For the sin of displaying LGBTQ+ Pride merchandise, Target Stores have become the latest casualty in the Rabid Right's Kancel Kulture Kampaign. Target announced earlier this week that the company was removing some LGBTQ-themed items from shelves and moving displays intended to honor Pride Month to the back of the store in response to a public backlash from the right. But what happened at Target goes far beyond just some people calling for a boycott. As Target explained in a statement, some customers had knocked down Pride displays at stores while others outraged by Pride-themed merchan ..read more

Thank you to Mike Peterson for linking to yesterday's historical post!  Now, with the past as prologue:   ..read more

A century ago, there was already talk about folks forgetting the reason for the holiday today. Saving my sneak peek for another day, here's Ceperley's take on the topic. "If It Wasn't for Grandpa..." by William A. Ceperley in Davenport Democrat, May 30, 1923   ..read more

There are several noteworthy events in May of 1923 that I haven't gotten around to highlighting in these Saturday History Tours, so it wasn't easy picking which one to end the month with today. I've decided that it's time to start paying attention to Wisconsin Senator Robert "Fighting Bob" LaFollette. "That Kid from Wisconsin Again" by Dorman H. Smith for Newspaper Enterprise Assn., ca. May 16, 1923 LaFollette still holds a place of honor here in his home state. There are streets and schools named for him all over the place here. Save for a COVID hiatus, Madison progressives have ..read more

I like to come up with an LGBTQIA+ Pride themed cartoon in time for monthly publications' June issues. This year, it just feels impossible to come up with anything upbeat, let alone funny. Pride celebrations have been cancelled in several Florida communities this year due to the "hostile environment" created by Governor Ron DeSantis and his legislature's intentionally vague law criminalizing drag performances.  Florida is by no means alone in promulgating DeSantis-style Cancel Culture. Event organizers have cancelled similar celebrations in Kansas, and organizers are concerned that a leg ..read more

 Alert readers may have noticed that George Santos did not, in fact, win the Preakness over the weekend ..read more

Today's Saturday rummage through the archives should perhaps belong before last Saturday's, since I'm starting off here with the last cartoon I drew for the Parkside Ranger before the 1983 summer break; but I'll move on to later years when summer breaks were not an issue. I've got no unifying theme to the cartoons this week, so join me on a hopscotch tour taking us hither, yon, and points unknown. in UW-Parkside Ranger, Somers Wis., May 5, 1983 I don't believe that I got the original of this cartoon back from the Ranger, so I've lifted this from their on-line archives ..read more

George Santos, the prevaricating Congressboob from Long Island, has been indicted in New York on 13 counts of wire fraud, money laundering, theft of public funds, and "making materially false statements to the House of Representatives." According to the indictment, "He used political contributions to line his pockets, unlawfully applied for unemployment benefits that should have gone to New Yorkers who had lost their jobs due to the pandemic, and lied to the House of Representatives." That doesn't count fraud charges pending against him in Brazil, or the FBI investigation of Santos fo ..read more

As promised:   ..read more

Drawing for student newspapers forty years ago, I had vacation time along with the undergrads come mid-May. What was an aspiring cartoonist to do (besides sending cold-mail applications to any newspaper around the country that didn't already have an editorial cartoonist on staff)? Keep in practice, that's what. This cartoon was never published anywhere until this very morning; nor did I have any publication in mind when I drew it. If I had expected to get it into the last Parkside Ranger of the school year, or the Racine Journal Times, I would certainly have put the paper's name in the carto ..read more