Here are the 13 most popular and most reprinted CagleCartoons for the week of March 29th through April 4th. These are the cartoons that editors download the most, in high resolution, to be published in their newspapers. Enjoy!
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Here’s a new batch of my old TRUE cartoons. I’m disappointed that so many of these are are dated and don’t hold up over time. I think the stats have only gotten worse in the past 20 years. I’m this batch, there must be twice as many taxing agencies, and the national debt must equal four times the number of grains of surface sand on Jones beach, times $2. I’m putting these up on PoliticalCartoons.com and CagleCartoons.com and I see that newspapers are starting to run them. I hope those newspapers aren’t counting grains of sand.
I’ve been occasionally accused of anti-Semitism in my cartoons criticizing Israel, here are a couple of examples. I drew this cartoon below during the last Israel/Hamas battle a few years ago.
My critics claimed that the helmet on the soldier resembled a Nazi soldier’s helmet, because of the jag at the base that covers the top of the soldier’s ear. I did a Google search at the time, to see what Israeli helmets look like, and they had the ear jag – still, Nazi helmets have a strong visual image. I also got complaints about the nose on the soldier being too big.
The second complaint was that I put the Star of David on the Israeli soldier’s helmet, rather than the Israeli flag, which is a rectangle with the Star of David with a blue stripe above and below. Putting the Star on the helmet implied that he was any Jew, rather than an Israeli soldier. I guess I would have done the whole flag on his helmet, if I had it to do over again.
Later, when a bunch of ships tried to break the blockade of Gaza and were attacked by Israel, I drew this related cartoon and didn’t get so much criticism – maybe because I softened the shape of the helmet over the ear (his nose is a little smaller, too).
From my e-mail box … somehow I don’t think Mr. Fish’s response to this reader will be satisfying to him.
Memorial Day cartoon from Mr. Fish.
Sent: Sunday, May 24, 2009 7:49 PM
To: cagle.com Subject: Mr. Fish Memorial Day “Cartoon”
Please tell Mr. Booth that although it is fair to humiliate politicians who unthinkingly send young men off to war, it his improper and unacceptably demeaning to belittle those who are brought up in the tradition of answering the call to arms when it comes. The cartoon is also unbelievably cruel to those who have lost family members in defense of our country.
Unless Mr. Booth can prove he served and put his tail on the line for this country, I suggest he keep his figurative mouth shut and ink bottled rather than make fun of a tradition that keeps us free and safe Without all Kevins, you would have a very small volunteer military indeed. And whether he agrees or not, we would be far less safe and fat and happy here if that were the case.
As a Former New Yorker, now living in Oklahoma, I further submit that since this tradition is strongest in the American South, Midwest and West, the cartoon is also brazenly elitist and sectionalist. I teach returning GI’s from Iraq and Afghanistan and Booth should be first in line to kiss the ground upon which these wonderful men and women walk.
I am so sorry you gave this piece of trash the light of day.
Bob Avakian Tulsa, Oklahoma
On May 25, 2009, at 1:04 PM, Daryl Cagle wrote:
Hola, Dwayne, Write a nice response and I’ll post it in the blog and newsletter. Best, Daryl
From: Mr. Fish Subject: Re: Mr. Fish Memorial Day “Cartoon” Date: Mon, 25 May 2009 14:28:21 -0700
Hey Bob,
I must respectfully disagree with your assertion that we must support and honor all men and women who choose to sacrifice their bodies to the perpetuation of massive amounts of violence in any war, particularly one predicated on hubristic goals with reprehensible consequences. Additionally, to address the broader implication of your note, to suggest that the tradition of any one nation engaged in war with another (or, in this particular circumstance, the tradition of one nation invading and then occupying another) be respected merely because it is a tradition is lazy at least and fascistic at worst. Remember, slavery was also a tradition. Should that atrocity be respected as well? Do you, Bob, raise your fist to the sky every morning and curse the fact that you have to dress yourself and prepare your own breakfast and rake your own yard? Or, more to the point, do you waste your time addressing emails to abolitionists in the past who felt it was their moral obligation to dispel the horrific myth that insisted indentured servitude was glorious and should be cherished and upheld for future generations? (I will now take a moment of silence so that you can sing Ol’ Man River with tears in your eyes.) Finally, committing brave servicemen and women to acts of criminal behavior in an illegal war and then saying that their intentions are really to uphold peace, democracy and humanitarian law, none of which apply to the situation at hand, is a treacherous sleight of hand and one that should be ridiculed. When an army is sent to commit a crime in the name of bureaucratic criminals, the nation is not being defended for me or anybody else. Instead, it is being made uglier and morally indefensible.
