Pudding and Pie

David Horsey, "Bush lays down for Big Oil"

Sometimes political cartoons just fall from the sky. Someone in the world of government will do something so absurdly self-destructive or propose an idea that is so transparently a pander to a powerful entity that all the cartoonist need do is transcribe reality.

A timeless example comes from Gary Hart's aborted run for the presidency in 1988. Who would have thought one of the smartest guys in politics would have been dumb enough to take a mid-campaign break with a pretty, young blonde babe who was not his wife... and go cruising with her on a boat named Monkey Business... and have his picture taken with the woman on his lap... and then challenge the press to follow him around? No cartoon could top that kind of looniness.

While the unruly sexual proclivities of politicians often provide easy target practice for cartoonists (see Bill Clinton and Eliot Spitzer), often it's just the jaw-dropping, blatant prostitution to special interests that turns cartoonists into mere illustrators of the news. The latest case in point is President Bush's plan to give the oil companies a huge tax cut at a time when they are raking in the biggest profits in history. Can he possibly believe that the oil industry is so strapped for cash that a deficit-building tax break is required? Does he expect us to believe it?