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Kevin McCarthy

Friday January 6, 2023

January 6, 2023 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday January 6, 2023

Canada and the U.S. both have House Speakers. For one of them, the stakes are a lot higher

It’s being called the “battle for the gavel,” a historic fight in the U.S. over who will hold the title of Speaker, the presiding member of the House of Representatives.

Angry Washington – available at the boutique.

For nearly two full days, bitter partisanship within the Republican party, now the majority in the House, has turned what’s normally a swift affair into a protracted stalemate over who from their ranks ought to hold the job.

Multiple rounds of voting so far haven’t meaningfully moved the needle, and it is holding up the start of the next Congress for the first time in 100 years.

“The rest of the world is looking,” said U.S. President Joe Biden on Wednesday of the chaos.

“They’re looking at, you know, can we get our act together?”

By contrast, the drama that’s attached to what might be called the “race for the mace” in Canada — the election of a Speaker for the House of Commons — pales in comparison.

The job of Speaker hearkens back over 600 years to the formative Parliaments in Britain, and an agreed-upon need for someone to oversee and guide the work of the legislature.

That a Speaker is required for Congress as well as for the House of Commons and Senate is part of the constitutions of both countries.

Still, with the two countries having different systems of government, the jobs have developed differently over time and with contrasting political dynamics.

December 16, 2020

In the U.S, the evolution has given the House Speaker a number of powers which — depending on the makeup of Congress — can allow a Speaker to derail a president’s agenda, drive their own party’s legislative goals and reward or punish fellow elected representatives with plum committee posts.

That makes the person in the job — normally chosen from the majority party — exceptionally influential; among other things, should the president not be able to fulfil their duties, nor the vice-president, it is the House Speaker who is on deck.

Former House of Commons Speaker Andrew Scheer used a sports analogy to describe the difference between the post in Canada versus that in the U.S.

“In Canada, it’s far more of a referee, where in the U.S. it is more like a quarterback,” he said when reached by the Star on Tuesday.

What Speakers referee is the House of Commons itself, ensuring the rights and privileges of MPs are respected as is the decorum and work of Parliament — there’s rarely a day, for example, where the Speaker doesn’t intervene to ask MPs to mind their manners as they joust.

They do it from a largely neutral position as the job is understood by all parties to place the business of Parliament above that of partisanship. Speakers only cast a vote in the event of a tie, don’t participate in debates, stay away from partisan party caucus meetings and even have to watch their words when they campaign for seats during general elections. (The Toronto Star) 

rom sketch to finish, in 30 seconds, see the current way Graeme completes an editorial cartoon using an iPencil, the Procreate app, and a couple of cheats on an iPad Pro … These sped up clips are posted to encourage others to be creative, to take advantage of the technology many of us already have and to use it to produce satire. Comfort the afflicted. Afflict the comforted.

https://mackaycartoons.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/2023-0106-NATshort.mp4

 

Posted in: Canada, USA Tagged: 2023-01, Anthony Rota, Canada, House of Commons, House of Representatives, Justin Trudeau, Kevin McCarthy, news, Parliament, recess, Speaker

Friday November 11, 2022

November 11, 2022 by Graeme MacKay

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday November 11, 2022

Greene’s call for ending U.S. aid to Ukraine isn’t about the money

December 20, 2016

Speeches presented at Donald Trump’s rallies are not renowned for their detailed presentations of carefully considered policy proposals. That’s not why people go to rallies in general, of course, much less this specific genre of rally. Attendees show up to show their support for Republican candidates — and to hear excoriations of the political left.

That’s the context in which we should consider the contribution by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) to a rally Thursday in Iowa: Her arguments about funding for the war in Ukraine were political rhetoric, not considered analysis. The question, instead, is what political aim she intended to advance.

Greene’s mention of Ukraine stemmed from a riff about the border. Greene accused Democrats and the news media of ignoring an alleged “crime spree” involving undocumented immigrants, including that there are “drugs flooding across our border, with fentanyl poisonings every single day.” One reason you’re hearing about fentanyl so much this year is that overdose deaths have increased, as the media have reported. Another reason is that Republicans are using the fear of fentanyl as a way to bash Democrats on border policies — although most fentanyl is smuggled in through existing border checkpoints, often by U.S. citizens.

June 18, 2022

Regardless, that was the setup for her comments about U.S. spending to help Ukraine.

“Democrats have ripped our border wide open,” she said in Iowa. “But the only border they care about is Ukraine, not America’s southern border. Under Republicans, not another penny will go to Ukraine. Our country comes first.”

See the logical jump there? From “Democrats care too much about Ukraine’s border” to “we shouldn’t spend on Ukraine at all.” It’s not clear how one follows from the other, but consistency on such things is not how Greene has built her political reputation.

June 15, 2021

While not the official position of the GOP, Greene’s “not another penny” line met with some applause. That’s not surprising, given that polling has shown increasing Republican skepticism about providing aid to Ukraine in its war against Russian invaders. As The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake noted Thursday, nearly half of Republicans now think the United States is doing too much in support of Ukraine.

But the United States is doing relatively little — particularly when considering the historical context of its effort to contain Russian aggression.

May 5, 2000

U.S. defense spending has increased dramatically since the end of the Cold War, the period in which U.S. opposition to Russian strength was most overt. That’s largely because of the increase in spending that followed the 9/11 attacks, including for the subsequent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

But it’s also because spending has increased broadly and because of inflation. Relative to total government spending, defense spending (here meaning Department of Defense outlays) has been fairly flat. (The Washington Post) 

 

Posted in: Canada, USA Tagged: 2022-38, Canada, Donald Trump, dundas, fascism, Kevin McCarthy, lest we forget, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Remembrance Day, Republican, statue, tyranny, USA

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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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