The Sorensen Monologues

This Week’s Cartoon: “Obama Cuts Deal to Live in Tent”

I’ve probably gone a little easier on Obama than some of my peers — not so much because I think he’s doing a great job, but because I have a certain amount of empathy (possibly too much) for anyone trying to run a country this steeped in nutballery.  The real problems with American politics are systemic. But even with my very low expectations, I’m kind of  amazed by Obama’s caution-to-the-point-of-recklessness. The contrast between Obama the campaigner and Obama the cold-fish prez have grown so stark, he’s looking highly disingenuous — and in politics, that’s a big risk. You’d think someone so risk-averse might start to worry about that.

This Week’s Cartoon: “Old McDonald’s Had a Farm”

Blogging this one a bit late, as it’s been a busy week. I had a big freelance deadline, spazzed my lower back out, and hosted my sister-in-law and her husband while waddling about like a duck. But better late than never, right?

I originally intended to draw a cartoon about that douchetastic governor of Maine who wanted to remove a mural depicting the history of labor from the Department of Labor. But while checking Daily Show clips to see if they’d done my idea (they had, dammit), I came across this utterly ridiculous McDonald’s ad touting the artisanal nature of Big Macs. It’s only 17 seconds — check it out!

I just love the perky smile on the McDonald’s employee’s face as she pours her heart and soul into that Big Mac. Notice those chic, Asian-style bowls she’s grabbing the pickles and lettuce from. Why do I get the feeling those are not standard-issue at all McDonald’s? And then there’s the barn. Why, all Big Macs start out in cute little red barns, don’tcha know!  Heck, why go to your local farmer’s market at all when you can get hand-crafted, 100% beef burgers, lovingly made just for you by a chipper woman in a cute ponytail?

On a related note, my friend Anne pointed me to this article, in which a photographer compares advertised images of fast food with what you actually get.

[UPDATE: Here’s a video on how burgers are prepped to look perfect in ads — fascinating!]

This Week’s Cartoon: “Conservative Counseling”

Continuing with a long series of obnoxious happenings in matters repro, South Dakota has passed a law that pretty much forces women to seek “advice” from those faith-based  “Crisis Pregnancy Centers” that I blogged about a few weeks ago. These centers are, as you might expect, notoriously unscientific. Poor South Dakotans. This is the second time I’ve had to make fun of them for this sort of thing. In all fairness, I will say the Badlands are lovely, and I spent a fine evening in Rapid City a couple years ago.  South Dakota is also the home of the Corn Palace and a giant pink prairie dog (see below).

I debated whether or not to call this strip “Conservative Counseling”  because I have misgivings about the term “conservative.” It implies the opposite of radicalism,  yet a number of self-described “conservative” pundits have policy prescriptions that are, to put it gently, nothing short of dramatic. But in the end, the alliterative “c’s” had it.

[Afterthought: for a fascinating map of passport ownership that ties into the fourth panel of the cartoon, see this post by Krugman.]

Writin’

I wrote a review of Sarah Glidden’s How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less for Cartoon Movement.

This Week’s Cartoon: “Dictator Do’s and Don’ts”

This strip doesn’t really have much deeper meaning beyond being a vehicle for me to draw Mr. Perkins as Qaddafi. I had started writing this when the Egyptian revolution was taking place, and then updated it for the present. I find it hard to write cartoons about the uprisings in the Middle East, as they aren’t exactly comedic affairs (aside from the mannerisms of certain prideful and eccentric despots).

As for my thoughts on the bombing of Libya: I don’t know. In general, I find the active slaughtering of civilians to be one of the better reasons for military intervention, but the more I read, the more I realize the situation is fraught with complications. My current mantra is “WWNKT?” — What Would Nicholas Kristof Tweet? Kristof is back in the Middle East for, I think, the third time in the past few weeks, which makes me envy his adaptable circadian rhythms (meanwhile, I’m still recovering from the switch back to Daylight Savings Time).

A telling side note: While the NYT has several journalists on the ground over there, with four of them being released recently from a harrowing capture by Qaddafi’s forces, the Huffington Post’s top stories are all AP reports. Yesterday, their top story on the Libyan conflict was datelined Paris. And yet pro-Arianna types call the NYT irrelevant?

WTF Email

A reader is upset about my Unplanned Parenthood cartoon:

Hi Jen, this is in response to your recent depiction of Planned Parenthood. First of all, I am not irrationally upset, please do not delete this message upon noting that it is a complaint. My lady associate and I found the particular section “Sexual Assault Victim” to be offensive and particularly insensitive. You have obviously never been raped, though many readers of Santa Cruz Weekly have been. You probably ruined someone’s day. Play nice, bitch.

Now, the second panel of that cartoon obviously criticizes the viewpoint of the Unplanned Parenthood counselor, who suggests the sexual assault victim was “probably showing a little thigh.” It illustrates the horror and absurdity of being told such a thing. This reader seems to think I’m attacking Planned Parenthood itself. But it says right underneath the title, “Pregnancy Centers, GOP style!” For some people, I suppose cartoon interpretation is a bitch.

This Week’s Cartoon: “Edu-Gangsters”

As the daughter of teachers, I find myself more incensed by what’s happening in Wisconsin than I’ve been about anything in a while — and there’s been plenty to get upset about. Last week’s coldhearted maneuver by the Wisconsin GOP was bad enough, and then that vapid, braying dipstick Sarah Palin — the opposite of education personified — went on TV (wearing a jacket from the set of “Star Trek,” I might add) and called the teachers’ union leaders “thugs” after the Wisconsin Republicans received a death threat:

“Well, these union bosses that are acting like thugs, as they are leading some of their good union members down a road that will ultimately result in, unfortunately, somebody getting hurt,” Palin said… ” it is these unions bosses’ responsibility to turn down the rhetoric and start getting truth out there, so that nobody gets hurt.”

Good one, Ms. Blood Libel! Of course, Palin is hardly the first to try to smear the WI protesters as “thuggish” despite amazingly peaceful demonstrations, so it seemed appropriate to draw a cartoon reminding everyone that these are the people who taught you to write the alphabet. They are not thugs, unless boring you to death with quadratic equations counts as thuggery.

Adding further insult to injury, Gov. Scott Walker actually had the gall to spin union-busting as “progressive” and “innovative.” Um, no.

This Week’s Cartoon: “Unplanned Parenthood”

As you may have heard, House Republicans are looking to solve our nation’s economic problems (not) by defunding Planned Parenthood. What you may not know is that there are currently over 4,000 anti-choice “crisis pregnancy centers” around the country, more than five times the number of abortion providers. These largely “faith-based” operations, known for disseminating medically-dubious advice, received at least $60 million under the Bush administration. (You’ll recall the many Republicans who howled about that instance of deficit spending, no? Hmm… neither do I.) So, in a sense, Unplanned Parenthood already exists, and this cartoon is merely absurdist exaggeration. I hope.

Japanese Snow Monsters!

If you enjoyed my Oregonian story about the snow ghosts in Whitefish, Montana, you might want to check out these totally cool photos of the Japanese equivalent — snow monsters!

(To give credit where credit is due, the above photo was originally posted here, prior to the snow monsters page linked above.)

Thanks to reader John A. for the link.

This Week’s Cartoon: “Union Envy”

As unions grow less and less powerful in the US, it seems we’re losing our collective memory of why they are important, and also of what a decent job looks like. As one young person put it recently in the NYT:

More typical was Brett Stephens, 23, who had worked in more jobs since he was 15 than Ms. Rollins has in her lifetime. He had jobs at a snack shop, as a lifeguard, at Little Caesars restaurants in South Carolina and Florida, at a Limited clothing store, with a temp agency, and most recently as a cook in a diner.

He did not go to college, he said, because his grandmother, who raised him after his mother died when he was 9, could not afford to send him. Now he scrapes by on $10 an hour, unable to afford health care for his two children. It is covered by welfare.

“I think they should stop crying,” he said of the protesting union members. Everyone was working hard and tightening their belts, he said, so why should unions be different?

I empathize with anyone trying to support a family on crap jobs like that — but this also illustrates how the working class plays right into the hands of the very elites who want to do away with unions. First, eliminate the good jobs that allow workers their fair share of the nation’s wealth; next watch them turn against each other. On the Slowpoke Facebook page (only 5 more likes till 900!), one reader alludes to a crab bucket, an analogy often used by writer Terry Pratchett:

Anyone as experienced in handling seafood as Ms Pushpram knows that no lid is necessary on a bucket of crabs. If one tries to climb out, the others will pull it back. Crabs fall considerably lower on the evolutionary scale than primates and, certainly, people, so this this seems to be a basic force of life. Petty jealousy or a reluctance to see anyone do better has probably slowed the development of civilisation more than anything.

Fortunately, polls show a majority of Americans support workers keeping their bargaining rights — so our case of crabs is not an epidemic, as some billionaires might have you believe.

A Telling Chart

From ThinkProgress, about news coverage of Affordable Care Act rulings (click for full size):

That danged liberal media strikes again!

This Week’s Cartoon: “A Teachable Moment”

Note: This post has been revised from the original in an effort to clarify facts about the Wisconsin budget.

If there’s one thing to understand about the Wisconsin battle, it’s that it’s not really about the budget, but a premeditated and politically-motivated attack on the teachers’ union. The teachers have already ceded to pay cuts — but now Walker is going to start firing them one by one if they don’t give up their bargaining rights forever. Never mind the fact that the Wisconsin budget was left with only a modest shortfall by Walker’s Democratic predecessor. To top it all off, Walker has added an additional $140 million projected shortfall to the next budget with his wealthy donor-friendly tax cuts.

After a commenter pointed out to me that Walker’s budget-busting measures were, according to Politifact,  not part of the current shortfall, it occurred to me that the first panel of the cartoon is misleading.  While I’d probably write it differently now, I still think the larger point — that he purports to care about the deficit while adding to it — is legit. And even if the current modest shortfall is not due to Walker, it’s clear that the Republicans are using the economic downturn to accomplish their long-sought political goals (union busting) even as they add to deficits themselves. [UPDATE UPDATE: some people are now saying Politifact is wrong (it’s a few paragraphs into the post). I give up. Can we just call Walker a douchenozzle and call it a day?]

If you had any lingering doubts that Wisconsin is part of a broader movement to attack workers’ rights,  it’s important that Americans understand that Walker is in tight with the billionaire right-wing activists, the Koch Brothers, whose foundation Americans For Prosperity is picking ideological fights in several states:

The effort to impose limits on public labor unions has been a particular focus in Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, all states with Republican governors, Mr. Phillips said, adding that he expects new proposals to emerge soon in some of those states to limit union power.

Even if Wisconsin teachers manage to preserve their bargaining rights, my feeling is that the bigger picture does not look good. The forces aligned against what few unions remain are just too powerful. In this Gilded Age we live in, moneyed elites have managed to convince millions of ordinary, struggling Americans to reject one of the last means of recourse workers have left. It doesn’t really matter if Scott Walker goes down — they have the ideological vision, and the willingness to take the heat for it. Something weak-kneed Democrats might want learn from.