First, a little background on this cartoon. Back in 2006, former Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson had this to say about the "individual mandate," the feature of Romneycare that required all Massachusetts residents to buy health insurance whether they wanted to or not:
“This is a little bit opposed to what Republicans really think, but the truth of the matter is that just like automobile insurance; you gotta have coverage.”
...And in October 2009, Thompson joined former House Democratic Leader Dick Gephardt in calling the Senate Finance Committee version of the [Obamacare] bill “an important first step” that “moves us down the path of providing affordable high-quality health care for all and expanding coverage for millions.”Now Thompson is running for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate. He has a TV commercial out in which he stands next to a STOP sign, a cornfield in the background, and pledges to stop Obamacare and repeal that pesky individual mandate so that he can replace it with ... well, something. You know, deregulation and stuff, like the Republicans did with the banks.
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Lastly, a few words about the nuts and bolts of the cartoon. I drew this cartoon on a sheet of Mead "Académie" drawing paper. I've had this pad for ages, because in spite of being advertised as "a textured, heavyweight (80#) drawing paper crafted to provide excellent results for pencil, ink, pastel, and color markers," it bleeds like a stuck pig. By "ink," they must mean ball-point pen ink, because india ink bleeds out in all directions (including onto the next page). It also claims to be "durable enough to accept watercolors," which I find hard to believe.I had to edit the computer scan of this cartoon to put white in the whites of Thompson's eyes where bleeding ink had filled them in. But doing the same around all the lettering would be like redrawing the cartoon from scratch.
Which I might have done if I weren't so sure that Tommy is going to be upset in next month's primary.
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