Every year, Newsweek and other
publications publish their “Best Cartoons of the Year.” Of course,
these are usually some of the worst cartoons ever–including
whichever ones of mine they pick. This year, I’m offering my own
selection of my favorite cartoons by yours truly. This is also a
homework assignment. I’m putting together entries for the Pulitzer
and other contests for cartooning. If you particularly like or
dislike one of the following cartoons, please share your comments
about which one(s) and why. Thanks, and happy holidays!
6 Comments.
@Ted its missing one of my favorites. The one that asks the question “how much will the Afghans share of the mineral wealth we steal from their country?” “All of it” (bomb).
My favourites in order:
1) Laughing in Waziristan whilst Americans strip naked (the people in Waziristan used to be the Pakistan government’s best friends)
2) I have a pile of rubble to go home to (metaphor for messed up as-usual-about-to-explode Pakistan, the place I came from)
3) Mullah Umar screaming about the Trillion dollars of mineral wealth.
BTW – how do I install this arithmetic spam blocker you have?
My top 4:
-Roommate from Hell– Okay, I was an English major, so the metaphor/allegory thing gets me. It works.
-The last two workers in the U.S.– Like a lot of the other comics, it shows why the economy isn’t working, but the interaction between the characters is more complex than the more straightforward, one-note cartoons.
-American occupiers have sent drone planes– This captures the problems with our thinking about the “war on terror” in a really striking way.
-Liberals: easily satisfied– This does a good job of showing why the progressive/liberal side tends to get nothing of substance done. They won’t look at the problem with the system and focus on making relatively meaningless advances in the broken system.
My least favorite 4:
-Portland Bomb Plot– This one seems to pick on people for no good reason. Sure, hipsters may be annoying, but they’re just trying to get through their days like anyone else. I’d rather see satire aimed at people who really deserve it.
These three seem kind of flat and obvious to me. They don’t seem to have many layers or much nuance:
-I can’t decide which is lamer
-80% of Americans
-Eye off the ball
A lot of these are funny, but my favorite has to be “The Curse”. It’s a little sick, but it actually conveys a sentiment I share. I hope every trigger-happy jerk in uniform who gets his kicks out of treating Afghanis and Iraqis as subhuman gets a nice little case of PTSD to help them rediscover their consciences.
“Casualty of Postwar” & “Home Sweet Home, Repo-ed”, too, for that matter, are good also. You have a real gift for humanizing the so-called ‘opposition’ in the War on Terror, and I enjoy the way you make them talk like us.
“Good news” actually made me laugh out loud at the first time I saw it, just because I hate the phrase “people of color”. If the phrase comes up when I’m listening to “Democracy Now!” I’ll shut the program off for the day (which, unsurprisingly, happens quite a lot).
I just noticed “Coming Fall 2001”! I’ve never seen this one before! Also good!
6-30-10
“…Because I was dumbfounded”
I rate it 8 on the Universal Ted Rall Comic Rating Scale
(“The Procession” is 1 and “If Terry Schaivo Were Iraqi” is 10)