Thursday, July 15, 2010

Q Toon: Honest Barry

Goodness gracious, I was so busy planning the Palin-Johnston wedding that I plumb never got around to posting the cartoon yesterday!

At any rate, I seem to be in an American History mode this month. A couple of weeks ago, I drew the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and this week it's Barack Obama as Abe Lincoln.

The inspiration comes from a TV ad for an insurance company featuring Honest Abe Lincoln and his wife, Mary Todd Lincoln. I'm counting on the reference being obvious, but I mention this just in case that particular company doesn't advertise in your neck of the woods.

Or perhaps this ad doesn't run south of the Mason-Dixon line. Given the Texas School Board's demand for textbooks that promote, among other things, the Confederate point of view of what they don't call the Civil War, "Honest Abe" may not be a term southern schoolchildren have been exposed to. The insurance company may choose to run its gecko ads there instead.

Of course, the ad itself is based on an even older comedic pretense than last week's "That is not my dog," so even a reader from outside the United States who has never seen any of this insurance company's ads ought to be able to appreciate some part of the gag here.

And getting back to my apparent penchant for drawing on American history for my cartoons lately, only a few months ago I drew President Obama as a Civil War era general's statue.

The tone of today's political debate may have something to do with the recurrence of that particular point of American history in my cartoons about this president.

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