Oily Character
- May 7, 2010 – 6:00 am
- Posted in Barack Obama, Big government, Diversity Lane, Jayson, Obama, Oil Leak, Oil Spill, President Obama, Progressivism, Promethea, Uncategorized
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Diversity Lane 
22 Comments
YOU’RE JUST SAYING THAT CUZ IT’S BL–*shot*
If I were paranoid, I’d think O’Bama ordered the BP oil platform destroyed just to spring the trap on the GOP that fell for his off-shore drilling bait.
Oil slicks in the ocean;
– can kill large amounts of marine and bird animals.
– deposit ugly and nasty deposits on shorelines, devastating the local eco-systems of those areas.
Unlike the creeping and insidious effects of big-government programs, oil slicks;
– are digested by the biochemistry of the saltwater marine environment
– their damage is temporary – all life forms recover and return in a few years
Unlike the properties of large oil spills, Obamacare, FDR and LBJ style big government programs;
– lasts for many generations.
– saps and leeches off productive citizens endlessly.
– instead of diminishing, these oily and insidious programs grow and grow.
– kill enormous amounts of economic potential, life and vitality.
– soils and punishes the spirit of free market entrepreneurism.
– endlessly punishes folks who want to build capital savings for independent living.
– steals and destroys multi-generational family savings and estates.
– encourages a poverty-class to be a bunch of entitlement oriented spoiled brats.
– destroys a potentially good work-ethics within otherwise good and productive citizens
– embeds a government bureaucracy of unionized (SEIU), entitlement-minded employees who enjoy salaries and retirement benefits that are twice, or more the private sector average.
Here’s to “Hope and Change”-!!
geeknerd: That’s part of what’s so dreadful about having an Obama type and his minions in charge: even when they may not have been responsible for something as conspiratorial as your suggestion it’s all too easy to suspect it anyway due to the hideous track record of Marxism and deceit they’ve already laid down. For me it all starts at the top of the party– by which I mean not Obama but Reverend Wright– since he was for 20 years Obama’s mentor, and can thus reasonably be designated the ideological fountainhead of the current political pestilence. By postioning Wright as de facto wellspring of all things Obama, virtually any hypothetical corrupt or evil act under this administration is very believable.
Nice, Steve T. Your comparison reminds me of the scandalous quotation– was it Buckley who said it? I forget, but someone pretty respectable– attributing, ultimately, more longterm evil to Eleanor Rooselvelt than to Hitler; since Hitler and naziism was a brief and long-since defeated historical freak, but the socialist heritage first kick-started in the US by FDR and Eleanor lives with us still and now threatens our national character and way of life permanently.
That seems like a rather steep hill those kids are standing on. They should probably move before they tumble headfirst straight into Obama’s ego!
Steve T.: Well said and you’re dead, bang on…
wootabega: Unfortunately it seems all too often that as a nation we’ve already tumbled headfirst into Obama’s ego.
Jamie: Warning: your use of the terms “dead” and “bang” may mark you as a scary dangerous Tea Party type.
Diversity Lane is beautifully drawn, but extremely hyperbolic.
Satire-via-straw men isn’t really satire at all, since it reveals no real insight about the issues at hand. And as far as straw men go, Diversity’s villains and pet peeves take the whole bakery.
Damn, but it’s beautifully drawn, though.
Marbles,
Wow, what impressive insight and keen observations you have. I agree whole heartedly, Zack produces very skillful artwork.
Speaking of skillful, this attribute is what is known as an antonym to your political analysis, and demonstrated communication skills of offering something merit-based to a discussion.
Zack’s cartoon takes a direct shot at Obama’s ego. Alright, how about we note a few well documented facts about our “historical” President and his ego;
– Obama is the only President elect to establish the “Office of the President Elect”, complete with its own seal mounted on a speaking podium in a press briefing room. Now, there is no such office, never previously has been one however, our “historic” new President sees this as appropriate for him.
– Many of his speeches are deliberately set with audio reverb. That ‘god-like-tone’ is an essential part of the image of this “historical” President, right?
– As of last September, 2009, within 41 speeches that year, Obama spoke of himself 1,198 times, in terms of “I”s amd “me”s. Ref. Dan Gainor – FOXNews.com – September 23, 2009
An excerpt:
“Obama loves to hear himself talk – about himself. In just 41 speeches so this year, not including this week’s big speech at the United Nations, Obama has talked about himself nearly 1,200 times – 1,198 to be exact. (That breaks down to 1,121 “I”s and just 77 “me”s.)”
That is merely three examples of the hubris of our Marist Man-Child “historical” President.
So Marbles, you cast a sweeping generality that is plainly false, and easily disproven.
However, I grant you the excellent insight and shared taste for very skillful drawing work.
One last note:
Notice Marbles, compared to the shallow excrement sandwich technique that was in totality, your comment, my excrement sandwich to you is more like a deluxe Quizno’s sandwich, which means I offered you some substantive, merit based facts to show how wrong (boring too) your generalizations are.
Steve T:
Facts, yes. Many facts in the sandwich. (they’re facts I haven’t heard before, but I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt).
But what matters isn’t facts, in and of themselves, as it is how important they are.
For instance, the focus of this particular comic, and thus of your comments, is Obama’s ego. People with overinflated egos are irritating, no question about that. But it’s a character flaw that has little bearing on anything of real importance, policy-wise.
Frankly, I don’t CARE if the president has an ego the size of a small planet. Why does it matter? I’ll tell you what matters to me. A track record of caution at the expense of courage, self-sabotage in pursuit of the approval of a blindly contrarian opposition, broken promises on infrastructural renewal, continued secrecy, continued Bush prisoner policies, and a botched opportunity to create a health care system that could have truly benefitted the country.
Our energy policies are suicidal. Our drug war is a trillion-dollar sham. Our immigration battle is tearing us apart. Terrorists are everywhere. Iraq and Afghanistan are still weighing us down. We’re hopelessly in debt. We don’t manufacture. Our infrastructure’s crumbling. Our education is a joke. The family is in decline.
And we’re supposed to care about an ego?
Or teleprompters? Or Chappaquiddick? Or not respecting the flag?
That, in general, is the problem with cartons like “Diversity Lane.” The focus is almost always on things that, frankly, don’t matter. Broad, shallow stereotypes of hyper-PC lib’ruls illuminate nothing and offer no insight. Jabs at the supposed sacred cows of said hyper-PC lib’ruls offer even less. It’s basically a more elaborate version of those “Annoy a liberal” T-shirts you see for sale at FreeRepublic. Beautifully rendered, handsome and polished, but no more meaningful than one of those shirts. When issues of substance are brought up, the focus is still on the shallow stereotypes. They supply some feel-good laughs, but inspire no further understanding of what’s being talked about.
(and yes, the same goes for a lot of what passes for wit directed at the right.)
Marbles,
Thank you for the in-depth reply you offer. I truly appreciate an opportunity to discuss issues in a candid and open fashion.
You ask about the significance of ego, in terms of the its bearing to the quality of a President.
There are vast volumes written on the subject of leadership, and specifically, something called “servant leadership” ( I hope you are tempted to research that last term ).
First, I would refer you to an easily found document called FM 22-100, the Leadership Manual of the Army. The key principles within happen to be the foundation from which the Ivy-League colleges built their prestigious MBA programs from (ref: Gen McCaffrey, lecturing my Infantry Officer Basic classes, at Ft. Benning, 1986 As coincidence would have it, this is the same Barry McCaffrey who became Clinton’s “drug czar”… whoop-de-do!, huh?).
If I had a son who was a Boy Scout, and working towards becoming an Eagle Scout, I would have him study this book. It is gold, in its contents, and what it offers for character develolpment – I am dead serious.
Effective leadership is not a selfish endeavor – it is about getting, in a conscientious manner, the best outcome, without caring who gets the credit (ref: an excellent quote from Pres. Reagan to the same).
An ego-centered person is nearly always a poor leader. Sure, good leaders do have an ego however, the judgment that makes them a good leader subordinates pride and ego to the well-being of the best outcome, for the right and morally principled reasons (such as, upholding the principles of the Constitution, as opposed to giving into pop-politics that is responsible for Obama’s quadrupled deficit).
I sincerely invite you to fetch this leadership manual (there is no copy write on it, as it is a government publication. You can fetch it in some pdf files)
There are great examples of folks who were great leaders (even if you did not like their politics), such as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and (yes) Ronald Reagan. A study of their style and character is remarkably similar.
Our energy policy is a complicated issue. I suggest, if you have cable, keep a staunch eye out for a specific program on the History channel. It is called, “Oil”. There is nothing partisan or ‘special interest’ about this program. Hell, I wish I could attach a boot-leg copy. This program systematically defines the what, where and how crude oil comes from, and shows an excellent slice of the thousands of market uses and demands for it. Putting gas in cars, or fueling up a truck or a jet plane are relatively minor uses for crude oil. This is an impressive and revealing program far too many people are unfamiliar with.
The point is, for many reasons beyond transportation, modern economies cannot be independent from oil… no chance, whatsoever.
Manufacturing – the decline of this has kicked my proverbial career in the balls, more than a few times. Our idiot government tax and regulation policies are 80% responsible for this… taxing big-medium-small businesses is stupid-stupid-stupid!! It is like eating your seed corn,… you know, the stuff that actually germinates the corn stalks?
Business taxes in the US are among the highest in the world. This encourages, even compels companies to move overseas.
All taxes put on any business, are always dumped off onto the end user/product – the citizen. No exceptions, ever!
Any tax on “big business” is a sleazy, commonly used tactic by politicians to leach more money from all the end users (all ‘Joe six-packs’). The economic unfamiliarity of much of our electorate is alarming, and is the underlying root cause of characters like Obama being elected.
Marbles, I disagree with you where you assert that the issues Zack addresses over the scope of his cartoons are unimportant.
I hope you keep up with his works, and comment frequently. Candidly, I would love to direct you to some of his older works, which are among my very favorites, and discuss the merits of these issues, too.
Perhaps Zack may consider recycling a ‘blast from the past’… that would be eco-PC friendly, right?
Be well-
I appreciate your interest in an open and frank discussion
Marbles,
You begin your remarks with a compliment. It reminds me of the way the Pharisees and Herodians began thier question to Jesus about paying taxes to Caesar (Matt. 22:15-22, Mark 12:13-17, Luke 20:20-26). This is not to compare Zack with Jesus, but to compare you with the Pharisees and Herodians who set a trap.
geeknerd:
Gotta admit, of all the things I could have anticipated happening to me in life, being compared to the Pharisees was never one of them.
Here’s to surprises!
No trappery intended. Simply thinking that qualifying negative remarks with a sincere positive note disarms those who would assume trollery was afoot—“trollery”, for me, meaning that one’s disagreement with the politics of someone’s message blinds them to other things, or most egregiously, causes them to see things that aren’t actually there. There are, unfortunately, tons of people who would have no difficulty saying that these pictures are “crude and amatueurish” or “he draws worse than a third grader”, and the scary part is that they’d probably believe it, too. I had sort of an epiphany on this subject when I came across a FreeRepublic thread where people were insulting Michelle Obama as “fat.” I realized that political biases are so overwhelming to the mind that they actually cause you to hallucinate. If Michelle’s last name were, say, “Malkin” instead, these jokers would not see “fat.” It’s amazing that everyone agrees on what a toned woman looks like, unless that toned woman is one of “the enemy.” Then somehow “fat” is superimpsed into their vision.
That kind of projection is one of the main reasons why American politics are so twisted.
Marbles: Appreciate your comments, though of course I have to disagree. For one thing I do believe I deal with important points, not just stuff like “inflated Obama-ego” mockery; how could a cartoon like this, for example: https://diversitylane.files.wordpress.com/2009/09/diversitylane_bigbusiness_for-blog.jpg be thought of as not addressing a profound issue? But I would also offer that when my drawings are more frivolous– things like Sierra on top of the house smoking Diversity’s jump rope because of its hemp content– this is not necessarily a waste of anyone’s time either. Cartoons often don’t cover the same province as a Thomas Sowell essay. They can frequently simply serve to humorously puncture some sacred (or secular) cow and in so doing add a spot of fun to someone’s day and raise a smile. Not an insignificant or unworthy goal in my opinion.
Steve T: Brilliant points about the consummate importance of sidelining the ego in pursuing good or great things. I think you’re right: Obama’s egoism is not such a secondary matter afterall. When, for example, one’s vision of a government-run healthcare system is strongly opposed by most of the country, rife with potential pitfalls and unsupported by any rational economic considerations, to continue to –egoistically– pursue it is to encourage financial instability and diminished freedom, among other things. Not exactly an insignificant piece of ego fallout.
Actually, Marbles, I wouldn’t compare you to Pharisees, the extreme traditionalist, extreme Mosaic legalist party on the Jews; I’d compare you to the Herodians, the assimilationist party of Jews that did all things Roman.
What surprises me about that incident in the Gospels is that the extreme Right and extreme Left joined forces against Jesus. Normally, the Pharisses thought the Herodians apostates who continually broke Mosaic law, and the Herodians thought the Pharisees fools who clung to an archaic way of life outmoded by the modern Roman way of life.
Wow… I haven’t looked at this thread in a few days… I think we’ve fully explored the ego thing… on so many levels.
• I would not downplay the importance of Zack’s work. Many people don’t pay attention to politics and get caught up in group-thought and the PC culture. They can be pushed to a wakening through ridicule. When some see that others are laughing at the previously sacred President, some of his aura disperses.
• Marbles seems to care about things that are not in the purview of the federal government, yet deems unimportant things that are. It probably takes 15 minutes to read the Constitution. I highly recommend it.
• I am galled by a President that believes that the founders and Constitution are fundamentally flawed. It was a miracle that those men appeared at the same time and place, producing such a document.
• Going to primary sources, you will find how much the founders believed that faith and integrity were critical to the function and survival of this nation.
• I’d better stop here, I’m getting as long-winded and annoying as some of the previous comments…
Just want to say what a great blog you got here!
I’ve been around for quite a lot of time, but finally decided to show my appreciation of your work!
Thumbs up, and keep it going!
Cheers
Christian, iwspo.net
Move over Captain Joe, make room for Captain Obama. Captain Joseph Jeffrey Hazelwood of the infamous Exxon
Valdez has been deposed by our glorious historic leader as sole owner of the largest oil spill in human history. The disgraced captain can now rest easy because his record will forever be eclipsed by another most deserving individual. The trophy for this achievement can sit proudly on his Oval Office mantle along with the richly deserved Nobel Peace Prize.
For what it’s worth, coming from a European socialist and feminist, that “Big Business” cartoon is probably the best Diversity Lane yet, and my least favorite was the long chain of very similar climate change jokes.
“I am galled by a President that believes that the founders and Constitution are fundamentally flawed. It was a miracle that those men appeared at the same time and place, producing such a document.”
Jamie:
You’re not going to find many people who would argue that the founding fathers weren’t a once-in-a-lifetime collection of brilliant minds, the likes of which we really don’t see in modern times.
But the black-and-white mentality that asserts that brilliance and enlightenment can’t exist side by side with “fundamental flaws” is codswallop.
How many really smart people do you know who have some glaring blind spot, or perfectly nice people who can turn nasty at the drop of a hat in certain situations? Flaws are unavoidable, for man as well as his creations.
One of the greatest things about the Constitution is that it provided the mechanisms through which to improve itself. And improvements have been desperately needed over the centuries to address the problems created by, among other things, the “bad check” Martin Luther King once referred to.
“Fundamentally flawed” may be strong wording, but the issue it addresses is not radical in the slightest. Not if you simply adjust your lens a bit to see things from a different historical angle.