Prophesying with pencils

[protect] The following is an article which appeared in the Ottawa Citizen December 29, 2007. Included with the story were about a dozen of my best cartoons of 2007. Cartoonists are supposed to draw the truth, even at the risk of annoying people in high places. CAM CARDOW

Four hundred years ago, Shakespeare wrote: “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances …”

True enough. The job of editorial cartoonists is to observe and comment on the ever-changing characters that walk across this stage. An old character gets hooked off in time for a new one to appear, and so it goes.

That said, I found the cast of 2007 somewhat dull. Maybe I’m just getting old or cynical — or both — but I thought it was an uneventful year from a cartoonist’s quirky perspective. Other than Stéphane Dion’s rise to mediocrity as Liberal leader, there really wasn’t much for us Canadian cartoonists to dig our teeth into.

This one seemed like a year of maintenance. The worldwide battle against terrorism continues with Canadian troops in Afghanistan and (cough) coalition forces in Iraq; we continue to be beguiled by the dysfunctional behaviour of Hollywood celebrities; the debate over global warming continues, and will until the last two survivors of Earth collapse from exhaustion.

There was the toxic Chinesemade products scandal, such as toothpaste and toys, which brought a little excitement last summer. The funniest part was when Mattel apologized to China for the whole thing. Maybe I missed something in the dialogue, but it is clear who is rapidly becoming a world economic superpower.

I am constantly surprised at how prophetic this job can be. Case in point: In September CNN reported that a new bin Laden tape had surfaced in time for the sixth anniversary of 9/11. The report said that the CIA was analysing the tape for authenticity and would be releasing it to the media later.

Despite having no details to work with, I jumped on the story with what I thought was hyperbole. My cartoon showed Osama pulling an Al Gore, lecturing about climate change and terrorizing us with sanctimony. I thought this was a good joke … until details of the tape emerged with bin Laden doing exactly that. It is difficult to be a humourist when someone steals your punch line.

Speaking of prophecy, I try hard not to appear too smug about the Iraq war. From the beginning, my cartoons of George W. Bush have been less than flattering, but the good news is that I have stopped getting hate mail over them. Even my friends who supported Bush and the war are now suspiciously quiet. I knew at just about the time Colin Powell did his dog-and-pony show at the United Nations regarding Iraq’s threat to the world that we were being sold the equivalent of the deed to the Brooklyn Bridge.

The 1962-vintage spy satellite photos of tanker trucks supposedly filled with vile contaminants were the clincher, and I knew we were all being deceived. It is my opinion that whether you believe in God, or some other universal power, anything founded on deception is usually prone to disaster and I knew in March 2003 that disaster was where we were headed. I drew many cartoons in 2003 and since that have made many enemies, but in retrospect they were correct. I annoyed more than a few people holding high office. Such is the life of an editorial cartoonist.

So in August when Mr. Bush suggested Iraq would become another Vietnam if U.S. troops pulled out, I just about fell out of my chair. Iraq is already another Vietnam, and I predict the same result: The U.S. will remain until a good opportunity comes along to declare victory and then get the heck out of Dodge.

Mr. Bush’s comment did, however, provide inspiration for what I consider one of my better efforts in 2007: a drawing of George Bush in the role of Lt.-Col. Kilgore from that famous scene in Apocalypse Now where Kilgore (Robert Duvall) says he loves “the smell of napalm in the morning.”

After the cartoon appeared, I received an e-mail from an American editorial cartoonist telling me how much he enjoyed it. This particular editorial cartoonist is one of the greatest cartoonists of this generation, and he was a major inspiration to me as a young cartoonist in the mid-1980s.

So in the end, was it worth it? Was it worth sticking to my inner voice and not wavering despite opposition and ridicule? Receiving that note from one of my heroes made it worth it. Editorial cartoonists constitute a small but close community, and praise from a peer counts for something.

In any event, presented here are some of my more memorable cartoons from the past year. Now I’m sharpening my pencils in anticipation of 2008.

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