You’ll notice that above me we’ve published another cartoon about Donald Trump.
This will annoy some people.
Very much.
So much so they will call me up and complain that we’re always picking on Trump and why do we not publish cartoons mocking Trudeau? “He makes mistakes too, you know,” one person said.
Almost invariably the complaint has been couched in those terms, that we publish cartoons making fun of U.S. President Donald Trump but we “never” print any about Justin Trudeau.
It’s an indicator that there is strong support for Donald Trump in our readership area, no matter how much he disgraces the U.S. presidency and makes a mockery of the American political process. I don’t think that can be taken as a biased statement any more. It’s so frequent that an entire entertainment genre is built entirely on mocking Trump.
I’m talking about the mock news casts of people like Seth Meyers, Stephen Colbert and John Oliver. They just lampoon the guy – maybe harpoon is the better word. They openly call him a liar and a myriad other unsavory adjectives.
I bring this up because the callers imply that the paper is obviously biased against Trump and they raise the supposed lack of criticism of Trudeau as proof.
The reality is, of course, the editorial cartoon which is a staple of newspapers and which we get from Vancouver-based Ingrid Rice, is the opinion of the cartoonist and only the cartoonist. It’s just like any other column. Like this one. It’s my opinion and only my opinion.
So, the fact that the cartoon mocks Trump is purely a reflection of the cartoonist’s opinion. It’s another form of debate or expression of opinion in our paper. But it’s not the paper’s opinion and you need to understand that. It’s designed to provoke thought. And laughter.
The reality is, of course that of the cartoons we’ve run so far this year – 78 – only six of them deal with Donald Trump. Yes, I counted them. Fourteen deal with Trudeau. Now, that may reflect the fact that it’s a Canadian federal election year but whatever.
And maybe last year there more Trump cartoons. But, like I said, whatever
There’s no conspiracy to dump on Trump. He generates the material himself. Because without doubt, his presidency has been one of the most extraordinary in history.
Trudeau has his issues as do all the rest of the politicians. And our cartoonists are going make fun of them.
And that’s fact.