DEVELOPING: SECRET SERVICE CONCERN AFTER LOS ANGELES TIMES COMIC DEPICTS 'BUSH ASSASSINATION'

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[ConservativeMan55]

DEVELOPING: SECRET SERVICE CONCERN AFTER LOS ANGELES TIMES COMIC DEPICTS 'BUSH ASSASSINATION'

[mamelukesabre]

I agree.

I am old enough to remember the original photo and I never would have recognized the cartoon as a copy of that photo had someone not posted it here. So I'm pretty sure I would have got a totally different meaning from it had I actually seen it in the newspaper. It is a bad cartoon.

[RandallFlagg]

I hope everyone's saving this pictute on their hard drives! BEFORE THE TIMES REMOVES IT!!!!

[zoen]

yes you right, I am wrong. its just a cartoon but still it gets me a bit ... lets say not happy

[jack gillis]

Fair point.

It might also be the case that it requires not just "thinking through," but LEARNING. And, to be perfectly frank, we could all use a little learning in these times of troubles.

There wasn't any ONE "lesson" from Vietnam, there are innumerable lessons, some that might be brought to bear in support of Bush's current policies, some against. We should learn 'em all.

[Miss Marple]

It is "Viet Nam" but "Vietnamese." I don't know why, but that is how I always have seen it.

Thanks for your compliment!

[johnfl61]

Ann Coulter is right about Rats and their liberal media people are guilty of treason.

[Lancey Howard]

Interesting that the cartoonist added a mosque in the background to make sure the viewer understands that Iraq will be Bush's demise like Vietnam was Johnson's. Boy, what a stretch.

[BCrago66]

Why depict Jim Belushi as the statute of liberty? What's the deep meaning of that?

[Gritty]

C'mon. This cartoon is actually pro-Bush.

It would, however, have been more accurate and to the point if the word on the flak jacket had said "Democrats" instead of "Politics".

Ramirez also could have substituted a donkey's head instead of the original police chief's head.

Poor taste? Maybe.

Accurate? Certainly.

Depicting the political intention of the smear campaign against Bush? Absolutely.

This is a GREAT cartoon and gets to the heart of the matter in a clever visual. Ramirez is a genius!

The Secret Service should go after real threats and not conservative cartoonists depicting the despicable political agenda of the Democrats.

[Domestic Church]

"... if a cartoon has to be explained, it's not that effective as a statement..."

It's as if the sympathetic aspect is just to legitimize its publication.

[arasina]

Is there really a Kim Phuc? When he was a young student in class, did the teacher have a problem with rollcall? "Patrick, John...Peterson, Elaine..." (A young woman interned where I worked years ago whose name was Ria Gano. I asked the same question and marveled at the cruelty of her parents.)

[Joe Hadenuf]

The fact that many do not is not because they are stupid, but because they were not adults during the Viet Nam war. The photo from the Viet Nam war has always haunted me

Uh, it was not a photo, it was an 8mm video tape (movie camera) taken of this NVC getting his head blown off. In the actual video tape this guy drops to the ground like a sack of potatoes with blood pouring out of his head like a garden hose.

[Guenevere]

#268...Bravo!

[StupidQuestions]

The Pentagon Papers precedent answers part of your question. If a reporter is given secret information, it is almost impossible for the Government to prevent publication of the material. Of course, you can argue that once the reporter has possession of the info, it is no longer secret. The Johnson Administration tried to prevent publication of the Pentagon Papers on the basis of national security and was rebuffed. Prior restraint on publication was ruled a violation of the 1st Amendment.

If a government employee who has sworn oaths not to reveal the secrets is found to have leaked the info or published it, that's a different question. That employee can be prosecuted and should be.

NAMBLA pamphlets can probably be passed out near public playgrounds now. Pornography could not be so distributed but NAMBLA text cannot be stopped (I would think).

But threatening someone's life or property is a different matter and falls under the 'fighting words' exception. I can agree with that in most cases but I am quite sincere in advocating a strict interpretation of the 1st Amendment for all speech involving ideas.

There are still libel, slander and privacy laws that can and should moderate people's speech. There are penalties for lying and for invading privacy. There are penalties for threatening others.

My real interest in in political speech and I am not kidding when I advocate that there be NO restrictions on that.

[Steel Wolf]

Actually, I think the trigger was pulled a split second BEFORE this picture was snapped. That's how I remember it anyway. The bullet is already in the poor guys head. That's why he's making that odd face.

I saw the film during a Law of Land Warfare/Geneva Conventions class a while back. I could be wrong, but as I recall he made the face when the gun came level to his head, and held it until he got ventilated a second or two later.

I'm not entirely sure what Ramirez's take is on this, because the VC in question was a combatant operating out of uniform. He had been captured while engaging in combat, and was, IAW said rules of warfare, executed. If I put on an Iraqi uniform a few months back and was captured, I wouldn't merit POW status. Same goes if I took my uniform off and tried to blend in.

So politics, in the case of this cartoon, is implied to be justified in its actions of capping W as an illegal combatant. (Selected not elected? He lied on WMD?)

Take your pick, I don't buy it. The deep meaning of this cartoon only references the superficial meaning of the photograph.

[Lancey Howard]

Yeah, hello.
Tell me, genius, exactly what the SS should be "concerned" about?

[dogbyte12]

I encourage you to see this guys work. Here are two more examples.

[veronica]

My mother says this is a viciously anti-Bush cartoon, and she is always right.

[hellinahandcart]

It bears repeating, but in a whisper:

That's not a man killing President Bush. That's POLITICS! It's a little tool political cartoonists have always used called SYMBOLISM. The message of this cartoon is, simply, POLITICS IS BAD - BUSH IS INNOCENT - BUT POLITICS WANTS TO KILL HIM DESPITE HIS GOOD NATURE. They're doing everything but strapping him to the cross, for God's sake. Learn what the cartoon says before you attack it!

Having listened to the cries of "liar", "mis-leader", and "impeach" for the past month, there can be no doubt about what the left wants to do. This cartoon uses a famous propaganda photo as a vehicle to throw that back in their faces.

But it's too easy to take it at face value. The cartoonist is probably wishing he'd never turned this one in...

[ChadGore]

Re: C'mon. This cartoon is . ..

This cartoon has a gun pointed at the leader of the executive branch of my government, and that is against the law by any measure.