Then it’s a good thing I never suggested any such thing.
No, you won’t – at least “you” as a whole. The tepid condemnation for Toles exhibited here makes me realize it would be useless.
It’s ironic that you choose this particular example, because it seems to be the same kind of hysterical manufactured outrage that surrounds Senator Obama’s quote.
Senator Obama implied that the government was wasting the lives of soldiers, and got accused of not valuing the soldiers himself: a malicious and egregious misinterpretation. Tom Toles implied that Secretary Rumsfeld was behaving callously towards wounded soldiers, and got accused of behaving callously towards wounded soldiers himself: again, a malicious and egregious misinterpretation.
If you want to talk about left-wing asshat cartoonists, you should really stick with Ted Rall. Wringing your hands over that Toles cartoon in the present context is not going to do any wonders for your supposed point.
Why should Toles be criticized for mocking Rumsfeld’s dismal treatment of the military personnel (especially casualties) just because the the Joint Chiefs tried to spin that cartoon in the manner that the left-wing blogs are beginning to criticize the cartoon presented in the OP?
We’re back to the issue that many cartoons are criticized by the opponents of their perspective far outside the actual statement of the cartoonist–often by (deliberately?) mischaracterizing what was portrayed in the cartoon.
This thread has wandered off into accusations that different political groups have no right to feel the way that they do (along with the typical SDMB subtext of second-guessing and criticizing other Dopers’ opinions), but I do not see any substantive criticism of Shelton since the context of his cartoon has been demonstrated.
That wasn’t what Rummy’s quote was about, and it wasn’t what Toles cartoon was about, as I said in the other thread.
As mentioned here:
Rummy was responding to the notion that the U.S. military would be stretched thin to the breaking point. It was about the size of the military. It was about recruiting goals. It was not about the callous treatment of wounded soldiers. The amputee was simply a metaphor for the collective military, one Toles clearly believed to be unhealthy and potentially ineffective as a result.
So, you could believe Rummy was completely full of shit. You could believe our military was/is getting the royal shaft from the government. You could believe that the wounded were getting benefits cut, an outrage that cried out to God for vengeance. And none of those beliefs would be inconsistent with finding offense at using a quadruple amputee essentially as a prop to make a point about the size of the military, a point unrelated to our treatment of casualties.
The analogy Toles drew was clear, and I think (from his perspective) an apt one. But, again, he did use a quadruple amputee soldier as a prop to make a point not directly related to the treatment of wounded soldiers, and some people took offense. In that thread, to make Bricker’s point, generally not anyone who opposed the war, however.
I think Stratocaster’s comments are precisely on point: the cartoon did not exist in a vacuum. It was a response to then-Secretary Rumsfeld’s comments about the size and perparedness of the military. That was the reason for the “battle-hardened” line, a quote from Rumsfeld. If the cartoon’s purpose had been to exorciate Rumsfeld over the medical treatment of soldiers, you’d hear no whining from me. But because of the timing and the quotes, we know that it was targeted at the Rumsfeld dismissal of the concerns about overtaxing the military’s collective strength and readiness. And to use a quadruple amputee to make THAT point is beyond the pale.
Now, you may contend that the cartoon is actually about “Rumsfeld’s dismal treatment of the military personnel (especially casualties)” but you’d be deliberately blinding yourself to the timing and context in which it was issued.
Oh how I miss Herblock, he was a true political cartoonist
I’m finding myself agreeing with Mr. Moto. Good God, I must need more coffee. 
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being a good politician any more than there is something wrong with being a good salesman. Good salesmen can tell the truth to make good sales, just as good politicians can tell the truth to win votes. I still believe this, in my overly-optimistic heart.
I think Obama speaks to that optimism, at least in those of us who have it. Especially because every time he gets called onto the carpet, it’s so patently obvious his opponents are grasping at straws. They have NO ammunition.
“You snorted cocaine!” “I admitted to that before you brought it up. I’m not proud of it, but I admit it’s true.” Et cetera.
I agree that in this situation he did exactly the right thing. He didn’t – as far as I can see – insult the people who misinterpreted him. He didn’t go off on them for having done so intentionally. He just said, in effect: “I apologize for being unclear. This is what I was trying to say.” He wasn’t flip flopping or equivocating. He was clarifying, and it was appropriate.
By the same token, as far as I’ve heard (and I haven’t done extra research on this, so if I’m wrong I apologize) he hasn’t even responded to the half-black thing other than to clarify yes, he has one black and one white parent. He hasn’t tried to prove his “blackness”. This is one of those things (and again, I don’t follow his every word, so I might have missed something) he treats as a non-issue.
So yes. Either he’s slicker than Bill or he’s actually real-life honest and dignified.
I’d draw a distinction, too, between the above cartoon and Toles’s famous quadruple-amputee one. The pitted cartoon is based on something the artist had to know was full of crap. Toles’s cartoon was appalling, I agree, but I think it was Toles being appalling than his subject matter. I can definitely see why it would offend, though. If I believed that Rumsfeld truly cared for the individuals of his “streamlined” army more than his own political reputation and his I’m-never-wrong ego, I would have been more taken aback.
Please explain. Why is it beyond the pale? I don’t consider myself to be abnormally insensitive to the sufferings and trials of others, but I’m not seeing anything offensive about this.
Oh, and Shelton has always been incompetent at anything other than trolling in his cartoons.
I don’t see the outrage in using a quadruple amputee as a prop. Is the quadruple amputee supposed to be too precious to be used as a political prop? Is he the Prophet or something?
I also don’t have a problem with the cartoon in the OP, though. Of course it’s unfair to Obama. It’s a political cartoon. It’s going to be unfair. This one is also not funny, so criticize it for that.
I see nothing out of line in saying that the US government, led by the administration of GW Bush, has wasted over 3000 lives in a needless war.
If someone wants to be outraged they should direct it toward those who did the wasting, not at those who point out the folly.
It isn’t the first time. Over 50000 were wasted in Vietnam. During WWII thousands died in the Hurtgen Forest in Germany in an operation that was criticized at the time as being unnecessary.
Well, yes, I think those who take offense would say something like that. A soldier who made such a sacrifice shouldn’t be used as a convenient metaphor, to make a point unrelated to the wounds in question. It’s insensitive, one might say, making a point using someone else’s pain gratuitously, a pain assumed in sacrifice for others.
Of course, different strokes and all that. If you take no offense, great. Is it really so hard to see the other point of view though? I really don’t think so. I think Bricker’s point gets proven over and over, frankly.
I really do. Again, I have no problem with cartoons about dying soldiers, or amputees. I don’t think anyone is really outraged by this; they’re using to bludgeon their political opponents.
There is no soldier actually represented in the cartoon. You get that right? He’s not any individual who actually served in combat, any more than Shelton’s soldiers are actually people. The Toles cartoon is a way of comparing an army missing 48,000 combat soldiers to a man missing at least one limb. One would think this comparison would not need to be made, but one would have to be unfamiliar with Secretary Rumsfeld to think that.
From where I sit, I see Shelton’s cartoon as somewhat dishonest and misrepresents Obama’s words, wheras Toles uses possibly insensitive imagery in making a point, but did nothing dishonest. I just can’t get as outraged at some cartoonist not being PC as I can at a cartoonist being dishonest.
Yep, I agree. It’s pretty funny, actually. Why would anyone find this disturbing? You convinced me.
I don’t believe this for a second. I think this is a self-evident reference point, one that anyone can understand even if their sensibilities don’t agree with the reaction. Anyone who reacts as you have is making political hay, period. Bricker’s point is made, again and again.
Yes, and he could have made a similar analogy by referring to Nick Berg, his decapitated body a symbol of the reduction in force of the army, rendered ineffective as a result its over-extension. This would simultaneously have been an apt metaphor and absolutely dickheadedly insensitive and gratuitous. Offensive, one might say. The fact that Toles’s soldier was not a specific person does not change for a second the fact that he was using as a reference point any one of many U.S. soldiers mutilated in this war, using them as a tidy foundation to make his fun little zinger (again, not directly related to any issue related to military casualties). And, again, I don’t believe for a second you can’t see this point.
I think I agree with the latter portion of this sentence. Toles’s soldier, as I think a simple reading infers, is an apt metaphor for the point he was trying to make. It was simply insensitive.
I’m not sure either cartoonist holds the high road.
I think that a soldier facing life as a quadruple amputee is a horrific thought, one that should bring tears, or the near occasion of tears, to the eyes of everyone that considers it, and using that icon to make an unrelated point about the size or readiness of the military is simply ugly.
I guess you have a consistently thick skin with respect to cartooning. Good for you. There are, after all, no universal standards for upset or outrage; no objective measure of tastelessness or insensitivity at which to point. I think you can legitimately say, “These don’t bother me,” or equally legitimately, “These bother me.”
What I was decrying was the willingness to inveigh against tasteless or dishonest cartoons when they trumpet a political view you dislike… and remaining silent when the cartoonist is advancing a cause your side of the aisle supports.
This I really don’t get. I would have thought the term “beyond the pale” implies that there are such universal standards.
It’s a strange world indeed where publicly stating you’re against soldiers being killed or maimed is considered to be dishonoring them and actually sending soldiers off to be maimed or killed is considered to be supporting them.
I suppose it does. But after reading saoirse’s response, I realized that my “beyond the pale” isn’t necessarily his “beyond the pale” and that I could not drag out the “Beyond the Pale, 4th Ed.” reference book to prove that my view was correct, since obviously there is no such reference work that we would both accept as defining precisely what limits exist in these matters.