
    "the biggest damn-fool mistake I ever made"
    a) Lyndon B. Johnson
    b) John F. Kennedy
    c) Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
    d) Dwight D. Eisenhower

    2) Who said the following upon signing the Civil Rights act into law?:
    "We have lost the South for a generation"
    a) John F. Kennedy
    b) Lyndon B. Johnson
    c) Jethro Tull
    d) Dwight D. Eisenhower

    3) Which party holds the majority of House seats below the Mason-Dixon
    a) Nazi Party
    b) Republican party
    c) Democratic Party
    d) Green Party

    4) In 2004 President Bush swept___________.
    a) the floor
    b) the western conference semifinals
    c) the South's electoral-college votes
    d) your mom off her feet

    ***Bonus***
    5) Who was against abolition?
    a) Conservatives
    b) Liberals
    c) nihilists
    d) existentialists

    This quiz is due Tuesday. Your grades will be posted Tuesday night.

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  19. IncitatusMay 26, 2008 at 8:10 PM

    Angelo, the political labels you abide by (liberal vs conservative) meant little in the 1860s and not at all what they mean to you today. As a side note, "liberal" does not mean left-leaning in Britain or Australia. Lastly, not all who were for abolition were in favor of Lincoln's war, and not all who were in favor of war were abolitionists. But you already knew that.
    Aggie, I think Dylan owes very little of his inspiration to the great musical traditions of Minnesota as opposed to Appalachia. Have you ever heard Woody's singing?
    Now, the problem with Kansas (or Appalachia) is that working-class people across the world, unlike leftist so-called intellectuals, like making money and getting ahead in life much more than they like the idea of socialism. It doesn't help that young apparatchiks like yourself seem to despise them. At least in other countries, the commies make a pretense of liking them.

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  20. ClownstotheleftjokerstotherightMay 27, 2008 at 7:23 AM

    Ignorant, prejudicial stereotypes only seem to be okay if they're leveled against folks the left does not like. And, as always, Ted's cheering section (though NOT Ted himself) proves its own hypocracy and intolerance!

    Oh, and socialism is no less a pie-in-the-sky pipe dream than most religions. Both are based on an absurdly positive faith in humanity, and neither understands that human's are (regardless of race, creed, politics, whatever) selfish bastards who won't turn the other cheek. Likewise, "To each according to his needs from each according to his abilities" neglects to consider that there will ALWAYS be those who fake a lack of the latter to get more of the former.

    We ALL suck and always will.

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  21. ClownstotheleftjokerstotherightMay 27, 2008 at 7:38 AM

    Oh, and incitatus...

    HERE HERE! Though, logic, when spoken to aggie and Angelo, all too often falls on willfully partisan and deaf ears.

    That, by the way, is the fatal flaw of much of American socialism. Those who believe in it actually look down on those who would most benefit from it (if, ya know, it were actually POSSIBLe and not just silly).

    They're elitists who can only see life in terms of their own opinions and ideology. As Jed Leland once said (and as the carange that followed Mao's victory in China only goes to prove): If the poor in this country ever really got together... wooo boy. "Intellectuals" like aggie and Angelo (and me too by the way) would be among the first up against the wall.

    Their hatred of the regime with its boots on the neck of the poor is only exceeded by that they feel for the poor themselves.

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  22. AngeloMay 27, 2008 at 9:14 AM

    incitatus, I'll assume you agree that passage of the Civil Rights Act was not a conservative endeavor.

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  23. Aggie DudeMay 27, 2008 at 10:24 AM

    Angelo.....dropping the JT bomb...awesome :) I love Tull!!!

    Incitatus, I'm not a communist apparatchik, and I don't despise the people of Appalachia. I am, in fact, very fond of folk music, and have heard Woody Guthrie's singing.

    Dylan owes A GREAT DEAL to the folk scene in Minnesota, which has always been strong (ever heard of A Prairie Home Companion?) and still is.

    What I do despise, and I defend my intolerance of, is a celebration of rule by the incompetent, willfully ignorant, and bigoted. Shear numbers ('the masses') does not make for intelligent decision making. I am NOT elitist, nor am I undemocratic, for believing that we need to make sound, high quality decisions in spite of hordes of NASCAR dads and soccer moms reacting to fear mongering by political opportunists.

    There is nothing sacred about these people in their ignorance of the world outside their little social network, and at once you feel free to claim people like me don't live in the 'real world' and then celebrate the decision making prowess of people who can't accurately identify their own country on a world map.

    That is why I say we live in an Idiocracy.

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  24. ClownstotheleftjokerstotherightMay 27, 2008 at 1:14 PM

    Wow. What a whopper of a humdinger of a contradiction. You actually typed "I'm not an elitist" after one of the most disgustingly elitist screeds I've ever seen! I hope you were chortling while you did it.

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  25. ShinsengumihunterMay 27, 2008 at 5:41 PM

    aggie dude sez: "I'm not an elitist, I'm just better than most people!"

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  26. guilty white maleMay 27, 2008 at 8:47 PM

    I want to make sure I understand the last 2 cartoons correctly . . . If I vote for Hillary I'm a racist, if I vote for Obama I'm a sexist, right?

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  27. AngeloMay 28, 2008 at 1:10 AM

    If you voted for Bush for any other reason than you want to see the world plunged into chaos, I do look down upon you. As I sip my iced dry cafe americano with a dash of mineral water, I think to myself. This is the crime:

    You have forced me to abandon one of my core beliefs about human beings (the one about them all being equal).

    btw, edward, you got an F
    (and don't worry, I know no one here actually voted for Bush)

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  28. Aggie DudeMay 28, 2008 at 6:16 AM

    Don't put words in my mouth, Shinsen, I never have claimed to be "better than most people"

    I do claim to be smarter than the average American, but in a country that celebrates mediocrity and the "average," that's somehow a crime.

    Why?

    As I've said in previous comments, because The United States is afflicted with a really pungent form of anti-intellectualism that celebrates 'the common man' in a near religious fashion, while people who really ARE elitist, self-centered and have a nasty attitude toward others in the world take the votes of those "hard working, good Americans" and rob this country blind.

    Obama has an arrogance problem?? ALL presidential candidates are arrogant, but certainly Obama is the least condescending of all of the current candidates.

    Of course if I say "this is as obvious as global warming or evolution" I get bombarded with "you're an elitist."

    Just like anyone else who tries to make a critique of idiotic behavior in American society, we're all somehow untrustworthy scum for having chosen to be educated and work toward getting the right answers to things.

    The media portrays the best candidates for leadership as those you'd like to get folksy with and have a beer. I for one sure as hell want someone smarter than me running the country, but they get tagged as 'elitist' too.

    Windsurfing showed how smug John Kerry was (supposedly), but all the Vietnam deferrals of the Bush Administration don't?

    And yet I get raked over the coals for saying "what the hell is wrong with you people!?"

    NO NO NO, anti-intellectualism is what leads to societies like the Nazis, Imperial Japan, modern day Myanmar....freakin' Lord of the Flies.

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  29. bsdMay 28, 2008 at 9:10 AM

    Aggie, I address the below to you in the spirit of debate….nothing personal.

    Distilling several of your thread posts down, I believe you have advocated:

    1. the American masses are ignorant and easily manipulated
    2. leaders have used fear to manipulate the masses into letting them (the leaders) achieve their agenda
    3. You do not like the leader’s agenda

    As an answer to 2 and 3 above, you want to do the manipulating with intelligent arguments to achieve your agenda. The means are different, but the end is the same (an oligarchy manipulating the masses).

    I happen to agree with your agenda, but you still have to recognize the above similarities. I think we might have to come to grips with the fact maybe Americans on the whole want to be rich at the expense of others (including other Americans), as stated by incitatus earlier in the thread.

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  30. Jana C.H.May 28, 2008 at 12:19 PM

    I'm with you, Aggie. I never want to vote for anyone who's not smarter and better-informed than I am.

    Not only that, I find knowledge and intelligence exciting. When Al Gore turns all wonky it sends thrills up my spine. To hell with your folksy bottle of beer! Give me a glass of artisan hard cider and a lively intellectual discussion any day.

    Jana C.H.
    Seattle
    Saith WSG: Nothing is more annoying than to feel that you’re not equal to the intellectual pressure of the conversation.

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  31. Aggie DudeMay 28, 2008 at 3:13 PM

    bsd, I accept your critique of my position, though I believe that intellectual argument based on an open and transparent process is a more inclusive and honest process, which will result in a better outcome. I disagree that the ends would be the same, because transparency in the process allows for full disclosure of what it takes to sit at the table where decisions are made.

    I see no reason why my thoughtful, deliberative and methodical approach to an issue should be drowned out by "you unpatriotic commie traitor," but in essence this has happened many times.

    I question both the agenda of our leaders and the motive, and I also think that my agenda is substantively better because it's not rooted in my desire for power, but a desire to return the best decision possible on each issue. The need for that level of expertise in fact rules me out of the vast majority of public service decisions, and I'm fine with that.

    It's not too much to ask for a just and lawful government, even if in the end it is still an oligarchy in form. So long as anyone can achieve access and a fair hearing, it's the best we can do.

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  32. ClownstotheleftjokerstotherightMay 29, 2008 at 5:10 PM

    YOu only think it's not about power. Indeed, right now it may not even be. But, should you somehow come to power, you'd change pretty damn quick. Mao, pre-'49 was largely a honorable (in a violent, realistic way perhaps, but once he came to power he went bad fast.

    Sometimes the best of intentetions give the worst of results.

    I said it before and I'll say it again. We ALL suck and always will.

    There are no good guys. There is no right and wrong. There is nothing good or bad on earth but thinking makes it so...

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  33. Aggie DudeMay 30, 2008 at 7:17 AM

    Clown, that's the logic I hear people use for their continued support of Republicans in the wake of mounting evidence of corruption and violation of the law, and it's what keeps the Democrats losing even though they're the one's advocating the policy most agreed with:

    "Well, with a Republican you know where they stand" But it's not even true that they do, and further allows these criminals to get off the hook.

    Maybe YOU suck...and maybe MOST PEOPLE suck...but not everyone. Furthermore, regardless of this, it's the act that matters. I would never place myself in a position of absolute power, and yes, I know, by the time I got there it'd just be all about the power.

    But I still wish people would stop using that excuse as a reason that it's OK to support a criminal regime time and time again.

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  34. AngeloMay 30, 2008 at 9:38 AM

    Mao's problem was the same as Reagan's. They did not do their homework.

    According to Marx, you have to go through capitalism. You can't skip from feudalism straight to socialism. You can't skip any steps.

    Reagan had it all ass backwards. Finding himself in the middle of capitalism, he tried to go back to feudalism.

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  35. Aggie DudeMay 30, 2008 at 1:53 PM

    We have always been somewhat feudal, actually, and we're regressing back to it with great haste now. The 20th century experiments with post-feudal governing forms are over. They all failed, but for different reasons (fascism got beat up, totalitarianism caved from the inside under its own weight, and democracy got purchased bargain rates).

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  36. AngeloJune 3, 2008 at 10:46 AM

    The 20th century experiments with post-feudal governing forms are over.

    Feudalism is fine with me if it cuts down on commodity fetishism.
    I hate that shit.
    Surplus labor should be split between the laborer and the protector.

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