Got the Kit As Well As the Kaboodle

Today's Graphical History Tour serves up some leftover turkey from Thanksgiving Day, 1925.

"Your Uncle Sam Is Good at This" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. Nov. 26, 1925

Editorial cartoonists greeted Thanksgiving a century ago with confidence and exuberance that the nation was awash in good times. The United States happily enjoyed peace and prosperity, even if the rest of the world was still recovering from World War I, revolting against colonial occupiers, or fighting to put down rebellious colonies.

"Some Stuffin'" by Ed Gale in Los Angeles Times, Nov. 26, 1925

Ed Gale lays out his specific ingredients for Uncle Sam's turkey stuffing. I'm not as confident as he was, however, that farmers in 1925 were enjoying prosperity as much as the auto makers, railroad barons, construction trades, and radio stations.

"Truly Thankful" by Dean O'Dell in Dayton Daily News, Nov. 26, 1925

A reader left a comment on my cartoon last week of Donald Napoleon Trump shushing Miss Columbia; she wondered when it was that the female characterization of the United States went out of fashion. That might be a topic for a future Graphical History Tour; but for now, here Columbia is settling down for Thanksgiving dinner with her male counterpart, Uncle Sam.

I was a bit surprised to come across her in Dean O’Dell’s cartoon; her star was fading by 1925. She rarely appeared in editorial cartoons any more, except at the bier of deceased presidents. 

"Uncle Sam Will Take a Little of the Stuffing" by Wm. A. Rogers in Washington Post, Nov. 26, 1925

I'm not quite as surprised to find Miss Columbia serving Thanksgiving dinner in this cartoon by William A. Rogers. This is very late in Rogers's career, which began when he succeeded Thomas Nast at Harper's Weekly in 1877, a time when Columbia was a frequent subject of editorial cartoons. (Dean O'Dell, in contrast to the 71-year-old Rogers, was 35 in 1925, ten years into a thirty-year cartooning career.)

What really separates Rogers's cartoon from the rest in today's post is how he uses the holiday occasion not to celebrate but to complain: that "Big U.S. Banker" and the European powers represented at the Locarno conference (see last Saturday's post) — even "Little Belgium" — are going to leave poor old Uncle Sam with nothing but a little of the stuffing.

Well, every party needs its pooper.

"Dr. Hoover Makes His 1925 Report" by Clifford Berryman in Washington Evening Star, Nov. 8, 1925

Just for some context, here are a couple of cartoons celebrating the heady economic news coming out of Washington D.C. Clifford Berryman's cartoon depicts Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover delivering an excellent bill of health to Uncle Sam.

"Having the Time of His Life" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. Nov. 12, 1925

Neither Berryman nor Dorman Smith could know that within months of Herbert Hoover taking the presidential oath of office four years later, that crashing sound from Wall Street would hardly be music to anybody's ears.

"Let Us Repair to the Dining Room" by Bill Donahey in Cleveland Plain Dealer, Nov. 26, 1925

But we return now to Thanksgiving 1925, and the requisite eating, drinking, and being merry, for tomorrow is always a day away.

"Thanksgiving at Aunt Maria's" by Archibald Chapin for New York Tribune, Nov. 26, 1925

Archibald Chapin overloaded this cartoon with labels, and since the print is probably too small for any of you reading this on a handheld screen, I'll give you some description. Those seated around the table include "the young man from the county seat," Cousin Dottie, Grandma Wyatt, the Minister, Aunt Maria, Aunt Abbie, Uncle Ham, Cousin Stella, the minister's wife, and Uncle George. Cousin Ada's chair is empty because she's heading to the kitchen. Three children are in another doorway "waiting for the second table." I'll forgo reciting all the dishes on the table and buffet, save to note that there are turkey, ham, and oysters, and two each of cakes and pies.

Chapin's Aunt Maria is saying to The Minister on her right: "Really, Brother Stephens, I'm sorry we haven't much to eat this Thanksgiving." And I should probably point out that Aunt Maria could have been Hispanic or Italian but probably wasn't; the name is common in Scandinavian and Germanic countries as well.

Authoritative cartooning historians tell me that Chapin was employed by the Philadelphia Morning Ledger and syndicated by Ledger Syndicate in 1925, yet this cartoon and others of his that year sport copyright notices crediting the New York Tribune. My guess is that the Tribune was distributing Chapin's cartoons during the illness that kept Jay N. "Ding" Darling away from his drawing board for much of 1925 and early '26.

In conclusion, here's a cautionary tale against gluttony, even if it comes too late for anyone whose eyes were bigger than their waistlines on Thursday:

"I Warned Him His Appetite Would Be the Death of Him" by J.P. Alley in Memphis Commercial Appeal, Nov. 26, 1925

But I have to quibble with Doc Featherbones's post mortem diagnosis. It wasn't Tom's own appetite what done him in.

Do Not Adjust Your Set

How come spaceships on Star Trek only meet each other head-on, face-to-face? Someday, I'd like to see a Star Trek episode in which the Enterprise meets a ship approaching at a perpendicular angle, or even upside down.

And then when the viewscreen shows the other ship's captain and bridge crew, so are they.

Q Toon: Scoff Drops

Leo and Max, my heteropolitical homosexual couple, are back. And they have a dog!

Earlier this month, the CDC website under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Felcher Kennedy Jr. began promoting the unfounded fantasy that vaccines cause autism. Turning 180 degrees from its previous position, the U.S. public health agency's now purports, "The claim 'vaccines do not cause autism' is not an evidence-based claim because studies have not ruled out the possibility that infant vaccines cause autism."

RFK and a cottage industry of flat-earthers and alien abductees have been promoting a link between vaccines (the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine in particular, but not exclusively) based on a 1998 study which has long since and many times been discredited. The Lancet, which had published it, formally retracted its claims in 2010. Ten of its 13 authors had earlier done likewise. Its primary author, Andrew Wakefield, has since been stripped of his medical license in his native Britain for falsifying timelines and misrepresenting the case histories of his study's subjects.

But the present U.S. kakistocracy has replaced medical professionals at HHS and the CDC with unqualified bamboozlers whose main qualifications are that they claim know where Elvis lives and recommend sugar-loaded gum for patients who brush their teeth. Having brain worms, a history of drug abuse, and a penchant for cringeworthy love "poetry" is a plus.

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine has issued a statement criticizing the CDC's new language:

It is important to point out that the 2012 Institute of Medicine report assessing adverse effects of vaccines and cited by the CDC, found that very few health problems are caused by or clearly associated with vaccines. Further, based on our body of work on this topic and the overwhelming scientific consensus, we support the statement that vaccines do not cause autism.

There is a substantial body of work, including expert reports from the National Academies, dating back decades analyzing data and providing guidance on the important question of childhood vaccine safety.  That work has affirmed that childhood vaccines are safe for the general population with long-established benefits of preventing illness and averting death.

For a second opinion, the American Medical Association concurs:

"Vaccination is essential to protect individuals and communities from preventable diseases, making it a fundamental element of public health. The AMA is deeply concerned that perpetuating misleading claims on vaccines will lead to further confusion, distrust, and ultimately, dangerous consequences for individuals and public health.”

And from the American Association of Pediatrics:

 “The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website has been changed to promote false information suggesting vaccines cause autism. Since 1998, independent researchers across seven countries have conducted more than 40 high-quality studies involving over 5.6 million people. The conclusion is clear and unambiguous: There’s no link between vaccines and autism. Anyone repeating this harmful myth is misinformed or intentionally trying to mislead parents. 

"We call on the CDC to stop wasting government resources to amplify false claims that sow doubt in one of the best tools we have to keep children healthy and thriving: routine immunizations. The American Academy of Pediatrics stands with members of the autism community who have asked for support in stopping this rumor from spreading any further.”

Thanksgiving Week's Sneak Peek

It's time to catch up on the boys this week.

They can get into arguments even without having family over for dinner, but they have promised to be on their best behavior this holiday weekend.

If we don't see you before then, happy Thanksgiving!

Awakening the Spirit of Locarno

Our Graphical History Tour, as is so often its wont (where there’s a will, there’s a wont), journeys back a century ago to check up on international developments, this time in the late fall.

"Prins Locarno en Sneeuwwitje" by Louis Raemaekers in De Telegraff, Amsterdam, Nov. 21, 1925

The major European powers reached a peacekeeping agreement at Locarno, Switzerland. A series of treaties were initialed in mid-October, 1925 for official signature on December 1.

"Got Him Going" by Arthur G. Racey in Montreal Star, Nov. 28, 1925

Not everyone was involved in the Locarno conference, however. Racey depicts Russia and the U.S. peering over the fence while Mr. Globehead punches War in the nose. Racey has helpfully written Great Britain, Belgium, France, Germany, and Italy on Mr. Globehead's pate.

It must be pointed out that the conference was strictly among countries of western Europe. No eastern European countries were invited; nor were any nations of Asia, Africa, or the Americas.

"The Real Treaty of Peace" by Wm. A. Rogers in Washington Post, Oct./Nov., 1925

The view from the U.S. was nevertheless hopeful. W.A. Rogers tended to be skeptical of international agreements, so one could perhaps interpret this cartoon to suggest the possibility that the Locarno agreement might fall short of a "real treaty of peace"; he seats Poland at the table even though Poland was not represented at the conference.

You may recall where World War II was started.

"Inside the Breakwater" by Nelson Harding in Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Nov. 29, 1925

Nelson Harding's cartoon acknowledged that the agreement would not bring an end to war, but believed that it would keep war from European shores.

"Hier Stehe Ich" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, Nov. 8, 1925

Arthur Johnson meant the above cartoon, drawn sometime around Reformation Day, depicting German Chancellor Hans Luther quoting Martin Luther, as a rebuke of the warlike inclinations of Germany's rivals. The armored knights on the right side of the cartoon include British negotiator Austen Chamberlain and French representative Aristide Briande, while the monk behind Hans/Martin Luther bears resemblance to German delegate Gustav Stresemann.

"Mussolini Furioso" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, Nov. 22, 1925

I do not recognize a representative of Italy in Johnson's November 8 cartoon. Italian dictator Benito Mussolini gets the starring role in his cover cartoon of November 22 after Il Duce gave a speech in Rome glorifying war at what was supposed to be a celebration of the Locarno accords.

I may not have translated the last word of the caption, “Gottstrammbach,” accurately. Literally “God tight stream,” the best I’ve been able to determine is that it’s some sort of colloquialism in Saxony.

"De Aanslag op Mussolini" by Leendert Jordaan in de Notenkraker, Nov. 14, 1925

Speaking of Signore Mussolini: Tito Zaniboni, a former Socialist deputy, was arrested on November 4 for plotting to assassinate Mussolini during a planned public speech. Mussolini seized upon the plot — he may even have engineered it himself — as an excuse to consolidate power and imprison political rivals.

"The True Status of Benito" by "O. Zim" Zimmerman in Daily Worker, Chicago, Nov. 27, 1925

The communists at the Daily Worker labored under the misapprehension that Mussolini was somehow held by the chains of banker J.P. Morgan. This surely would have come as a surprise to Mussolini himself.

"She Had So Many Children She Didn't Know What to Do" by Edward G. McCandish in Washington Post, Oct. 31, 1925

Getting back to the prospects for world peace: Edward McCandish outlined the international disputes outside the Locarno accords' purview. Spain continued their suppression of the Riffian revolt in Morocco. French forces, while also helping put down the Riffian revolt, were forcibly quelling the Hama uprising against French rule in Syria. And Bulgarian soldiers crossed into Greece in "The War of the Stray Dog," a brief skirmish in October allegedly sparked when a Greek soldier chasing a dog across the countries' border was shot and killed.

"This Ought to Be Easy to Settle" by John Knott in Dallas News, Oct./Nov., 1925

The errant sentry and a captain were killed before the Bulgarians withdrew. Greece demanded an apology and reparations, and mobilized its military to occupy the Bulgarian border town of Petrich to enforce its demands.

"Premature" by Rollin Kirby in New York Evening World, Oct./Nov., 1925

The League of Nations stepped in and quickly resolved the conflict between Bulgaria and Greece, which Rollin Kirby* held up as proof to the doubting "Irreconcilables" in Congress that the League could act, and act decisively.

Bulgaria issued an apology for its soldiers' actions and agreed to pay compensation to the first two Greek soldiers' families. The League of Nations made Greece pay Bulgaria to compensate for the occupation of and civilian death toll in Petrich.

"Something Else Again" by Wm. Sykes in Philadelphia Public Ledger, Oct./Nov. 1925

As for Franco-Syrian hostilities, France would quash the Hama uprising by late November, capturing its leaders and bombarding Damascus from air and ground, resulting in large-scale destruction and a death toll in the thousands. Occasional guerilla attacks by the Syrians continued for the next two years, but without achieving independence.

――――――――

* Tour Guide's Note: My source credited the "Premature" cartoon to Bill Sykes, I believe incorrectly. I find no signature on the cartoon, either because it is missing or cropped out, but the style, and the copyright line included in the original source indicate to me that Rollin Kirby was the probable cartoonist.

Q Toon: Just Deserted

The Supreme Court declined to hear Kim Davis's appeal of a $100,000 judgment against her in suit brought against her by David Moore and David Ermold because she refused to issue them a marriage license.

Davis was elected Rowan County Clerk as a Democrat in 2014, a position whose job description includes the issuing of marriage licenses. When the Supreme Court's Obergefell decision made marriage equality the law of the land in 2015, the Davids applied for a marriage license; but she refused "under God's authority" and told them to go to some other county. She then went further and stopped issuing marriage licenses to all applicants to protest the prospect of having to issue them to same-sex couples.

Two different lawsuits followed: one by Moore and Ermold, who contended that she had violated their constitutional right to marry; and one challenging her refusal to issue any marriage licenses. In the latter case, U.S. District Judge David Bunning ordered Davis to issue licenses to both gay and straight couples. That prompted Moore and Ermold to try once again to obtain a license, but Davis and her deputies rejected that request, as well. Kentucky eventually enacted a law that would accommodate county clerks like Davis by removing their names and signatures from the forms used for marriage licenses. 

Moore and Ermold’s case against Davis went to trial, and a jury awarded each of them $50,000. Davis then appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit, which upheld that award. It rejected Davis’ argument that requiring her to issue a marriage license to Moore and Ermold would have violated her First Amendment right to freely exercise her religion. In that court’s view, because Davis was acting on behalf of the government when she refused to issue the license, her actions were not protected by the First Amendment. 

In the meantime, Davis switched her party affiliation to Republican as the Grand Old Party rallied around her as a cause celebre. Republican Presidential candidates fought over who got to champion her case loudest (see this cartoon). Rowan County voters, however, threw her out of office in the next election.

Marriage equality advocates were quite worried that the current Supreme Court would seize on Davis's case as a vehicle to overturn Obergefell. The right-wing supermajority on the Court today includes three of the justices who ruled in the minority, two of whom, Thomas and Alito, have been very vocal in their continued opposition to the decision. They have been joined by Trump appointees who have demonstrated that their lip service to the concept of stare decisis ain't worth a 2015 penny.

This Supreme Court has already decreed that wedding cake bakers, florists, and pharmacists are free to discriminate against whomever they dislike, provided they claim that God made them do it. And along comes Davis asking to extend the privilege to public servants.

So virtually everyone was surprised when the Court refused to hear her appeal. One has to assume that the current majority thought that Davis's case made for lousy law.

They're probably waiting for another case better suited to putting an end to same-sex marriage, even when the County Clerk is pleased to assist the happy couple.

Toon: Quite Piggy

A short while ago, I suggested the possibility that perhaps it was time for me to retire drawing Donald Old Major Trump with a pig snout.

And now he goes and snaps "Quiet, Piggy!" at a female reporter for deigning to ask him about his name appearing many, many times in the Epstein e-mails released the other day. To paraphrase something I read in the blogosphere this morning, every time you think his regime has hit rock bottom, a trap door opens.

I decided to use Miss Columbia in my cartoon. She used to be the most common cartoon representation of this country, even before Uncle Sam, although she might not be familiar to any of you who were born after, oh, 1945. Especially drawn from behind like this.

My alternative choices were Lady Liberty and the statue of Justice. But neither represent the U.S. in its entirety, only particular aspects of it, so I went with Columbia.

And the pig snout remains for the foreseeable future.

✍

This is not this week's Q Toon; I plan to post it somewhat later than usual tomorrow just to give this cartoon a little time to breathe.

This Week's Sneak Peek

In lieu of a snippet from this week's cartoon, here's one from September of 2015, since we were just the other day mentioning Ted Cruz's presidential campaign from that year.

Now he's sporting a scraggly beard, Ambassador Mike Huckabee is hawking sleeping pills on late-night TV, and Kim Davis... well, tune in again later this week.

The Toons of November Remembered

Rummaging through the archives in Bergetoons' state-of-the-art plastic bins, our Graphical History Tour guides have run across my cartoon about funding the federal government forty years ago this month.

in UW-Parkside Ranger, Kenosha Wis., Nov. 7, 1985

There's a lot of charcoal in this cartoon of Congress congratulating itself on agreeing on a deadline for resolving the federal deficit, which was almost $212 billion, 4.9% of Gross Domestic Product, in 1985. President Ronald Reagan had promised in 1980 to reduce the deficit, at which time those same figures were $74 billion and 2.6%.

Where are we now? That would be $1.8 trillion in the hole, representing 6.0% of GDP.

in Journal Times, Racine Wis., Nov. 21, 1995

2011 Redistricting in Wisconsin has secured a lopsided Republican advantage in the state legislature and our congressional delegation ever since; that was not the case in 1995. Republicans held a 17-to-16 majority in the State Senate that year.

The Milwaukee Brewers came to Madison asking for help funding the building of what is currently American Family Field. Governor Tommy Thompson was loath to raise taxes on the entire state, so he proposed instead imposing a .1% sales tax on Milwaukee County and the four counties adjacent to it, including Racine County to its south. 

The idea was extremely unpopular in Racine, and wasn't helped by Thompson gleefully telling voters outside the five-county area to "stick it to 'em." State Senator George Petak, Republican from Racine, pledged to vote against the five-county tax, and did so on several procedural votes. The deal appeared destined to fail by one vote, but then, around 4:00 in the morning, Petak switched his vote to Aye.

A supposedly grass-roots group quickly gathered enough signatures for a recall election against Sen. Petak. The Wisconsin Democratic Party denied involvement in the "No More Petax" recall effort, and if you believed them, I've got a Bridge To Nowhere I'd like to have sold you.

In the end, the recall was successful, and Democrats were happy to take over control of the State Senate from 1996 to 1998.

not in Business Journal of Greater Milwaukee, Nov. 18, 2005

In a multi-panel cartoon, one can often get away with not drawing any background, and merely drawing one or two characters standing and talking. In a single-panel cartoon, however, it's best to have the characters doing something somewhere (especially now that everything has to be in color).

So when the Business Journal editors told me that the week's editorial was going to chide corporate boards that professed not to be able to find qualified women to serve on them, I figured the characters in my cartoon had to be discussing the issue in some men-only space. They aren't as plentiful as they were, oh, half a century ago, so I drew these corporate guys schvitzing in a sauna.

My editor quickly got back to me that the sauna setting was unacceptable, as was the second product line of Amalgamated Mustache Wax & Urinal LLC.

in Business Journal of Greater Milwaukee, Nov. 18, 2005

I whipped off this version with the Mustache Wax CEO talking by phone to some unseen person, and pasted in the dialogue from the earlier version, minus the "and urinal." (It being Milwaukee, I counted on readers recognizing the Rollie Fingers bobblehead on the corner of the man's desk.)

It was the third time that year that the Business Journal editors asked me to edit or redo a cartoon, which may have had something to do with them deciding at year's end to go forward with no editorial page cartoon at all.

Or maybe it was because I had been away on a planned vacation for the November 11 issue, and readers hadn't missed me.

Moving right along...

for Q Syndicate, Nov. 2015

It seems nearly inconceivable now, but a mere ten years ago, Donald Humbert Trumpbert was just one of a dozen Republican presidential candidates, each of them clawing and biting to stand out from the pack.

At a candidates' cattle call on CNBC in October, Ted Cruz figured that the way to stand out was to attack the debate moderators. He accused them of asking "frivolous" questions (he had been asked about his opposition to the recent budget agreement, but ran out of allotted time before getting around to answering it), and said future GOP debates should have only questions submitted by GOP voters.

And his ploy might have worked, too, except that Marco Rubio and Chris Christie quickly seconded Cruz's complaint; Trump also called the questions "nasty," and it should come as no surprise to you that he was answering a question from the one female moderator on the panel when he said that.

To be fair, the moderators' first question to the group was to identify their biggest weaknesses. It's the sort of question you might be asked in a job interview at a company whose biggest weakness is employee retention; it's not the sort of question its CEO, much less a president of the United States ever has to answer.

The unquestioned loser of that debate was CNBC itself, although they were stuck with the format of trying to get twelve candidates to do something other than regurgitate standard Republican talking points and their own campaign slogans.

As for those candidates, they had already gotten their wish. The next debate was hosted by Fox Noise.

Q Toon: Will He Be Greeted with Flowers?

Looking over my shoulder as I was sending this cartoon to my syndicate editors over the weekend, my husband asked the immortal question: "Too soon?"

If anything, my publication schedule rendered this cartoon too late. The news cycle keeps on rollin', and all the other editorial cartoonists have moved on to other topics.

Frankly, mine is perhaps the mildest cartoon about the passing of former Vice President Dick Cheney that I've seen. Quite a few of my colleagues chose to chastise him one last time for leading the country into Iraq War II under false pretenses and with unrealistic expectations. 

Those weapons of mass destruction were never found, and we were greeted not with flowers but with IEDs. Then there was the true cost of the war: not the $728 billion spent by the U.S. government on hostilities, but 4,492 U.S. soldiers killed and 32,292 wounded, and somewhere in the neighborhood of 200,000 Iraqis killed.

Looking back from an LGBTQ+ perspective (as your humble scribbler did this past Saturday), one can muster up a demimodicum of sympathy for a man who has been rated the most powerful Vice President in U.S. history who had to hold his tongue is deference to the homophobic policies of his President that worked to the detriment of his own daughter. George W. Bush campaigned for reelection pushing a constitutional amendment denigrating people like Mary Cheney, in a committed but legally unrecognized relationship with a woman with whom she would raise a family.

Democrats exploited that conflict in 2004, earning the Cheneys' everlasting resentment; but he was after all the loyal Republican from his days as Gerald Ford's Chief of Staff onward. But then, Republicans turned on Dick and Lynne's other daughter after Donald Trump's thwarted coup attempt in January, 2021. Liz Cheney joined Adam Kinzlinger on the House impeachment panel, the only two House Republicans brave enough to stand up for country over party.

Even the Wyoming Republican Party turned against the Cheneys; Liz was trounced in her 2022 reelection bid for not pledging allegiance to Trump, who has complained ever since that she ought to be prosecuted for treason. 

For the first time in his long life, Dick Cheney endorsed a Democrat for President in 2024. Publicly and strongly.

Not that it helped Kamala Harris a whole hell of a lot. But it's the thought that counts.

Is Cheney's unjust war outweighed by turning away from the Dark Side in his twilight years? You, dear reader, get to decide which direction the celestial elevator in today's cartoon is headed.

Heavy responsibility, ain't it?

This Week's Sneak Peek

I incorporated the design of this mosaic at Santa Cruz in Seville into this week's cartoon. Can I deduct the trip to Spain as a business expense now?

The Good, The Bad, and The Cheney

A special Graphical History Tour bulletin: former Vice President Dick Cheney passed away this week. Since the man was often the subject of editorial cartoons, not least by your humble scribbler, this week's installment is dedicated to his memory... for better or worse.

Cheney, then a Congressman from Wyoming, was President George H.W. Bush's second choice for Secretary of Defense, after his first choice, powerful Texas Senator John Tower was forced to withdraw over a drip, drip, drip of allegations of womanizing and heavy drinking.

in UWM Post, Milwaukee Wis., March, 1989

No, there were no such pesky rumors against Mr. Cheney, who had not cultivated the kind of resentment among his colleagues that Mr. Tower had. 

As Defense Secretary, he oversaw the Bush administration's military overthrow of General Manuel Noriega's regime in Panama; and later, Operation Desert Storm. The latter successfully repulsed Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, but Cheney allowed General Norman Schwarzkopf to be the public face of the military action.

in UW-M Post, Milwaukee Wis., Sept. 23, 1991

Operation Desert Storm was one of the Bush administration's many foreign policy wins, even though it left Saddam Hussein in power; the international coalition behind Operation Desert Storm would not have held together for an advance on Baghdad. By the time I drew the above cartoon, the Soviet empire was crumbling, reformer Boris Yeltsin was the hero for thwarting a hardliners' coup against Mikhail Gorbachev, and the U.S. had extended Most Favored Nation trading status to Communist China.

Moving on to the year 2000, I've got a couple cartoons that I drew but didn't submit for publication:

August, 2000

After George H.W. Bush lost the presidency to Bill Clinton, Cheney was in charge of energy conglomerate Halliburton. Then Republican nominee-presumptive George W. Bush tapped him to lead the search for his 2000 running mate. After vetting several potential vice presidents, Cheney found the perfect choice staring back at him from the mirror.

I didn't submit the above cartoon for publication because I was not satisfied with how this cartoon came out visually; a vertical format might have worked better than this horizontal one.

Every once in a while, a cartoonist gets an idea that is too mean to publish, but too wicked not to draw.

November, 2000

When Dick Cheney suffered one of his five heart attacks while the outcome of the 2000 election was still being decided in the courts, I drew this take-off of the running gag in the TV cartoon South Park. I posted it to the GeoCities page I had at the time, and nowhere else.

The joke here was that the Kenny character got killed off in every episode only to reappear in the next. Yet aside from being such an insensitive cartoon, the one other problem with it is that no Republican then (or now) would pronounce the "ic" in "Democratic bastards!"

As for worrying that the level of political discourse had sunken so low, none of us a quarter century ago would have imagined a President of the United States posting a video on line of himself literally bombarding citizens of an American city with a planeload of shit.

February, 2002

I think this was another unpublished cartoon, but only because I didn't have a market for it: not local enough for the Journal Times, not addressing LGBTQ+ issues for Q Syndicate, and not aligned with a Business Journal editorial. I apparently expended quite a lot of ink on it anyway.

The cartoon comments on Cheney's efforts to intercede for California energy provider Enron from his position as Vice President. When mismanagement from the top forced the company to go belly-up and under-the-table deals between the company and government came to light, any association with Enron could have been injurious to one's political career.

March, 2003

I drew this one for a former editor of mine from In Step days, Jamakaya, who liked my conceit of a Journal of Faith-Based Statistics. The imaginary magazine's medical advice has since come to fruition in the Health Department of Secretary Robert F. Kennedy the Lesser.

Cheney would be the most forceful advocate for achieving the unfinished task from twelve years earlier of overthrowing Saddam Hussein, but unlike so many of my colleagues, I didn't draw any cartoons depicting his role in Iraq War II (or, for that matter, any cartoons about the famous incident when he accidentally shot a friend in the face while quail hunting. What could I possibly draw for publication a week later that outdid what all the other cartoonists and late night comedians put out the next day?).

Q Syndicate, January, 2004

Instead, I drew a series of cartoons highlighting how his daughter Mary living openly with her partner, Heather Poe, left Cheney in the awkward position of having to support President Bush's advocacy of amending the U.S. Constitution to define marriage as existing only between one man and one woman (at a time, one presumes) despite how it directly affected his own flesh and blood.

His rival for the vice presidency in 2004, Senator John Edwards, attempted to needle Cheney about this during their televised debate.

for Q Syndicate, Oct., 2004

John Edwards: "I think the Vice President and his wife love their daughter. I think they love her very much. And and you can't have anything but respect for the fact that they're willing to talk about the fact that they have a gay daughter, the fact that they embrace her. It's a wonderful thing. And there are millions of parents like that who love their children, who want their children to be happy. ...." (He went on to criticize the GOP's Definition of Marriage constitutional amendment.)

Moderator Gwen Ifill: "Mr. Vice President, you have 90 seconds."

Dick Cheney: "Let me simply thank the Senator for the kind words he said about my family and our daughter. I appreciate that very much."

Ifill: "That's it?"

Cheney: "That's it."

At another point in the debate, Cheney dismissed Edwards as an empty suit: “I’m up in the Senate most Tuesdays when they’re in session. The first time I ever met you was when you walked on the stage tonight.” When Edwards's running mate, Sen. John Kerry, brought Mary Cheney up during the next presidential debate, Cheney told reporters that "I am a pretty angry father," and his wife, Lynne, accused Kerry of "a cheap and tawdry political trick."

for Q Syndicate, February, 2007

Mary and Heather welcomed son Samuel into their family in 2007, so I supposed that Dick and Liz were still tight-lipped on a subject about which most grandparents are more than happy to regale passers-by. Drivers-by, too.

This cartoon broke free of my clientele of LGBTQ+ niche publications, catching the eye of my esteemed colleague Joel Pett, who put together weekly editorial cartoon round-ups for the Sunday Los Angeles Times in those days. (February 11, page M2, at the top of the display, for gosh sakes! Thanks, Joel!)

I did check with my syndicate editors in case having the cartoon in the LA Times might scoop a subscriber in the local LGBTQ+ press. They gave the go-ahead.

for Q Syndicate, October, 2007

Early in the 2008 presidential campaign cycle, some genealogist with lots of time on their hands determined that Dick Cheney and Democratic candidate Barack Obama are ninth cousins once removed. It was a news story that didn't stop certain other people from making up stories about Obama being born in Kenya. Nor did it get Cheney and Obama to invite each other to family reunions.

for Q Syndicate, 2013

By the time Cheney's other daughter, Liz, ran for Congress, Dad had mellowed on the question of marriage equality. Liz, however, campaigned on a platform of anti-LGBTQ Republican orthodoxy. But she and her father deserve credit for putting country above partisanship after Donald Trump's attempted coup on January 6, 2021. Unfortunately for them and the rest of us, the MAGA Kool-aid has proved thicker than TEA.

That, ladies and gents, would be my last cartoon of Mr. Cheney, except that I have drawn one more. See you next week.