Jimmy Carter delivered his so-called “malaise” speech 29 years ago today. What we wouldn’t give today to have done what he advocated (except perhaps the expanded use of coal):

CARTER: Point one: I am tonight setting a clear goal for the energy policy of the United States. Beginning this moment, this nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977 — never…

Point two: To ensure that we meet these targets, I will use my presidential authority to set import quotas…

Point three: To give us energy security, I am asking for the most massive peacetime commitment of funds and resources in our nation’s history to develop America’s own alternative sources of fuel…

I will soon submit legislation to Congress calling for the creation of this nation’s first solar bank, which will help us achieve the crucial goal of 20 percent of our energy coming from solar power by the year 2000.

These efforts will cost money, a lot of money, and that is why Congress must enact the windfall profits tax without delay…

Point four: I’m asking Congress to mandate, to require as a matter of law, that our nation’s utility companies cut their massive use of oil by 50 percent within the next decade and switch to other fuels, especially coal, our most abundant energy source…

Point five: To make absolutely certain that nothing stands in the way of achieving these goals, I will urge Congress to create an energy mobilization board…

Point six: I’m proposing a bold conservation program to involve every state, county, and city and every average American in our energy battle. This effort will permit you to build conservation into your homes and your lives at a cost you can afford.

To further conserve energy, I’m proposing tonight an extra $10 billion over the next decade to strengthen our public transportation systems…

Our nation must be fair to the poorest among us, so we will increase aid to needy Americans to cope with rising energy prices. We often think of conservation only in terms of sacrifice. In fact, it is the most painless and immediate way of rebuilding our nation’s strength. Every gallon of oil each one of us saves is a new form of production. It gives us more freedom, more confidence, that much more control over our own lives…

I do not promise you that this struggle for freedom will be easy. I do not promise a quick way out of our nation’s problems, when the truth is that the only way out is an all-out effort. What I do promise you is that I will lead our fight, and I will enforce fairness in our struggle, and I will ensure honesty. And above all, I will act. We can manage the short-term shortages more effectively and we will, but there are no short-term solutions to our long-range problems. There is simply no way to avoid sacrifice.

Thanks, America’s crazy right wing. We couldn’t have ignored our most important problems for three decades and thereby made them much worse without you.

(The speech can be watched here.)

In discussing a controversy about a political cartoon (or at least, an illustrator’s attempt at political cartooning), the New York Times quotes three late night talk show hosts and several more of their writers … and not a single political cartoonist.

Though due to my “deadline schedule” there wasn’t time to include the most recent example of … Obama Phenomena ….

Much attention has been paid to Barry Blitt’s shocking attempt to destroy the candidacy of Barack Obama with his so-called “cover illustration” for the New Yorker this week. But no one has yet mentioned the same artist’s earlier cover, in which he portrayed Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton sleeping in the same bed:

Is this appalling image meant to invoke racist stereotypes about the sexual prowess of black men? Or is it an anti-feminist swipe at middle-aged women comfortable with their own sexuality? Or maybe it’s meant to suggest that all Democrats are promiscuous adulterers who can’t be trusted with the responsibility that comes with the President’s hot line!

Whatever his intentions, Barry Blitt obviously drew this cover because he hates Democrats, and wants John McCain to win.

And then there’s this cover, published shortly after Hurricane Katrina:

Clearly, the “artist” is expressing his deep sympathy for the members of the Bush Administration, who — he suggests through his visual trickery — felt such deep compassion for the victims of Katrina that they might as well have experienced the flooding first hand.

Why not just draw George Bush with a halo while you’re at it, Democrat-hater Barry Blitt?

Maybe you could get away with biased commentary like this in the olden days — but this is the 21st century, and the Internet has your number now!

I keep running across the alleged truism that “if you have to explain why a joke is funny, it’s not.”

Sometimes that’s true. But sometimes a joke is not, or maybe more accurately “does not seem” funny because the reader/audience member/whatever lacks the information, reference points, perspective, and/or sense of humor to appreciate the joke.

Humor is subjective.

The McCain campaign has a new talking point :

Sen. Lindsey Graham said that a “turning point” was when Harry Reid declared the war “lost” over a year ago, and brought up an old quote from Chuck Schumer predicting that discontent with the war would lead to further Democratic gains. “The Democratic Party built a political strategy around us losing the war in Iraq,” Graham said.

McCain adviser Randy Scheunemann joined in: “Senator Obama seems to think losing a war will help him win an election.”

So The New Yorker features a cover showing Obama as a Muslim and his wife as a militant radical, sharing a fist bump as a flag burns in the fireplace. The point is immediately obvious: these are the caricatures of the Obamas that the right has been trying to draw from the start of this election season. It’s not wacky, over-the-top, laugh-out-loud satire, but few New Yorker covers are. The intent is clear enough, and is obviously not to mock the Obamas.

Personally I’m not sure why the conversation about this goes any further than, “Oh yes, that was a mildly amusing reference to those crazy right wing emails everyone has heard about,” before moving on to other topics. But it’s appalling that a piece of artwork clearly mocking the delusions of the right is being excoriated as if it presents those delusions approvingly.

… part of what’s incredibly troubling about the reaction from the left (”your so-called art does not advance our cause, comrade!”) is that this is a pretty basic riff I could have — probably would have — incorporated into one of my own cartoons sooner or later, the old “pretending-crazy-right-wing-shit-is-true-in-order-to-show-how-fucked-up-it-is” gag being pretty integral to my work. Indeed, my pal Ruben Bolling already made a pretty good run at it here.

… Ruben’s take here.

… for all the responses and suggestions regarding my children’s book dilemma. I’ve got to set aside some time and sort through them all, but I didn’t want the moment to pass without expressing my appreciation.

Today’s Los Angeles Times contrasts McCain’s claims on how he dumped his injured first wife, the one who was faithful to him the whole time he was in Vietnam, for millionaire booze heiress Cindy Hensley, finding the public record to be pretty darn sleazy:

McCain, who is about to become the GOP nominee, has made several statements about how he divorced Carol and married Hensley that conflict with the public record.

In his 2002 memoir, Worth the Fighting For, McCain wrote that he had separated from Carol before he began dating Hensley.

[snip]

An examination of court documents tells a different story. McCain did not sue his wife for divorce until Feb. 19, 1980, and he wrote in his court petition that he and his wife had “cohabited” until Jan. 7 of that year — or for the first nine months of his relationship with Hensley.

Although McCain suggested in his autobiography that months passed between his divorce and remarriage, the divorce was granted April 2, 1980, and he wed Hensley in a private ceremony five weeks later. McCain obtained an Arizona marriage license on March 6, 1980, while still legally married to his first wife.

You apply for a wedding license to a millionaire blonde while still married to the mother of your children, and then write a memoir that out-and-out lies about it?

More straight talk from a true maverick.

While we’re at it, more of McCain’s strange version of straight talk can be viewed here (where he literally squirms with discomfort while dodging simple questions about birth control), here, here, here, here, here, and (in a couple of nice roundups, because I don’t have all day) here and here.

A brief and final update on my buddy Mike Irwin, a fine comedian and old friend fighting stage four bone cancer since the startling and sudden diagnosis just a few months ago.

There are a lot of things to say about Mike, but I’ll keep it simple. He taught me a lot about stand-up comedy, about politics, and just about getting through life. Mike was funny, Mike was smart, and Mike cared deeply about somehow making a more compassionate, rational world. More than anything, Mike was kind. Everything else I could write would just be illustrations.

Last time I saw Mike was in his hospital room, the night before my flight home. We both knew it might be the last time we’d see each other.

The conversation could have been kinda hard, but fortunately there was a good baseball game on, so we watched and talked in between the spaces of the game, just like we used to do back when I lived with him in Chicago, back when we were both young and starting out not so long ago. We cheered. We booed. And we said the stuff we needed to say. One last night of something like normality, right there amid all the tubes and pumps and horrible hospital crap.

It was wonderful.

I’ll always be glad for that night, both for his sake and mine.

If you’ve got folks you love you haven’t spoken to in a while, do. One of the most important things you can do while you’re here, I think. And you never know how fast the time can go.

btw, I understand some folks reading this might want to send a note of condolences. Thanks, but no need. It’s just grief. It’s part of life. If you want to, just take that energy and put it into hugging your own loved ones like you mean it. That’ll do more good. And maybe go over the the fund set up for Mike and his family and chip in a few.

Thanks.

Lindsay Beyerstein has written a great article for Raw Story about an editor at the University of Alabama publications office who was obviously fired for criticizing the Alabama Republican party—on his own time.

Alabama: America’s Own Third World. Well, at least they didn’t shoot him in the head.