Crackdown Crackup – The Daily Cartoonist

Jen Sorensen starts us off with a plain statement: The Bill of Rights is no longer part of our government, or of our daily lives. Freedom of speech and freedom of the press can be restricted if people speak or write things that go against official policy, and freedom of religion means the freedom to have you pay for schools that teach my religion.

For now, the majority of restrictions on speech and press are being placed on non-citizens, the authoritarian argument being that only full citizens may enjoy the Bill of Rights, despite several court decisions declaring otherwise.

But who cares what the courts decide? Marbury v Madison no longer applies and the executive branch openly argues that the judicial branch of government has no jurisdiction in this nation.

Suddenly, the purpose of the Department of Justice is not to see that the laws are fairly applied but to see that they are applied in accordance with the wishes and policies of the President. Had Pam Bondi been Attorney General in the Watergate days, Archibald Cox would have been fired without all that business of AG’s refusing and resigning in protest.

Things are more efficient today. People can be arrested, stripped of their rights, sentenced and sent to prison without the delays and potential interference of hearings and trials, and should a judge suggest that this is a problem, the answer is that even if the ruling makes sense, it’s too late to change things.

This may all sound frightening and upsetting when viewed from a distance, as Brazilian cartoonist Custodio suggests, but it’s perfectly logical and acceptable for those of us close enough to recognize, as in that final panel of Sorensen’s cartoon, that we know the correct answer and can recite it upon the demand of the authorities.

Juxtaposition of the Day

Wilcox suggests that whether destruction is “terrorism” or “liberation” largely depends on who is destroying what, and whether they have official clearance for what they’re doing. Groups protesting Tesla’s CEO, Elon Musk, insist they encourage peaceful protest, not destruction, but the DOJ is not in the mood to distinguish between the two approaches.

“If you’re going to touch a Tesla, go to a dealership, do anything, you better watch out because we’re coming after you,” Attorney General Bondi has said.

Walters points out that anti-Disney conservatives did not resort to such actions, though he doesn’t point out that the State of Florida attacked Disney with punitive tax laws, forcing expensive legal actions that likely cost Disney more than the damage done to automobiles at a dealership, which are likely insured.

The closest Tesla protesters can get to enlisting official allies is reports that cybertrucks have become so unpopular that dealers are refusing to take them as trade-ins for other vehicles.

Musk is also coming under a different official form of protest, as a prominent Tesla investor has called for him to step down as CEO, saying the company has been neglected too long while Musk dabbles in national politics.

That problem may be resolving itself, given Musk’s expensive failure in this past week’s Wisconsin election. Many cartoonists showed him with a stinking cheesehead, but Koterba added the egg on his face just in time for news reports suggesting that Trump is on the verge of kicking him to the curb.

Good thing he’s got his American citizenship, or he might be getting kicked right out the Golden Door.

And speaking of expensive failures, Trump loyalists are eagerly proclaiming the value of those tariffs, and it’s less about formal definitions and standard economic theory than about agreement. If a majority agrees that tariffs are not taxes, then they aren’t.

And if a majority agrees that they should be based on trade imbalances rather than reciprocity, well, then high tariffs on countries like Myanmar are the fault of selfish Burmese citizens who do not buy American automobiles and household appliances despite the riches they acquire by selling us inexpensive T-shirts.

The point being that, if that $7 bag of Vietnamese shrimp suddenly costs $10.22, you should ask yourself why those people refuse to purchase wide-screen TVs and luxurious motorhomes.

As Herb points out, we’re simply trying to equalize things, after, as the President explained, our having been ripped off and raped for decades by those other countries, the big bullies.

Speaking of bullies, Morland suggests that Britain recognizes that we know what is best for their economy and that it’s not our fault if they misbehave and make us angry, and that, even in those cases, we’ll never do it again.

Which is why we have such a good relationship with them.

In time, the other nations will also adjust to the new economy, though it may take a little bit of scaling back, specific to trade with us.

Still, there are sensible workarounds. In the last Trump administration, China adjusted to American tariffs by making trade agreements to import soybeans from Brazil, and while our farmers have never regained those lost markets, we were able to compensate them for their losses at the time with $23 billion in taxpayer funds.

That may become the model for other losses as our trading partners find new sources for things they used to buy from us and new markets for things they used to sell us.

But we’ll still be able to get Marmite and shortbread from England, which will only include a 10% tariff, though if that’s all we’re importing, the per-unit cost of shipping may rise a bit.

Not to worry, MacKinnon assures us. The imposition of tariffs will fix things so that Canada, our largest trading partner, will no longer exploit us by selling us lumber for housing and fertilizer for our fields, and will stop the practice of assembling automobiles as part of the 60-year-old US/Canada Auto Pact.

If not, we’ll simply invade and make Canada our 51st, 52nd, 53rd, 54th, 55th, 56th, 57th, 58th, 59th and 60th states, such that they will come up to us with tears in their eyes as has never been seen before, saying, “Sir, please, take all the potash you need.”

Won’t that be nice?