Patriots

Bandwagon Babies

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I dedicate this cartoon to one of my very bestest friends, Kelly. Kelly is not a bandwagon baby and has been an Eagles fan her entire life, which makes perfect sense because she’s from Ohio.

Kelly is one of two reasons I’ll be rooting for The Eagles in Super Bowl LII. Kelly has always been there for me and has done things that no friend should be expected to do. For example, she went to my father’s funeral with me…in Indiana…in January. That’s a friend! Funerals, especially for someone you don’t know, suck. Indiana sucks. Indiana in the winter really sucks.

Her husband, Phil, is a very good friend too. He’s helped me out more than once with messed up car situations. Hell, more than twice. Once, he came over to help me push it out of the snow where it was stuck on a hilly driveway. Another time, he came over to discover someone hated me enough to unplug my oil pan. Critics, a woman, or some woman’s boyfriend. Who knows? The mystery lives (like the mysteries of who covered my front door in dog poop, or slashed my tires).

The reason I’ll be rooting for the Eagles is in this cartoon. I’m tired of the Patriots always going. I don’t hate the Patriots (like I hate Alabama and Nick Saban. Someone should put dog poop on his door), but it’s getting kinda old. Between cheating scandals and just being very good, the Patriots are expected to walk through this game to a win.

But, after losing their starting quarterback, the Eagles were underdogs to Atlanta, and then to Minnesota. They can beat the Patriots, who almost lost to Jacksonville (a city that shouldn’t even have a team).

Kelly is having a Super Bowl party. I don’t know if I wanna go. If the Eagles lose, I can’t take seeing Kelly cry. If the Eagles win, I don’t know if I can take seeing Kelly get drunk and riot. I’ve seen Phil get drunk. That I can handle.

I don’t know if I’ll be going out to see the game either. I don’t like packed bars. Even when I was going to bars all the time I avoided weekend nights, New Year’s Eve, and St. Patrick’s Day. I can’t stand being in a room packed with stupid, drunk, loud people. It may not be that bad in Virginia, as there’s not a lot of Eagles fans here. However, during the Saints/Vikings game a couple weeks ago, I went out and there were quite a few loud Vikings fans. That was weird because you never see Vikings fans in Virginia, or even that many people wearing purple. Where do these people come from?

Creative notes: I had this idea Sunday night. A reader suggested I do something on how tiresome it is to see the Patriots in the Super Bowl again. I’ll take suggested subjects at times, though not ideas. It’s always nice to get away from Trump for a day. Now that’s tiresome. I intended to draw this Monday but I couldn’t resist bashing Chuck Schumer. Someone should put dog poop on his door.

And to my friends and readers who are Patriots fans (JoAnn)…sorry.

I want to thank everyone who has donated in the past. Your support helps me continue creating cartoons and columns with a little less stress in my life. Between competing syndicates with much larger resources, timid editors, and Trump supporters who attempt to intimidate the editors who do publish anything that criticizes their idol, it’s a challenge to make a career out of this. So your support (if you can) is appreciated. Want to help me continue to create cartoons and keep doing what I’m doing (pissing off conservatives)? Look to the right of this page and make a donation through PayPal. Every $40 donation will receive a signed print (please specify which print you want or I won’t mail one). All donations will receive my eternal gratitude

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Reign Of Illegitimacy

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Like Donald Trump, most people don’t like New England Patriots’ coach Bill Belichick, unless they’re from New England.

One reason people dislike the guy is because he wins repeatedly. People like to root for an underdog, until that underdog turns into a repeat champion. At some point the Patriots may overtake the Dallas Cowboys as the most hated team (who is also the most popular and most financially valuable team in any sport in the world. Look it up). The biggest reason people hate Belichick is that the man is a cheater.

Sure he’s a great coach. He constantly reloading his team and never seems to go into a rebuilding phase despite coaching the Patriots for seventeen years.

Belichick started his tenure at New England building animosity. He was an assistant for the New York Jets and he was promoted to head coach. At the press conference to announce his hiring he stunned everyone by instead announcing his resignation. In fact, Belichick has been named coach of the Jets TWICE, and he’s never coached a game for them. But the biggest reason people hate the guy is because his team cheats.

In 2007 the Pats were busted video taping the defensive signals of the New York Jets from the sidelines. In 2002 they were caught taping the walk-through practice of the Carolina Panthers before their game in the Super Bowl. We all know about Deflategate where they were caught deflating balls to give quarterback Tom Brady a better grip, thus an advantage, over the Indianapolis Colts in the AFC championship. Brady had to sit out the first five games of this season for this offense. That didn’t seem to matter as they went 4-1 without Tom-Tom. Correction: My cartooning colleague and evil Pats fan Don Landgren just corrected me that it was a four game suspension (originally five) and they went 3-1.

In 2015 Pittsburgh Steelers’ coach Mike Tomlin complained about the headsets used while playing in New England. He said it’s a common occurrence every time they play in the Patriots’ home stadium. The coaches communicate with each other with headsets throughout the game, and at times instead of hearing each other, the Steelers were hearing the Patriots’ radio network’s broadcast of the game. They were probably lucky it wasn’t the Lollipop song. The funniest part of this scandal is that if one team’s headsets malfunction then the other team has to stop using theirs, as a rule of equity. As soon as the Patriots would be told they had to stop using their headsets, the problem with Pittsburgh’s cleared up. A few minutes after everything was restored the problem would return for the Steelers.

Finally, last weekend before the AFC championship, once again, between the Patriots and Steelers there were some shenanigans. No, it wasn’t the Lollipop song. Before the game in Foxborough, Massachusetts someone triggered the fire alarm at the Steelers’ hotel while they were snoozing. This was an attempt to rob them of sleep and generally just to rattle and piss them off.

Belichick’s fingerprints were not found on the fire alarm but a fan of theirs was arrested for the crime. The fan was quoted saying “I’m drunk. I’m stupid. I’m a Pats fan.”

I believe that quote would also fit those supporters of a current leader many find illegitimate.

Creative notes: I like easing up on topics here and there, which helps when clients are screaming at me. I like combining sports into my work. While I can appreciate when an editorial cartoon tackles sports, I really hate cartoons that focus entirely on sports. I love sports but I find those cartoons to be the laziest. They tend to be cheerleaders without making any sort of statement and they overkill with the cliches. Of course the team’s fans love them because it’s about their team (Yeah! We do have the best mascot!). Over the weekend I saw a cartoon predicting the Packers would beat the Falcons. That cartoonist should be given points for a bold prediction but I’m sure he’s eating a lot of stinky cheese today after Atlanta blew out Green Bay 44-21. Ouch!

Several years ago I used the Saints’ “bountygate” in a political cartoon, and I’m a Saints fan. In that case I made fun of my own team. While I was employed at The Free Lance-Star I would have to explain every cartoon to my editor that used a sports analogy. He didn’t follow sports. I’d also have to convince him that it worked which was difficult at times.

On another note I have no idea who to root for in the Super Bowl. The Falcons are division rivals to my Saints and I have hard time cheering for them. And then the other team is New England, where the owner, coach, and quarterback, are Donald Trump supporters. Gad! I’ll probably just root for a good game.

Did you like this cartoon? Want to help a cartoonist make a living? Look to the right of this page and make a donation through Paypal. I need to buy pens, paper, sandwiches, etc.. The starving cartoonist appreciates it. If you’ve donated in the past, THANK YOU!!!

Patriot’s News Source

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People who support Donald Trump believe he’ll give them everything they want. He’ll give them their country back. I just wonder what Vladimir Putin wants to do with the United States.

What baffles my mind, but not really, are all those Tea Party jerks who spent the years of the Obama presidency screaming “I want my country” and co-opting the word “patriot” to define themselves. They’ve spent the past eight years implying that anyone who’s liberal or a Democrat was not a patriot and didn’t love their country. Republicans have cornered the market of love for America, baseball, apple pie, and Chevrolet (even though Obama saved Chevrolet).

One of their favorite platforms is the Constitution. They believe Obama has disregarded it and is ruling as a king or a dictator. To repair that they’ll vote for a man who’s made violating the Constitution a huge part of his platform. The problem is that these Tea Party types, like Trump, are really only familiar with the 2nd Amendment. Trump doesn’t even know how many articles are in the Constitution as he’s promised to defend a few that don’t exist.

Wikileaks is attacking the Clinton campaign and the Tea Partiers, “patriots,” and Trump supporters are using the information from the leaks to campaign against Clinton. Many people say it’s not important who exposes the leaks. The only thing important is what’s in them. I don’t buy that. If the people hacking into U.S. computers is a foreign power trying to manipulate an American election, yeah, the motive is kinda important.

These “patriots” don’t care where the information is coming from. They don’t care if it’s a foreign power meddling in our affairs. They don’t care if the information is partly fabricated. They don’t care to notice that Wikileaks is not hacking into the Trump campaign’s computers. Seriously, there’s no warning signs or cause for suspicion with these people. They don’t care as long as they get what they want, which is a Trump presidency. That’s also what Russia wants.

They even refuse to acknowledge the Russians are behind the hacks. Even Trump who receives intelligence briefings has refused to admit Russia is playing a part. Maybe it’s the Chinese, or it’s not even happening. Let’s just forget the fact that Trump asked Russia to leak information on Clinton. The most important thing is the message that Hillary is corrupt. Yes, the man with a fake university and a fake charity wants us to believe the other candidate is corrupt. Of course Mr. Sniffles also wants her to take a drug test.

These people also don’t trust the media. They claim the election is rigged is by the media while they’re touting information hacked my another nation trying to rig our election. Sure, the press has an agenda but let’s trust and use the information Putin is feeding us.

There should be universal outrage in this nation over Russia’s attempt to screw with our Democratic process. This shouldn’t be political. It shouldn’t be left versus right. Can you imagine the outrage if Iran was hacking into Republican computers?

But there isn’t any outrage from Trump supporters. These people who want their country back are willing to lease it out to defeat Hillary Clinton. I would accuse them of checking their patriotism at the door when they signed up for Trump, except they never were patriots.

Did you like this cartoon? Want to help a cartoonist make a living? Look to the right of this page and make a donation through Paypal. I need to buy pens, paper, sandwiches, and dog food. The starving cartoonist and his Beagle appreciates it. If you’ve donated in the past, THANK YOU!!!

A Little Militant Lunacy

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Showing that they can do the Occupy Wall Street crowd one better, a group of right wing militants are now Occupy Bird Sanctuary. A federal bird sanctuary that is.

Remember that crazy old rancher who was dickering with the government over his cattle grazing on federal land? Cliven Bundy, inspired a standoff between armed local anti-government activists and federal officials seeking to confiscate cattle grazing illegally on federal land in Nevada. Now his two sons have overtaken a federal building in a remote part of Oregon.

Friends of the Bundys have been in a battle with the government over federal land. Dwight Hammond and his son Steven Hammond were sentenced to prison for setting fire on federal lands. There’s a terrorism aspect to the conviction which has a mandatory sentence of five years. The judge gave them less and after finish that sentence another judge said “wait a minute, hillbillies, you have more time to serve” and sent them back to prison. OK, I made that quote up but that’s what happened.

So a bunch of armed militants against the federal government staged a protest and then occupied the federal refuge and they say they’re willing to stay there for several years. They claim their group has 150 members but some witnesses say they only counted 15, which might just be as high as they’re capable of counting. They’re calling for supporters to arm themselves and join them. They say it’s a peaceful effort, but if the government tries to kick them out they’ll fight back. That’s peaceful?

Their supporters call them patriots. If they were black they’d be anarchists. If they were Muslim they’d be terrorist. They National Guard, FBI, and ATF would be all over it by now. There are now reports government agents are on the way but they’re kinda taking their sweet time about it. It’s a good thing they’re not a bunch of black 12-year-old kids with pellet guns or they would have been shot by now.

For some reason these people think it’s their Constitutional right to steal federal land and to rob taxpayers. If they can’t take it then they should be able to set it on fire and endanger the lives of fire fighters.

You can be unhappy with the government and still love your country. Nobody is 100% happy with government. But to take up arms and threaten war with the government, is declaring war on your country. It is treason. These people are traitors to the United States of America. They have all the integrity and morals of al Qaida and ISIS.

And it’s probably not going to do the birds any good.

Did you like this cartoon? Want to help a cartoonist make a living? Look to the right of this page and make a donation through Paypal. I need to buy pens, paper, sandwiches, and dog food. The starving cartoonist and his Beagle appreciates it. If you’ve donated in the past, THANK YOU!!!

 

Tom Brady Is Playing Dumb

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It’s kind of nice to draw a cartoon that’s not about riots, police brutality, terrorists, Texans.

I woke up Thursday morning with an idea on this subject that I really liked. I didn’t want to draw a deflated football or to actually indict Tom Brady. The report is that he “probably” was aware of the footballs being deflated, though not proving his guilt. I do think it’s a little unrealistic that he didn’t know. I also think he totally flaked Thursday night when he was finally questioned about it. He could have been up front with stating he didn’t want to talk about it. That would have been a lot more honest than pretending as though he hasn’t read the NFL’s report.

Back to this idea I woke up with: Somebody else did it first. Usually when someone has a cartoon that coincides with a thought of mine I get real down about it, mope all day and I don’t get another idea I can live with until 1:00 AM. This time the cartoon that beat me to the punch was drawn by a cartoonist I respect so I tried not to let it get me down too much.

So around 1:00 AM I finally got my idea. The report came out Wednesday and I saw three cartoonists with two cartoons a piece on the subject. There were a lot of cartoons with something being deflated. I didn’t want to go there. From the two minutes Tom Brady avoided questions about Deflategate I felt he was really playing dumb. It took me several hours to realize that was my idea.

Sometimes when I’m dumb, I’m really not playing.