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January 6

Wednesday July 19, 2023

July 19, 2023 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday July 19, 2023

Trump Uses Bad News to Energize His Base

June 14, 2023

Former U.S. President Donald Trump’s recent announcement that he is now a target of the Justice Department’s investigation into efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election is just the latest episode in a long series of legal challenges he faces. Rather than being subdued by the mounting allegations, Trump seems to be using the bad news as a means to rally his troops and strengthen his position within the Republican party.

In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump disclosed the existence of a target letter he received from prosecutors, indicating that he could soon be facing charges related to the 2020 election. While the purpose of such a letter is to inform individuals about their right to appear before a grand jury, Trump took the opportunity to emphasize the timeline, stating he has been given a mere four days to report. His claim that this usually leads to an arrest and indictment echoes a familiar pattern of presenting himself as a victim of persecution.

May 11, 2023

This revelation comes on top of the existing state and federal charges in New York and Florida, as well as the ongoing election-interference investigation in Georgia. The mounting legal problems do not seem to dampen Trump’s ambitions for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. Instead, he appears to use these challenges to present himself as a defiant figure, further solidifying his image as a strong leader fighting against the odds.

Throughout his political career, Trump has been no stranger to controversy and legal battles. Just last month, he was indicted on 37 federal felony counts in relation to accusations of illegally retaining classified documents at his Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago. Despite these charges, he maintains his innocence, consistently pleading not guilty.

The pretrial conference for this case took place recently, where Trump’s lawyers pressed for an indefinite delay of the trial date. While the judge has not yet issued a decision on the matter, Trump’s legal team seems confident in leveraging the court system to their advantage, possibly in an attempt to buy time and sway public opinion.

January 8, 2021

Trump’s impeachment by the Democratic-led House for incitement of insurrection following the Capitol riot has only added fuel to the fire. Although he was acquitted in the Senate, Trump continues to exploit the events of January 6th, framing himself as a victim of political bias while downplaying his role in the escalation of tensions.

Special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation has honed in on Trump’s efforts and those of his allies to overturn the election results. This includes the role of lawyers pressuring for the overturning of results and the submission of false electoral certificates to Congress. Witnesses, including former Vice President Mike Pence and Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, have been questioned before a grand jury. Despite this scrutiny, Trump’s allies remain loyal, refusing to turn against him even in the face of legal repercussions.

News: Trump Faces Possible Indictment in Capitol Attack Investigation

As Trump navigates this legal quagmire, he continues to tap into his tried-and-tested strategy of rallying his supporters around him, portraying himself as a victim of a biased justice system and a target of political persecution. By framing himself as a warrior fighting against the establishment, Trump energizes his base, ensuring that his political ambitions remain alive and well, even amid the ongoing investigations.

It remains to be seen how these legal challenges will unfold and whether Trump’s fervent base of supporters will be enough to propel him to a potential presidential bid in 2024. However, one thing is clear: Trump’s ability to leverage bad news and turn it into a rallying cry is a testament to his enduring influence in American politics. (AI)

From sketch to finish, see the current way Graeme completes an editorial cartoon using an iPencil, the Procreate app, and a couple of cheats on an iPad Pro. If you’re creative, give illustration a try:

https://mackaycartoons.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/2023-0719-USA.mp4
Posted in: USA Tagged: 2023-12, blow horn, Donald Trump, indictment, insurrection, January 6, procreate, Target, trump disgrace, USA

Saturday July 23, 2022

July 23, 2022 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday July 23, 2022

The Jan. 6 Panel After 8 Hearings: Where Will the Evidence Lead?

June 18, 2022

Comprehensive, compellingly scripted and packed with details, the eight hearings of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack have laid out a powerful account of President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

The select committee assembled a mass of evidence and testimony — provided in large part by Mr. Trump’s aides and other Republicans — not only for the judgment of history but for the purpose of two more immediate and related goals that the panel’s leaders highlighted during the hearing on Thursday night.

Posted in: USA Tagged: 2022-23, 2024, ball and chain, capitol riot, Donald Trump, election, insurrection, January 6, outtakes, Trumpers, USA

Wednesday June 15, 2022

June 15, 2022 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday June 15, 2022

Rudy Giuliani, drunk on conspiracy theories

President Donald Trump, his former aides testified, faced a fateful choice on election night 2020: Heed the best advice of his top political and legal advisers? Or go with the erratic drunk guy?

January 6, 2022

Trump chose Option No. 2.

“President Trump rejected the advice of his campaign experts on election night,” Vice Chairwoman Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) alleged at the start of Monday’s hearing of the House committee probing the Jan. 6, 2021, attack, “and instead followed the course recommended by an apparently inebriated Rudy Giuliani to just claim he won and insist that the vote counting stop, to falsely claim everything was fraudulent.”

A video of Jason Miller, a senior Trump campaign adviser, flashed on the screen above the dais in the Cannon Caucus Room. “The mayor was definitely intoxicated,” Miller testified, but “I do not know his level of intoxication when he spoke with the president.”

What, he wasn’t carrying a Breathalyzer?

July 20, 2021

Whatever his blood alcohol level, Giuliani’s nonsense quotient was over the limit. He was saying, “We won it, they’re stealing it from us,” Miller recounted. And “anyone who didn’t agree with that position was being weak.”

So Trump did as Giuliani instructed: He cried fraud and declared victory.

Giuliani, once America’s Mayor and Time’s Person of the Year, long ago became a national punchline, with his melting hair dye and his post-election news conference at Philadelphia’s Four Seasons Total Landscaping. But thanks to the select committee, we now know that people inside the Trump administration and campaign also thought him preposterous — with one key exception: Trump.

The committee relived some of Giuliani’s most ludicrous claims, sometimes accompanied by footage of his wild-eyed TV appearances. Votes “in garbage cans” and in “shopping baskets” being wheeled in for counting under orders from Frankfurt, Germany. Eight thousand dead people voting in Pennsylvania. A suitcase full of ballots pulled from under a table in Georgia. Votes manipulated via Italy, the Philippines and a deceased communist dictator in Venezuela.

February 26, 2021

In depositions screened by the committee, a veritable parade of Trump advisers testified that they told the president what they thought of such ideas: “Bull—t.” “Completely bogus.” “Silly.” “Completely nuts.” “Crazy.” “Incorrect.” “Debunked.” “Idiotic.”

White House lawyer Eric Herschmann, in his videotaped deposition, wondered aloud whether Giuliani, “at this stage of his life,” had “the same ability to manage things at this level or not.”

Trump campaign lawyer Matt Morgan, in his deposition, spoke about his conversations with outside counsel: “The general consensus was that law firms were not comfortable making the arguments that Rudy Giuliani was making.”

But Trump still sided with Giuliani’s lunacies — which “demoralized” the attorney general, Bill Barr. “I thought, ‘Boy, if he really believes this stuff, he has … become detached from reality.’”

January 8, 2021

Barr worked for Trump for two years before this occurred to him?

Even Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, no profile in courage, testified that he disagreed with Crazy Rudy. Asked in his deposition whether he ever shared with Trump his “perspective” on Giuliani, Kushner paused 10 seconds as he searched for a reply: “Um … I, I guess … [Sigh] … Yes.” Finally, Kushner said he told Trump it was “basically, not the approach I would take if I was you.”

The committee played the deposition of Bill Stepien, Trump’s campaign manager, in which he testified that he disassociated himself from Trump’s bogus election-fraud claims. “There were two groups,” he said, “my team and Rudy’s team.” Stepien’s was, he said, “Team Normal.”

But Trump disbanded Team Normal the second week after the election. Instead, he arranged for “Mayor Giuliani to be moved in as the person in charge of the legal side of the campaign, and, for all intents and purposes, the campaign.”

May 14, 2021

A Republican-appointed U.S. attorney from Georgia explained how he chased down the Giuliani allegation that a “black suitcase” stuffed with ballots was the “smoking gun”: It was “actually an official ballot box,” handled correctly.

A former Republican official from Pennsylvania testified about investigating Giuliani’s claim to the state legislature that 8,000 dead people voted. “Not only was there not evidence of 8,000 dead voters voting in Pennsylvania, there wasn’t evidence of eight.”

A supposed 68 percent error rate of Michigan voting machines? Trump Justice Department official Richard Donoghue’s deposition said the actual error rate was 0.0063 percent.

But the debunking of each zany conspiracy theory (“whack-a-mole” was Barr’s description) would only cause Trump to “move to another allegation,” Donoghue testified.

January 31, 2008

And so the “big lie” was born — of no evidence but limitless repetition. Even now, Giuliani is, well, drunk on the idea.

“If you gave me the paper ballots, I could probably turn around each one of these states,” he said to the Jan. 6 committee in his own deposition. “I’d pull out enough that were fraudulent that it would shake the hell out of the country.”

Thanks, Rudy. But Team Abnormal has already done damage enough. (The Washington Post) 

 

Posted in: USA Tagged: 2022-19, circus, Donald Trump, election, Elephant, Emperor, GOP, insurrection, January 6, jester, Rudolph Giuliani, USA

Thursday January 6, 2022

January 6, 2022 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday January 6, 2022

A year after Jan. 6 riot, Americans and Canadians agree U.S. democracy in peril: poll

January 8, 2021

One year after the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, a majority of Americans and Canadians alike say democracy in the United States is under threat, a new poll suggests.

The poll, conducted by the Angus Reid Institute and released Thursday, also found stark differences in how the event is viewed by conservatives and liberals in both countries.

The divide is more severe in the U.S., where 68 per cent of respondents who voted for Donald Trump in the 2020 election disagree that the riots were an act of domestic terrorism — an opinion at odds with the FBI and other officials — while nearly three quarters still believe Trump won the election that he lost.

“There are only two (major) political parties in the U.S. … and this has become the narrative of one of those parties,” said Matthew Lebo, a political science professor at Western University who studies U.S. and Canadian politics.

“You cannot have a democracy with only one party that believes in democracy.”

Thursday marked the one-year anniversary of the riots, which saw supporters of Trump violently storm the Capitol building and disrupt the certification of President Joe Biden’s election victory the previous November. Seven people, including police officers, died during and after the siege.

Posted in: USA Tagged: 2022-01, anniversary, big lie, Capitol riots, coin, commemoration, Democracy, Donald Trump, insurrection, January 6, USA

Friday February 26, 2021

March 5, 2021 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday February 26, 2021

CPAC and the New Republicanism

The golden statue of the former president being wheeled through the halls of the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday may have been a touch on the nose, considering the obvious Old Testament allusion.

February 4, 2021

But if you were looking for clues about the direction of the Republican Party after the Trump years, an effigy of Donald Trump in an American flag bathing suit may be as symbolic as any golden calf.

In recent years, CPAC has evolved from a family reunion of Republican libertarians, social conservatives and a hawkish foreign policy establishment into Trump-chella.

This year has been no exception, with speaker after speaker focusing on the pet issues of the former president. “Are your votes being distorted?” one ominous video asked, flashing photos of President Biden on the big screen. Mr. Trump plans to address the crowd on Sunday and anything he says about his future political ambitions will inevitably overshadow the entire event.

Yet, the former president may not end up running again — continuing legal issues could kill his bid — but there’s little question that he leaves the party reshaped in his image. Even though Mr. Trump often failed to articulate a comprehensive policy doctrine, he has fundamentally remade what being a Republican means.

That shift was made strikingly clear in the remarks of politicians who hope to lead their party into the future — with or without Mr. Trump.

October 12, 2016

Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, a rock star in conservative circles right now, laid out a pretty concise summary of the new conservatism in his speech on Friday: Anti-“adventurism” abroad, anti-big technology companies, anti-immigration, anti-China and anti-lockdowns.

“We cannot — we will not — go back to the days of the failed Republican establishment of yesteryear,” he said, proclaiming Florida to be an “oasis of freedom” in a country suffering from the “the yoke of oppressive lockdowns.”

Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, who opened his remarks with a jokeabout his much-criticized trip to a Cancún resort, cast conservatives as Jedi “rebels” against the “rigid conformity” of the socialist left — a call to arms at an event steeped in complaints of cultural victimhood. This year’s conference is titled “America Uncanceled.”

But Mr. Cruz also had a message for members of his own party.

March 24, 2015

“There’s a whole lot of voices in Washington that want to just erase the past four years, want to go back to the world before,” he said.“Let me tell ya right now: Donald J. Trump ain’t goin’ anywhere.”

Josh Hawley, a junior senator from Missouri, after defending his efforts to contest the election results as “taking a stand,” proclaimed a “new nationalism” that included breaking up technology companies, standing up to China and tightening borders. The “oligarchs” and “corporate media,” he said, want to divide Americans with “lies” like systemic racism. Hours before his speech, Mr. Hawley announced legislation requiring a $15 minimum wage for corporations with revenues over $1 billion.

None of the men, it’s worth noting, made any reference to Mr. Biden, a sign that the party continues to lack any cohesive line of attack against the new administration. 

But what was equally striking is how far the speeches differed from traditional Republican ideology. A party that has defined itself as defenders of the free market now believes big technology companies wield too much power and the government needs to put more restrictions in place. Concerns about interventionism abroad have replaced hawkish doctrine as the driving foreign policy force. Nativism has gone mainstream and the politics of cultural grievance, focused heavily around race, dominate among conservatives that once delighted in mocking sensitive liberal “snowflakes.” (Continued: NYT) 

 

Posted in: USA Tagged: 2021-08, Conservative, Donald Trump, GOP, hostage, January 6, Mike Pence, party, Proud Boys, QAnon, Republican, Ted Cruz, Trumpcult, uprising, USA

Please note…

This website contains satirical commentaries of current events going back several decades. Some readers may not share this sense of humour nor the opinions expressed by the artist. To understand editorial cartoons it is important to understand their effectiveness as a counterweight to power. It is presumed readers approach satire with a broad minded foundation and healthy knowledge of objective facts of the subjects depicted.

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