Since I brought it up last week, I'm just going to mention that I gave my rolltop desk to inlaws who were looking for one. I'm still a little upset over the loss and have heard the rest of the story told too many times already.
I wouldn't be able to say anything more without sounding petty, so I guess I'm going to have to leave it at that.
I had intended to post this last week, but if we have any motto at Graphical History Tours Ltd., it's "Better Late Than Never."
So here are the late election reports from Weimar Germany.
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| "Im Katastrophenjahr" by Thomas Theodor Heine in Simplicissimus, Munich, May 4, 1925 |
He wasn't a candidate in the first round of Germany's presidential election in March, and he only reluctantly accepted the German People's Party nomination a week later, but when the votes were counted, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg had been elected President of the Weimar Republic.
Heine was probably being facetious captioning his cartoon "A united Germany has its President"; Hindenburg received less than half (48.3%) of the votes cast.
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| "Goose Stepping Again" by Bill Hanny in Philadelphia Inquirer, April 28, 1925 |
Hindenburg was familiar to Americans (and no less to the French and the English) as the leader of the Imperial German Army during World War I. The 77-year-old Generalfeldmarschall’s military career dated from the Austrian-Prussian War in 1866; he tried retiring in 1911 only to be called back to active duty by Kaiser Wilhelmina.
His electoral victory speech warned the extreme right and left against "rash adventures," and promised that he would govern as an independent.
"Let no one by any chance imagine that henceforth I shall take orders from any political party. The battle is over, and I honestly and unreservedly declare that I am ready to offer my hand to every German for the common task, and I include my former opponents." (Translation per O.D. Tolischus, Washington Herald, April 28, 1925)
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| "Der Lotse Besteigt das Schiff" by Arthur Johnson in Kladderadatsch, Berlin, May 10, 1925 |
Arthur Johnson's cartoon updates a famous cartoon by Sir John Tenniel in Punch, "Dropping the Pilot," depicting Otto von Bismarck, dismissed as Chancellor by Kaiser Wilhelm in 1890, heading down those stairs.
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| "Dropping the Pilot" by John Tenniel in Punch, or the London Chiavari, March 29, 1890 |
The Tenniel cartoon is well-known in both Britain and Germany, and has been parodied many times when some powerful politician resigned or fell out of favor. It used to be an occasional reference in American editorial cartoons, too; but nowadays it would be an inside joke understood mainly by fellow editorial cartoonists. Your average editor today is more likely to understand a cartoon of Homer Simpson retreating into foliage.
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| "That Morning After Feeling" by James Fitzmaurice in Vancouver Daily Province, April 28, 1925 |
Speaking of cartoons that today's editors might have liked, Fitzmaurice's ambivalent regard of Hindenburg's election was very much an outlier among cartoonists in the nations of World War I's Entente. From what I've seen he doesn't seem to have been one for forceful opinions.
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| "Willie Has Hopes" by Douglas Rodger in San Francisco Bulletin, Apr. 29, 1925 |
Hindenburg was a declared royalist, and ex-Kaiser Wilhelm Hohenzollern applauded his election, but a return by the Kaiser to the throne six years after the armistice was a far fetched scenario.
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| "Peek-a-Boo" by Edmund Duffy in The Independent, Boston, May 16, 1925 |
Alfred von Tirpitz, Admiral of the German Imperial Navy during the war, was responsible for convincing Hindenburg to enter the presidential race.
We left Erich Ludendorff singing forlornly on a mountain in a previous GHT. Coming in dead last in the first heat of the 1925 presidential election, Ludendorff, a vocal proponent of the Dolchstosslegende, the idea that Germany lost the war because of traitorous Germans "stabbing it in the back," withdrew from public affairs. He wasn’t missed.
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| "The Black Eye" by A.G. Racey in Montreal Daily Star, Montreal, April 29, 1925 |
A.G. Racey's strong reaction against Hindenburg's election was typical of most western editorial cartoonists. But in fact, the German presidency was somewhat of a figurehead. The president had no authority to initiate policy, and the coalition behind him in the multi-party legislature did not hold a plurality of seats.
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| "In der Saddle Again" by Harold M. Talburt for Scripps-Howard, ca. Apr. 29, 1925 |
Harold Talburt proposed that the election of a monarchist president would be bad for the Germans themselves, burdened as they were with debt and reparations payments. The Kaiser, in the background, hopes to be pulled out of the mud, although nobody in the foreground appears to be equipped for a tow.
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| "Scaring France and Hurting Germany" by Carey Orr in Chicago Tribune, April 28, 1925 |
Reaction to Hindenburg's election was especially hostile in France. Le Temps of Paris declared, "The election of von Hindenburg is a defiance to the allies and to America. It is not the political genius of the old man which is disquieting, it is the force of brutal revenge which is behind him."
Poles and Czechs also responded with trepidation. The Austrian press were disappointed in Hindenburg's election as well, opining that it was a setback in hopes for a union of Austria with Germany. (I'm going to have to look up that Austro-Prussian War someday.)
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| "The New Helmet Cover" by Grover Page in Louisville Courier-Journal, April 28, 1925 |
For his part, Hindenburg sought to reassure the outside world:
"I affirm before the whole world that it has always been my holiest endeavor to prevent new horrors of war and to help to the utmost the victims of past wars. This aim can best be attained by unity, and to serve my people as leader in this sense will be my holiest task." — as reported by Associated Press
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| "His Hopes May Be Stronger Than His Ship" by Homer Stinson in Dayton Daily News, May 1, 1925 |
Perhaps alone among western cartoonists, Homer Stinson sang a note of optimism.
Spoiler alert: Paul von Hindenburg might not have been what the rest of Europe needed to worry about.
So now the search for Pope Francis’s successor begins.
It’s a highly secretive process. On May 7, some 120 cardinals from around the world will hole up in the Sistine Chapel, lock the doors, and nobody is allowed in. Not even the pizza delivery guy (although there happens to be a Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem. He will be allowed inside.)
Any cardinal divulging to the public what goes on within the conclave faces being stripped of his position, excommunicated, and exiled to the Land of Nod.
The cardinals vote by handwritten ballots, and are actually supposed to disguise their handwriting. One imagines that they write upside down, or with their non-dominant hand, or with their eyes closed.
And if that weren’t secretive enough, the ballots are burned in a special chimney. No recounts allowed.
At the end of the process, a senior cardinal deacon will step out onto the balcony of the Basilica of St. Peter and announce "Habemus Papam!" Opening the sealed envelope from the accounting firm of Price Waterhouse Coopers, he will then tell everyone that the new Pope is "La La Land."
And nobody will be able to contradict him.
Because, you know, of that excommunication to the Land of Nod thing.
So, did anyone hear Saturday's post title tune in their heads?
Things have been slightly chaotic at the home front this week: it was time to get some repainting done inside the house, and my better half decided that the guest bedroom at the front of the house and the office in the back of the house ought to switch places. As we originally had them, any guest would be awakened early in the morning by the sunrise through the picture window — very early from mid-spring to mid-autumn.
We started by emptying the bedroom; as of this writing, much of the bedroom furniture is still in the living room, dining room, and basement. My husband finished painting that bedroom in time for my computer and scanner to be set up in the new office so I could send this week's cartoon in on time.
I'm extremely disappointed that my beautiful, sturdy rolltop desk can't fit in the new office. It would block either the picture window or a pair of light switches, and it's not built to house a computer tower, scanner, or any monitor bigger than a modest laptop.
At least it's not a family heirloom (it includes an interior light fixture and a phone jack). I bought it almost 30 years ago at a charity auction to replace a much more cheaply made one I'd had since I moved out of my parents' house.
After all these years, I had its seven drawers, four cubby holes (and a secret compartment) crammed with stuff: a staple remover, my good scissors, spools of thread, paper clips, photo corners, stamps, return address labels, greeting cards, a 15" ruler, a slide rule, a set of Dietzgen drawing instruments from the 1930's, pay stubs, tax forms, banking records including those Mom left behind, her obituary and funeral arrangements, Grandpa Berge's jade pen standard from the Wisconsin Alumni Association in 1937...
While my husband painted the front room, I spent over a day shredding old papers. Nearly everything else has ended up in cardboard boxes in the basement ... among all the other cardboard boxes in the basement that I'll have to rummage through in order to find where the damned staple remover is.
Pope Francis died in the wee hours of Easter Monday after having greeted Vice President Shady Vance and the throngs who came to celebrate the Resurrection with him the previous morning. I didn't get invited to the funeral at the Vatican today, so instead, I've got a look back over his papacy for this week's Graphical History Tour.
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| March, 2013 |
I caught a little bit of flack for this initial response to Cardinal Bergoglio’s election to the papacy in 2013, but I thought it was a light, whimsical cartoon to celebrate Catholicism’s first Latin American Pope. Besides, I happened to be discovering the music of Astor Piazolla just then.
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| for Q Syndicate, August, 2013 |
Taking his papal name in honor of St. Francis of Assisi, Bergoglio quickly showed himself to be a very, very different pope than Benedict XVI. The archconservative B-16, breaking with longstanding tradition, had resigned the papacy rather than linger in the position while cruel age slowly robbed him of mind and body. (As critical as I was of Pope Benedict, I credit him with a selfless decision many aging politicians would have done well to emulate.)
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| for Q Syndicate, September, 2013 |
Conservative Catholics in America, who had weaponized their faith to impose their beliefs on pro-choice and LGBTQ+ fellow citizens, came to be extremely disappointed in the new pontiff...
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| for Q Syndicate January, 2014 |
...and eagerly searched for another.
Here I suggested that Minnesota Archbishop John Nienstedt, Catholic League professional umbrage taker Bill Donahue, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, anti-marriage troublemaker Maggie Gallagher, and Senator Rick Santorum would be happy to invest Duck Dynasty's Phil Robertson with the scepter of St. Peter.
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| for Q Syndicate, October, 2015 |
Rowan County Kentucky clerk Kim Davis, who worked her refusal to issue to issue same-sex couples marriage licenses into national fame, subsequently boasted of having a private audience with the Pope. It eventually came to light that her private audience was shared with dozens of other Vatican visitors, and was private only in the sense that she hadn't brought the right-wing media along.
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| for Q Syndicate, October, 2020 |
Pope Francis gave his blessing to "civil unions" rather than marriage equality for same-sex couples in the fall of 2020 (although some conservative Catholics disputed the translation in English-speaking media of the papal Latin "convivenia civil"). A majority of the Catholic majority on the McConnell Supreme Court have been itching to overturn the 2014 Obergefell v. Hodges ruling favoring marriage equality in this country.
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| for Q Syndicate, March, 2021 |
Franciscan liberality notwithstanding, Catholic orthodoxy continues to condemn homosexuality as "intrinsically disordered."
As with the Anglican, Methodist, fundamentalist, and other denominations, antigay animus is especially dominant among Catholic clergy in much of Africa. Pope Francis's dialogue in this next cartoon is a direct quote, somewhat edited between panels two and three:
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| February, 2024 |
Ninety bishops and cardinals published a letter strenuously objecting to that papal pronouncement. They will be speaking up loudly as their conclave meets to elect a successor to this modern-day Pope.
Don't be surprised to see someone more in the mold of Benedict XVI... if not Innocent IV.
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When I scour newspapers and magazines from 100 years ago for these Graphical History Tours, I never come across Pope Pius XI in U.S. editorial cartoons. I suppose that Protestant cartoonists didn't pay much attention to what Pius XI had to say about anything, and any Catholic cartoonists never presumed to differ with him. He did issue encyclicals criticizing capitalistic greed and warning against socialism and communism.
After initially supporting fascism in his native Italy and in Germany, Pius XI would issue an encyclical in 1937, smuggled in to Nazi Germany, lashing out against violations of a concordat between the Nazi state and the Holy See. In Mit brennender Sorge, Pius condemned "pantheistic confusion," "neopaganism," and "the so-called myth of race and blood," which he called a form of idolatry.
I bring that up in regard to modern-day cartoonists such as Michael Ramirez, who apparently believe that papal pronouncements on current politics are something new with Pope Francis.
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| "You'll Have to Leave That Behind" by Michael Ramirez for Las Vegas Review Journal, April 21, 2025 |
Pius XI never stood up to Benito Mussolini, although he was scheduled to deliver an address on February 11, 1939 in which he was expected to denounce il Duce's laws aping Nazi Arianism. The Pope died on February 10, however, and Mussolini tried to have all 300 copies of the address destroyed.
Under the next Pope, Pius XII, the Roman Catholic Church turned a blind eye to the atrocities of Mussolini and Hitler.
Today's Republican Party and its Amen Corner cartoonists, teledemagogues, and duck dynasts would most certainly have approved.
Saying that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is one of the more qualified members of Donald Joffrey Trump's cabinet is akin to saying that Doc is one of the taller of the Seven Dwarfs.
Nevertheless, while Trump may not give a shit about health, education, welfare, the rule of law, international relations, veterans, labor, agriculture, the environment, transportation, national parks, democracy, or anybody not named Donald Trump Sr., he does like to have a monetary system that keeps him in the style to which he come accustomed.
So he put a billionaire hedge fund manager and major campaign donor in charge of the nation's finances. Trump was even willing to overlook that Bessent is openly gay, and used to work for George Soros. (Don't think for a moment that fails to rankle the MAGA rank and file.) He even used to give large sums to Democratic campaigns.
Bessent has the unenviable job of trying to soothe his buddies on Wall Street. This week, there was a momentary interruption in the stock market slide after his prediction that Trump's tariff war with China might not go on forever. Wall Street also appreciated him prevailing upon Trump yesterday to back off his demands that Fed Chair Jerome Powell resign — but as soon as the markets closed, Trump went right back to calling Powell derogatory names, so a lot of good that did.
Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can spook the Nasdac.
A couple Sundays ago, Bessent told Kristin Welker on Meet the Press: "Americans who want to retire right now, the Americans who put away for years in their savings accounts, I think they don’t look at the day-to-day fluctuations." And he's right, insofar as someone who wanted to retire right now might decide to put it off until their savings account recovers.
Assuming that they have a choice in the matter. Over-67-year-olds aren't eagerly sought after by the Gen Y-ers and millennials now in charge of most hiring and firing decisions. (Hiring? Good luck getting your 50-years-of-experience résumé getting through indeed.com to be seen by any human being.)
When it comes to LGBTQ+ issues, Bessent has not had much to say in his present position. One can, however, go back ten years ago, when he told the Yale alumni magazine ,
“In a certain geographic region at a certain economic level, being gay is not an issue. What’s fantastic is now, people in the rest of America, whether blue collar or white collar, have access to everything. If you had told me in 1984 when we graduated and people were dying of AIDS that 30 years later I’d be legally married and we would have two children via surrogacy, I wouldn’t have believed you.”
There is much about the present moment in history that you wouldn't have believed in 1984.
But as for the immediate future, there may be a fan base for former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, but I don't see anyone, not even the Log Cabin Republicans, clamoring for Scott Bessent to take a shot at the Top Job.
If any of my fellow editorial cartoonists were not taking Easter Sunday off, how many of them do you suppose would have put out cartoons for this morning about Pope Francis schooling Vice President Shady Vance on "the true ordo amoris"?
I was at my drawing board late into the night, but that wasn't what my cartoon was about.
I decided against scanning the reverse of a $10 bill into the background of my cartoon. Otherwise, my cartoon might have looked like this.
