I'm not a racist...

I know the Tea Baggers get upset easy.  There’s been a few outrages recently over other cartoons and animations (hello, Mark Fiore!).  Apparently they have thin skin.  Let’s see what this cartoon does.

My issue is that the organization might be too loose.  I’ve posted before how they’re an embarrassment and logical people who share some of their concerns should distance themselves from these people as far as humanly possible.  They’re a “fringe” movement that’s propped by the GOP and that can host a convention, pay Sarah Palin a hundred grand to speak and organize cruise ship tours…but yeah, they’re fringe and representing the little guy.

It seems if you’re a part of a movement and there’s a substantial element that wants to scream racists, homophobic and generally stupid comments in public, then you’d want to say goodbye to these people.  That’s why I’m not a member of any party.  When Democrats embarrass themselves, they do it by stupidity.  When Republicans do it, they use hypocrisy, greed and double standards.  Equate sex scandals between the parties and see what number you get.

I had another idea Tuesday but it was killed.  I roughed it out two different ways and it still didn’t pass.  Wednesday I took the Klan cartoon to my editor and though he didn’t love it, he still laughed.  He knew the cartoon was accurate and would bring some grief, but he approved it knowing it was the correct statement.  He said we should say something about the racist, homophobic comments the Tea Baggers were linked to, but he didn’t want to smear the entire movement.  He felt the cartoon was fair.  I don’t think cartoons have to be fair but I really love my editor on days like this, when he doesn’t love a cartoon, laughs at it anyway, pauses and approves it.  He called his assistant, a fellow conservative into his office and said “I’m not gonna kill it but I want to know how you feel about the cartoon”.  She said she didn’t have a problem with it.  Sometimes I think that pause is because I’m hitting a movement they endorse, but they know I’m right.  Of course I’m always right (haha).  Let me repeat one thing….Wednesday, I’m proud of my editor…wait, everyday I’m proud of my editor (he might start reading this blog at some point).

One funny thing, when I brought this concept to my boss he said “you’re not gonna let this go”.   I would have let it go if he had killed it, but I would have drawn it for my syndicate and the blog.  I try not to fight the same battle over and over.  Also, when something is killed, I’ll tell him how I feel but then let it go.  Tuesday, he left me an opening by telling me he wasn’t against hitting the Tea folks.  So yeah, I came back the next day with something different.  I’ll post and two roughs, and I like the one we ran much more than the roughs.  It’s more subtle which I dig.

Here’s the first rough.  Been a while since I posted a rough but all the multiple scannings and four different files I have to create each day kinda kills my enthusiasm to scan, size, save and post something that’s never going to be printed on paper.

And here’s the other version altered slightly.

Another reason not to post roughs is that the black and white kinda kills the flow of the blog that the colors leave.  No!  I’m not going to start coloring the roughs.

By the way, I hope you read this blog, Kelsey, since you’re the one who expresses the most passions for the roughs.  Luv ya, babe!