This is Historic Times » Congress

That’s A Paddlin’

deephurting — Sat, 03 Sep 2011 21:25:50 +0000

I began drawing this cartoon at least a month ago, but when it was nearly finished, decided on something else, and shelved it.

I was planning on drawing something on Global Warming on Thursday, but when I read the news about the President caving to the GOP yet again, I thought it gave this gag some renewed relevance, so I finished inking it and then spent a ridiculous amount of time coloring it. I really need to find a speedier coloring technique–there’s got to be a way to get the same look in a fraction of the time it usually takes me.

As I said, I was originally planning a cartoon on Global Warming for today. I hope to follow this one up with that one, and a cartoon addressing the exploitation of 9/11. Stay tuned.

Neo Cons

deephurting — Sun, 17 Jul 2011 04:50:02 +0000

It’s become increasingly common for Republican Congresspersons lately to refer to the obscenely wealthy as “job creators” in their quest to deflect the burden for government spending onto the poor and the middle class instead of those who can actually afford it without giving up a meal. Since recent history shows that cutting taxes for the rich didn’t prevent the high unemployment and other economic problems the US is currently experiencing, the relationship they’re trying to draw is pretty unreasonable–if there’s a correlation at all, it seems more likely to me that the tax cuts, as well as other giveaways to corporations (such as various deregulations), probably caused the recession, and continuing that trend is bound not to help.

This cartoon compares this blatant economic trickery to the “shell game” or cup-and-ball routine, both of which being sleight-of-hand used for centuries to con desperate or unsuspecting dupes out of money by presenting them with what appears to be a simple gambling game which is in fact impossible to win. The crowds surrounding a victim in this con are usually composed of shills or “muscle” whose job it is to either make the game appear to be winnable, keep the victim from leaving, or watch out for police (although the cop in this cartoon doesn’t really seem to be all that effective at protecting the public from these crooks, eh?). Another well-known form of the same basic trick is the Three-card Monte.

Weiner of Mass Distraction

deephurting — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 14:00:22 +0000

I avoided doing anything on the recent Anthony Weiner Twitter scandal basically for its entirety. There was enough nonmentary throughout the media that I didn’t figure there was any sense in me adding to it unless I happened to come up with a perspective that was unique, or at least not being explored very much.

In my opinion, the important thing here isn’t what Weiner was accused of in the first place–it’s that he lied about it. That’s the part of this story that’s bigger than one man. It’s the latest incident illustrating how some members of Congress and other governmental institutions think they can be flagrantly dishonest to their constituents and suffer no consequences for it.

What baffles me is that people who can howl for blood and run a person out of office over lies about his or her inconsequential fetishes and affairs couldn’t get so worked up about having the nation plunged into economic disaster and hundreds of thousands of lives pointlessly extinguished by a war based on fabricated threats. I’m sure many of those who called for Anthony Weiner’s resignation (or demanded such from President Clinton when he was embroiled in his own scandal) are the same ones who defended the lies and treason of the Bush Administration, and probably do so to this day without any awareness of the irony.

When I mentioned this to a friend on Thursday, shortly after hearing about the Congressman’s resignation, he said, “Well, it’s too late to impeach Bush and his cronies now.” That may be so, but as long as they live it won’t be too late to punish big liars like them, both for the purpose of justice, and to send a message to other big liars, and smaller liars like Anthony Weiner: When you speak to the public, speak the truth, especially when you’re working at the public’s behest.

Gorilla Radio

deephurting — Sat, 11 Jun 2011 21:29:10 +0000

This cartoon comments on the PROTECT IP Act, which found its way through Congress last month before being put on hold by Senator Ron Wyden due to serious concerns over its broadness and its potential effects on the Domain Name System, which associates URLs with servers’ IP addresses. The bill remains in limbo at this time, but still hasn’t been struck down, and continues to be strongly criticized by internet security experts, people like Google CEO Eric Schmidt, and pretty much anyone else who values individual freedom of speech over the “rights” of dinosaur trade organizations like the MPAA and the RIAA to continue taking advantage of their customers and content-producers.

The RIAA, of course, is at this point better-known for its business model of suing dead people and children instead of making and distributing music. Its sister organization, the MPAA, also seems to have figured out that it doesn’t really do anything anymore except put dopes in suits between consumers and content-producers. It’s not surprising that they would champion (and, I imagine, had an active hand in crafting) bills like PROTECT IP as a last-ditch power-grab, to offset their obvious and increasing irrelevance.

I actually finished a different version of this cartoon early Thursday morning, but I wasn’t happy with the composition, both because it was boring, and because the arrangement of elements didn’t emphasize a direct-enough line of action from the apes to the subject of their ire. It looked too much like the ape with the club might have its back entirely to the laptop. So, rather than put it up on this site, I scrapped what I had already done and redrew the cartoon from scratch. I’m glad I did, because the above is a much tighter (and funnier) illustration. The apes in this one don’t just look angry, but also look kind of afraid, which was perhaps the biggest improvement over the first illustration. And while the addition of the chimps doesn’t really add another layer of meaning, I do enjoy their facial expressions quite a bit.

Gusher

deephurting — Fri, 27 May 2011 14:00:44 +0000

As promised last week, here is a cartoon on Congress’s recent decision not to eliminate enormous tax breaks for Big Oil. I finished it later than I wanted to, because I spent some time earlier in the week practicing some caricature that didn’t turn out.

The oil companies represented here are the so-called “Supermajors”: Shell, BP, Exxon-Mobile (with his back to the viewer), and Total, along with Chevron, Texaco, and Halliburton. Missing from the pack is Conoco-Phillips, because their main logo (much like Exxon’s) wouldn’t easily adapt to the above treatment, and I forgot 76 is one of their brands.

Originally, I was going to caricature the various heads of each company I included and then label their outfits with their corporate logos, but I thought that would make the logos too hard to identify at a small size, hence what I did here instead. In spite of the above-mentioned issues with Exxon and Conoco, as well as the fact that I hated trying to copy the BP logo by hand, I think it worked out pretty well–Chevron just looks so darn happy!

Since Congress and Obama chose to renew expiring provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act on Thursday, I’m guessing my next cartoon will be on that. Hopefully I’ll finish it earlier in the week than I finished this one. In the meantime, here’s an old cartoon I did on the same subject in 2009.

Pyramid Scam

deephurting — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 12:00:14 +0000

I stayed up several hours tonight coloring this cartoon, but ultimately decided it looked better in black and white.

This piece addresses the White House’s recently released Federal budget proposal, and how the squeeze is being put on programs that benefit the middle class and the poor in order to satisfy the demands of the defense budget, and the tax cut “compromise” made between the President and the GOP to continue giving tax breaks to the wealthy. The GOP is represented here by Speaker of the House John Boehner, although I admit he’s not very recognizable at this scale.

American Golgothic

deephurting — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 14:27:04 +0000

This cartoon addresses Congress’s failure to pass the DREAM Act.

Since it’s Christmas, I thought it might be appropriate, funny, and thought-provoking to ironically compare the Christ child to the offspring of poor, illegal immigrants, thus highlighting the hypocrisy of people on the Religious Right who preach Jesus-this and God-that while at the same time bellowing about how much they hate illegal immigrants and want to kick both them and their children out of the country.

I’m extremely happy with how this turned out–particularly the thousand-yard-stare on the face of that donkey in the background.

Fox (News) Retakes (Hen) House!

deephurting — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 11:24:31 +0000

I was planning a different cartoon for Election Day, but developed the above idea before finishing it, and decided it’d be better, and that the one I was planning would stay more relevant for a bit longer. So I set the other cartoon aside and drew this one up first.

The news that the GOP has retaken control of the House of Representatives is hardly surprising, and it’s not as if the Democrats were doing anything they were put there to do. Of course, Republicans are sure to put the brakes on any progress that was being made, tortoise-like though it was. That’s what the insane loudmouths in the tea party demand, after all (that, and increased persecution and/or enslavement of anybody who isn’t a Straight White Christian Male).

I thought this cartoon would be a clever and meaningful way to sum up the election results, since it compares Democrats to chickens, compares Republicans to a well-known destructive farm pest (which happens to be one of several unfortunate symbols they’ve chosen to represent themselves), and compares the electorate to a senile old hillbilly farmer.

I’m planning on sending this cartoon out to a few newspapers, to see if any of them are interested in carrying it, since I haven’t really seen anything on the topic that’s better. If you live in a city with a big paper (especially one with a national edition), you can help me out by suggesting they pick this cartoon up, since it’ll probably mean more to them coming from a reader than it will coming from the artist himself.

Tortoise Wins by a Hair!

deephurting — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 11:00:00 +0000

Here’s my cartoon on the historic healthcare reform vote which occurred a few days ago. This was among my more positive ideas for commentary on the subject.

Some readers may recognize the title as a reference to this classic Bob Clampett cartoon.

Also, I want to thank everybody who donated money to me recently, since I brought it up in the previous post. Pretty sure this means I’ll be able to pay my rent next month!

Inaction Comics

deephurting — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 12:39:04 +0000