Cagle.com

UP WITH COLOMBIA!

Angel Boligan — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 15:00:46 +0000

The Arbiter of Truth

Angel Boligan — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 15:00:44 +0000

AI Robot Replaces White House Press Secretary

Jimmy Margulies — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 14:50:43 +0000

AI ROBOT REPLACES WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY

by Jimmy Margulies, Cagle.com

An AI robot has assumed duties as White House press secretary amid ongoing debates over automation displacing human roles in government communications. The development highlights tensions between technological efficiency and traditional staffing in high-profile federal positions. The piece portrays the shift as enabling scripted, contradictory messaging from the briefing room.

Affordability Needs Labor Day Workers

Joe Heller — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 12:52:31 +0000

AFFORDABILITY NEEDS LABOR DAY WORKERS

by Joe Heller, Cagle.com

A cartoon published near Labor Day 2026 shows workers completing the phrase Labor Day while emphasizing that affordability depends on labor. The piece argues that workers juggling multiple jobs remain central to economic stability and cost-of-living concerns.

Pentagon Priorities

Adam Zyglis — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 12:37:20 +0000

PENTAGON PRIORITIES

by Adam Zyglis, Cagle.com

RESTRICTIONS: May not be Published in Buffalo, NY

Trump Closes Blinds on Money Vault

Dave Whamond — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 11:37:40 +0000

TRUMP CLOSES BLINDS ON MONEY VAULT

by Dave Whamond, Cagle.com

Donald Trump appears inside an open government vault surrounded by spilling money bags and orders the blinds closed. The scene highlights concerns over financial secrecy and lack of transparency in high office. The piece takes the position that such actions undermine public trust in how funds are handled.

Pete Hoekstra in Canadian Stereotype Roles

Graeme MacKay — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 11:11:14 +0000

PETE HOEKSTRA IN CANADIAN STEREOTYPE ROLES

by Graeme MacKay, Cagle.com

Pete Hoekstra faces scrutiny over a prospective diplomatic posting tied to Canada amid ongoing US trade and Arctic policy tensions. The appointment draws criticism from those who view the nominee as unprepared for cross-border diplomacy. The cartoon argues the selection adds little practical value and leans on outdated cultural clichés instead.

Wall street vs Jobs

Dave Granlund — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 11:01:43 +0000

WALL STREET VS JOBS

by Dave Granlund, Cagle.com

Wall Street and employment figures remain at odds in ongoing market dynamics. The separation underscores persistent challenges in aligning financial markets with job creation efforts amid broader economic pressures.

RESTRICTIONS: No Eagle Tribune MA

Pete Hoekstra in Canadian Arctic Roles

Graeme MacKay — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 10:14:00 +0000

PETE HOEKSTRA IN CANADIAN ARCTIC ROLES

by Graeme MacKay, Cagle.com

Former Michigan congressman Pete Hoekstra faces ridicule in a Canadian editorial cartoon that places him in a series of absurd Arctic jobs. The piece mocks his reported diplomatic ambitions north of the border.

Trump catering truck escape

Dave Granlund — Fri, 14 Aug 2026 09:55:55 +0000

TRUMP CATERING TRUCK ESCAPE

by Dave Granlund, Cagle.com

RESTRICTIONS: No Eagle Tribune MA

Political bickering and AI: Top ten cartoons of the week

Daryl Cagle — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Our two-party system hasn't really worked well for decades, with one side blaming the other for everything wrong in our country. It's low-hanging fruit for political cartoonists, but this week Jonathan Brown mined it in a timely, funny cartoon that struck a chord with editors.

AI continues to be a major issue, with two of our cartoonists – Steve Sack and John Darkow – depicting the disruptive technology as Frankenstein's monster. I chuckled at Gary McCoy's AI cartoon, which features an angry man who just lost a game of checkers to a computer opponent.

Let's hope that's the worst fate any of us will suffer to our soon-to-be computer overlords, especially since we can't expect our squabbling politicians to provide any help.

Here are our top ten most reprinted cartoons of the week:

#1. Jonathan Brown

#2. Steve Sack

#3. John Darkow

#4. Gary McCoy

#5. Dave Granlund

#6. John Darkow

#7. Dave Whammond

#8. Daryl Cagle

#9. Bob Englehart

#10. John Darkow

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Daryl Cagle is the publisher of Cagle.com and owner of CagleCartoons.com, a syndicate that distributes editorial cartoons and columns to over 500 subscribing newspapers. See Daryl’s blog at DarylCagle.com and watch his video podcast about editorial cartoons at Caglecast.com

Can the FCC let us be?

Charles Sauer — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Following ABC, NBC, and CBS’s refusal to air Donald Trump’s recent prime time address, the president threatened to revoke the networks’ broadcasting licenses. The argument is that, by refusing to air the president’s speech, the networks violated their legal obligation as holders of a government-issued broadcast license to act in the public interest.

On its face, this case does not seem unreasonable. After all, denying their audiences the opportunity to hear the president speak on an important issue like election integrity does seem contrary to the public interest.

However, the argument against revoking the licenses is stronger. The Supreme Court has held the FCC cannot exercise its authority in a manner that violates the First Amendment. For example, the FCC cannot retaliate against broadcasters for editorial decisions, such as refusing to air a prime-time presidential address. The argument any action taken against ABC and NBC for not airing President Trump’s speech is retaliatory is strengthened by FCC Chair Brendan Carr’s threats to revoke broadcast licenses over his displeasure with network news coverage of the Iran War and late-night comedians’ jokes at the expense of conservatives, the president, and the first lady.

Another argument in the broadcasters’ favor is they did provide live coverage of President Trump’s speech on their websites and YouTube channels. In addition, the speech was not only broadcasted on CNN, Fox News, and CSPAN, it was available on those networks’ YouTube channels. Thus, anyone who wanted to see the speech could stream it on their TVs or on their phone, tablet, laptop, or iPad. Those who did not see the live speech can watch it any time by googling “President Trump’s speech on election integrity.”

People can also find a wide variety of commentary on the speech from across the political spectrum on YouTube and other sites. Many of the views, on both the left and right, were ones shut out of mainstream political discourse when the three broadcast networks, newspapers, and national news magazines were the American people’s main (and in some cases only) source of news and opinions.

Federal control of the broadcast spectrum was justified by the limited amount of bandwidth, as well as concerns that without a government bureaucracy determining who could use what parts of the spectrum, broadcasters would infringe on each other’s spaces. Whatever the merits of that argument (there is sound scholarship arguing there is no need for government control of the spectrum anymore than there is a need for government to allocate other scarce resources), the case for government control of the airwaves has been demolished by the rise of the internet.

According to a 2025 Pew Research Center survey, only 47% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 25 sometimes or often get their news from television, while 93% of 18–25-year-olds sometimes or often get news from their smart phones, iPads, and tablets.

The number of young people abandoning television news may not surprise a lot of observers, however they may be surprised to learn that, according to the Pew survey, 71% of Americans 65 or older get their news from digital devices. This does not mean Americans are abandoning the news networks, it just means they are more likely to use the internet to view programming from the legacy media.

If the FCC successfully revokes network broadcast licenses because of a refusal to air President Trump’s recent election interference speech, the networks would likely move their productions online, where an increasing number of their audience is and the FCC isn’t. Modern technology has eliminated whatever need there was for a federal agency with power to determine who can and cannot use the broadcast spectrum.

Congress should recognize this reality and do what they should have done years ago – shut down the FCC, privatize the broadcast spectrum, and allow the free market of ideas to flourish over the airwaves and online.

It is time for the FCC to finally let us be.

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Copyright 2026 Charles Sauer, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Charles Sauer is the president of the Market Institute and the author of “Profit Motive” Sauer can be reached at charles@marketinstitute.org.

The host

Alexandra Paskhaver — Thu, 13 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I have studied the art of conversation and come to a conclusion.

“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.”

It’s not my conclusion, but why do you care? I don’t get paid to be original.

My relatives visited last weekend for a day of no booze and unhinged fun. Or maybe it’s the other way around.

Before I go any further, I must qualify that most of my relatives are ex-Soviets.

To them, free speech is an invention for other people.

This means that whenever I, an American, attempt to get a word in edgewise, I am shut down with a prompt “Go boil your head.”

Of course, they say it in Russian, but the sentiment applies.

I hoped we might discuss the darkness intrinsicate to the human spirit, so ably captured in literature by Dostoevsky.

“Dostoevsky was idiot,” replies Alyosha, my mother’s cousin. Like many ex-Soviets, he does not bother with articles.

“Why?” I cry. “I thought Raskolnikov was a perfect representation of—”

“Go boil your head,” he says with a smile, as if he is indulging a child.

I want to pull a Raskolnikov and bean him with an ax, but I don’t have one handy.

So I sit in brooding silence, like a nihilist law student or something.

We discuss the rise of artificial intelligence and the nature of work.

My great-uncle, Oleksandr, says that artificial intelligence will eliminate the need to work for money.

“There will be perfect material equality,” he states. “Everyone will have house, and Tesla, and property. No! There won’t be individually-owned Tesla, because it will be cheaper and more easier to share excellent public transport.”

This is greeted by rousing cheers.

“Wait a minute,” I cut in. “Isn’t forced material equality what you guys ran away from?”

“Nyet,” says Oleksandr.

So I sit silently until someone requests I set the samovar. We don’t have a samovar. We have an electric tea kettle.

For goodness’ sake, my family didn’t even have a samovar when they lived in the Soviet Union. It was always a kettle. I point to it and observe that it is, has been, and will forever be a kettle.

The relatives shake their heads and mutter among themselves. “For this, a college education,” I hear.

I slouch back into my seat and listen as the conversation turns from economics to music to politics to literature. I perk up my ears as Raskolnikov’s name is mentioned.

“Is simple, plot of Dostoevsky novel,” says Alyosha, gesturing with a teacup. “Man suffers.”

I wait for elaboration. I think of the role of faith and doubt, of the weight of tradition, of the sanctity of human relationships.

“That is it. See? Bad writer. Only good writer is Pushkin. Better than Shakespeare, even in translation.”

I’m pretty sure that an English poet in English is better than a Russian poet in English, but I’ve long ago realized that I will not be invited to give my two kopeks.

So much for human relationships.

My mother’s other cousin, Natalya, turns to me.

For a moment I cherish the hope that I will finally be included in the conversation.

She then brings up a question very familiar to ex-Soviets: “Why you aren’t married yet?”

I take a breath to respond.

“Go boil your head,” she concludes, and that’s that.

-

Copyright 2026 Alexandra Paskhaver, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Alexandra Paskhaver is a software engineer and writer. Both jobs require knowing where to stick semicolons, but she’s never quite; figured; it; out. Feel free to contact her at alexandra.paskhaver@gmail.com

Do you think you’re cute? 

Danny Tyree — Wed, 12 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Tyrades! by Danny Tyree

“He thinks he’s CUTE.”

I can’t count how many times I heard my late mother offer that unsolicited observation about some stranger who violated her standards of decorum.

(I can’t count – and my ABCs aren’t so hot, either – because my formative years involved a heap of instruction about allegedly “cute” people having the audacity to wear a ponytail, expose their beer belly, visit a tattoo parlor, wear shorts, read a book, buy 2% milk, use words like “audacity,” etc.)

Mom was never a mind-reader, so I winced when she made her bold (usually out-of-earshot) assertions about people’s motivations. I mean, the folks could have had any number of motivations besides “cuteness” for their lifestyle choices, such as health issues, budgetary constraints, family traditions or an overwhelming desire to bug the heck out of nosey old women.

(Okay, the guy who chased squirrels, buried bones and rolled over for tummy rubs was arguably going for “cute,” but that’s the exception that proves the rule.)

Granted, I myself notice distinctive characteristics of other people, if for no other reason than to be able to assist a police sketch artist. (Mercifully, Mom never had to give such a description. It might have been, “The robber had red hair poured out of a bottle and her hind end looked like it could have been a couple of sizes smaller if she had worked in the garden instead of sitting on the couch eating bonbons.”)

Outside of the police station, I usually keep my comments to myself. “Live and let live” is my motto. My mother’s motto was more like “Live and let live, but if they do happen to die, be sure to comment on whether they’re putting on airs with their casket choice.”

It’s difficult to blame people for wanting to be somewhere in the vicinity of “cute.” Our slavish attention to newborns seems to have made cuteness the Ultimate Good. You never hear anyone gushing, “Awww…” when a lawyer shares the 400th photo of a class-action lawsuit he settled.

Sometimes you’re contented to be practical, sensible and under the radar; other times you simply have to show off your originality, your sexiness, your individuality. (“I am, I said, to no one there. And no one heard at all, not even the chair -- because the furniture all got repossessed when I spent all my money getting body piercings for my appendix!”)

You don’t have to apologize to me if you sometimes make a grooming/wardrobe/hobbies choice to break the tedium of life. I, too, have been known to dabble in things that make me feel fleetingly “special.”

In 1977 I purchased a pair of mirrored sunglasses that would have made any redneck sheriff proud. And around the time my son was born, my headgear consisted of an Indiana Jones-style fedora. (You wouldn’t believe what prompt service you get when you brandish a bullwhip and shout, “My wife says she wants an epidural – STAT!”)

Maybe you find this week’s column cute. Maybe you don’t.

But perhaps it’ll start you thinking about your reaction to strangers. I’ve heard it said of some “people persons” that “they never met a stranger.” Well, I’ve never met a stranger … because they all skedaddle when they see me coming!

*Sigh* Mom said there would be days like this. She got as far as Tuesday teaching me their names…

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Copyright 2026 Danny Tyree, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Danny Tyree welcomes email responses at tyreetyrades@aol.com and visits to his Facebook fan page “Tyree’s Tyrades.”

Tuskegee's dress code revives an old debate

Elwood Watson — Tue, 11 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Tuskegee University's updated dress code has revived an old debate about professionalism, respectability politics, and how much responsibility Black institutions should take in preparing young people for the larger world.

Tuskegee recently prohibited bonnets, du-rags, bedroom shoes, and “revealing clothing” from classrooms and dining halls. In a recent letter to students, President Mark A. Brown said the goal was to prepare students for the workforce.

The decision ignited an ongoing and, at times, contentious discussion: proponents referring to it as preparation, detractors chiding the ban as respectability politics disguised as preparation, with some going as far as to label such action “anti-Black.” Some decry that Black students are being held to different standards than their peers at predominantly white institutions, who often show up to class in casual wear. As I see it, the issue is greater than a university’s dress code requirements. Both camps raise valid concerns.

Anyone with a healthy knowledge of American history is aware of the fact Black people have routinely been expected — in some cases, demanded — to redefine themselves to become socially palatable to institutions whose standards or agendas were seldom, if ever, designed to embrace or include us. Respectability politics defines how marginalized people frequently manipulate and alter their appearance, language or behavior to curry acceptance within dominant institutions. Blackness cannot be minimized to hairstyles.

It is important to note that Tuskegee is hardly the only HBCU to enforce dress codes. Hampton University’s dress code, for example, prohibits du-rags, bonnets, skull caps, scarves, and bandanas “at all times” outside of student housing. Dillard University’s student handbook asks students to “dress neatly” and outlines “appropriate dress for various occasions,” including classrooms, the cafeteria, and university offices. Men must take off caps and hats worn for nonreligious purposes before entering the dining hall at Claflin University. And Virginia Union University has an extensive dress code that bans not just du-rags and bonnets but “pants worn in a ‘baggy’ fashion,” hoodies with the hood up, head scarves, and curlers.

It was not by accident that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights activists were ever mindful about presenting themselves accordingly in public. They knew they were under the lens of a very discerning public microscope and were always impeccably groomed, neatly dressed in suits and ties and other fashionable attire. They knew they were representing a movement and a greater cause and governed themselves accordingly.

Let’s cut to the chase. Most people make decisions, justified or not, on appearance. You are provided with one opportunity to make a first impression, and those impressions die hard. As a professor at a regional state university, I have witnessed certain students come to class and visit the dining hall in bed slippers and pajamas.

Whether we approve or disagree, the truth is appearance and perception are often reality. It is no accident many of those campus radicals of the 1960s and 1970s traded in their sandals and t-shirts, removed their nose rings, cut their hair and dyed it back to its original color when they applied for summer internships or applied for lucrative jobs in the private sector after graduation.

There is certainly more to a person’s character than what sort of threads they wear in public. Dressing professionally isn’t about assuaging white discomfort. Most people of color know a pristine and elegant appearance does not prohibit racism and discrimination. But that doesn’t absolve appearance as irrelevant. Not every expectation set within the larger Black community should be equated as a nod to respectability politics. Having standards should not be associated with subjugation, oppression or adherence to whiteness. Teaching a young person to present themselves with purpose and mission instills him or her with the tools and choices that can serve as immensely valuable at some point.

Two truths can be true at the same time. No one, Black or otherwise, should ever have to change or transform the basic facets of their culture in an effort to garner the right to be granted dignity and respect. But as a worthy individual, you also need to be mindful how you have decided to present yourself in any given situation. One could argue, if you do not know how to dress accordingly, what else do you not understand?

That is not respectability politics for the approval of any specific people. Rather, it is demonstrating self-respect, for yourself and, in some cases, our ancestors.

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Copyright 2026 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Time for reflections as anniversary of mother’s death arrives

Christine Flowers — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Twelve years ago, my mother passed away. It was Aug. 8, 2014, in the very early hours of a Thursday morning.

I had spent the night sleeping in her bed as she lay across from me in a hospital bed. My sister would come in every hour to check on mom’s breathing, and to see if she needed anything, but we knew that she was dying.

The wonderful hospice nurse hugged us tighter earlier that evening, when she left to go home. It was an unspoken message that the end, almost six months after the journey homeward started, was near.

Every year around this anniversary, I feel the weight of time on my shoulders. Lucy was my last direct link to the carelessassumption that life would always go forward, and carry me with it.

When you lose the person who brought you into the world, you begin to look around for the things that will keep you tethered to it.

And at 64, there aren’t very many left.

I don’t mean to sound morbid. My life is actually quite joyous, filled with friends, work, the anticipation of distinct pleasures like an upcoming trip to my beloved Rome, a conference where I will be honored for simple decency, and many more lunches and dinners with my nephew who finally lets me post his photos on social media after a 10-year prohibition.

We’re not even Sicilian and the kid took an oath that Don Corleone would have appreciated.

All of this is to say that the last 12 years haven’t been very different from the ones that preceded them, except for this: finality is no longer hypothetical.

The end is coming, and there are many more stretches behind me than ahead of me on the journey. And that is OK, because the part that remains to be traveled is filled with as much and as many good things as I choose to collect and then scatter.

I no longer have to worry about how this will affect my reputation, or whether my job will be impacted, or whether I will have enough money put away for “that time.”

That time, dear reader, is here. And that is the one of the gifts my mother left me, when she joined my father, and her parents, and my brother Jonathan in the celestial summer house.

Her death taught me that while I can very easily worry about less important things like my weight, my hair and my teeth, there is absolutely no point in agonizing over what other people think of me.

The ones that matter are either already quite aware of who I am, or are waiting for me on the other side. And having that burden lifted from me is such a liberation that I can actually post videos of myself dancing in random bathrooms and smile. Who cares what strangers think?

My mother is not here to criticize, which she likely would, so I forge ahead and seize the moment.

I have written before about my mother’s death. It is the most immediate tragedy of my life. My father passed away when I was 20, over four decades ago. My brother died when I was 36.

I lost my grandmother at 25, and my grandfather was the first great loss, at 7. But Lucy’s passing was the last domino to fall,because I suspect I will be the next one to go.

And with that, I have become much more sensitive to this exceptional gift I’ve been given, the gift of time, of life, of living in health and in overall happiness.

I have had good fortune, better friends, and there has never been a lack of opportunity. Hope, as my friend says, is the last thing to die.

And so, as I commemorate the woman who was my alpha and will be my omega, the face I see before me seconds before ascending to meet her and the rest of the crew, I wish for all of you what I now have: an understanding that while this, too, shall pass, we can have a hell of a lot of joy holding on until it slips like a butterfly through sunlight from our fingers.

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Copyright 2026 Christine Flowers, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Christine Flowers is an attorney and a columnist for the Delaware County Daily Times, and can be reached at cflowers1961@gmail.com.

As goes the American entrepreneur, so goes America

Tom Purcell — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

American entrepreneurs are beginning to flourish again.

According to Dictionary.com, an entrepreneur is a “person who starts, organizes and operates a business, taking on financial risks in the hope of making a profit.”

What’s good for the American entrepreneur is good for America.

The Engine of American Prosperity

Entrepreneurs and small businesses are the engine of our economic vitality — they make up 99.9% of all U.S. businesses.

They also employ about 45.9% of private-sector workers — roughly 62.3 million people — and have accounted for about 61% of net new jobs since 1995.

Not only have such small-business inventions produced millions of good-paying jobs, they’ve dramatically improved our lives.

In his seminal 1958 work, "The Sources of Invention," the late British economist John Jewkes found that more than half of the major job-creating inventions of the twentieth century were the work of entrepreneurs and small startups.

Entrepreneurs gave us the sewing machine, electric power, the automobile, the zipper, the aircraft industry, the jet engine, radio and television, power steering, the helicopter and rocketry.

They also invented acrylics, cellophane, neoprene, air conditioning, the electron microscope, instant cameras, magnetic recording, fluorescent lighting, radar, the safety razor and stainless steel.

What Held Entrepreneurs Back

Not so long ago, our small businesses were languishing.

In the wake of the Great Recession of 2008, America experienced a horrible reversal of its entrepreneurial fortunes: For the first time in decades, more businesses failed than started up.

That regrettable trend didn’t begin reversing until 2012, and even then new startups remained modest through 2016.

During Trump’s first term, the business climate improved sharply.

Business applications rose from about 3.0 million in 2016 to 3.5 million by 2018-19, while the NFIB Small Business Optimism Index soared to multidecade highs.

As tax cuts and deregulation took hold, the Optimism Index averaged a record 104.8 in 2017 and peaked at an all-time high of 108.8 in August 2018.

Just two years later, the COVID-19 lockdowns delivered another severe shock.

In the spring of 2020, roughly 40% to 45% of small businesses temporarily closed at the peak of the restrictions. Permanent closures rose sharply, especially among the smallest firms.

Interestingly, as millions of Americans lost their jobs and were stuck at home, many used the sudden free time, stimulus money and shifting economy to launch something of their own. Applications to start new businesses surged in 2020 and stayed elevated for years.

However, entrepreneurs faced a different set of headwinds. Surging inflation, high interest rates, increased regulation and labor shortages kept the NFIB Optimism Index in the high 80s to low 90s — well below the record highs a few years earlier.

Clearing the Path

The Trump administration is taking several key steps to encourage entrepreneurship and small-business growth.

These include making the 20% qualified business income deduction, Section 199A, permanent, restoring and expanding full expensing and bonus depreciation for equipment, factories and research and development, and aggressively cutting regulations through initiatives such as the SBA Deregulation Strike Force, which aims to reduce regulatory costs by hundreds of billions of dollars.

The administration has also increased SBA lending, eased certain reporting requirements — including Beneficial Ownership Information rules for many small businesses — and provided greater tax certainty through its “One Big Beautiful Bill,” signed into law in 2025.

Small-business groups have welcomed the administration’s tax cuts, deregulation and other pro-business policies.

And there are encouraging signs that America's entrepreneurial engine is revving again.

The Entrepreneurial Comeback

The National Federation of Independent Business’ Small Business Optimism Index jumped 2.1 points in June to 97.4, nearly reaching its 52-year historical average of 98.0 — though still short of the 2018 average.

Still, expectations for better business conditions and real sales have improved substantially, while plans for capital spending rose to their highest level of the year.

The Kauffman Foundation reports that the rate of new entrepreneurs and job creation increased in 2025 and remained above pre-pandemic levels.

Let’s all cross our fingers that the entrepreneurial spirit continues to grow — that more Americans are emboldened to take on big risks to create a new business, product or technological innovation.

Because as goes the American entrepreneur, so goes America.

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Copyright 2026 Tom Purcell, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

See Tom Purcell’s syndicated column, humor books and funny videos featuring his dog, Thurber, at TomPurcell.com. Email him at Tom@TomPurcell.com.

Can an American Muslim win a pivotal Senate seat?

Dick Polman — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

If words of wisdom could cure the Republicans’ addiction to Islamophobia, these might suffice:

“Muslims make an incredibly valuable contribution to our country. Muslims are doctors, lawyers, law professors, members of the military, entrepreneurs, shopkeepers, moms and dads. And they need to be treated with respect.”

Those remarks were voiced six days after 9/11 by President George W. Bush. Which means that in today’s depraved GOP, he’d be a bleeding-heart leftist.

What we’re witnessing across our benighted land, from the White House construction site to the MAGA grassroots, is a demagogic crusade to reduce Michigan-born Oxford and Columbia-educated medical doctor Abdul El-Sayed to a “terrorist” cartoon.

It’s a cinch to explain their motive. Control of the U.S. Senate may hinge on the outcome of the Michigan Senate race, and with Trump’s poll numbers in the toilet, indulging the cult’s racist id and scaring the hell out of voters is arguably the most promising strategy.

Granted, hard-core Michigan MAGAts wouldn’t vote for a Democrat even if that candidate was a white Christian male who’d partied with Jeffrey Epstein. But in that likely tight swing-state election, every vote may be crucial. If even a tiny share can be conned into recoiling at the prospect of a Muslim in the Senate, Islamophobics will spike the ball in the end zone.

I’m not implying El-Sayed, a former Rhodes scholar and author of three books on public health, is a perfect candidate. Some of his progressive stances, like “Medicare for All,” may alienate moderate voters, and his denunciation of Israel’s war in Gaza is anathema to some Jewish voters. His narrow win last Tuesday in the Senate Democratic primary showed he’s weak (thus far) with working-class voters and Black voters.

Healthy skepticism on those fronts is obviously warranted. But MAGA’s personal smears are already far beyond the pale.

Will they work? Possibly. Fox News has long been a cultural blight - it does for journalism what toxic dumps do for the environment - and for three decades it has pumped Islamophobia into millions of weak minds. And we have Trump, the propaganda outlet’s demon spawn, who as early as 2011 was playing the pejorative Muslim card on Obama. Yeah, he conceded on camera, maybe the president does have a U.S. birth certificate, “but there’s something on that, maybe religion, maybe it says he is a Muslim.” (It didn’t.)

But El-Sayed is indeed a Muslim, and Trump’s toadies are in low dudgeon. Tommy Tuberville, the meathead Alabama senator, posted the other day without a shred of evidence that El-Sayed is a “RADICAL ISLAMIST” and a “TERRORIST.” The Senate Republicans’ super PAC says El-Sayed will “unleash terror.” Ted Cruz told Fox News that El-Sayed wants “Sharia law,” despite the dearth of evidence and El-Sayed’s repeatedly voiced respect for the U.S. Constitution and religious freedom. And according to Mike Rogers, the Senate Republican candidate, El-Sayed supposedly believes that America “deserved” 9/11. That’s a viral lie; in truth, a lefty commentator who supports El-Sayed said it in a podcast seven years ago and later retracted it. For what it’s worth, El-Sayed wrote in 2020 that the “craven” 9/11 attacks had “devastated” him.

For the record, El-Sayed at age 31 held public office - executive director of the Detroit Health department and city Health Officer - drawing on his specialty as an epidemiologist. That doesn’t seem to track with the Islamophobic stereotype of a violent terrorist, and what makes the haters’ hypocrisy even more detestable is the fact that they have no qualms about routinely selling weaponry to white Christians who shoot up public places and secure America’s standing among high-income nations as the leader in gun homicides.

All told, El-Sayed is situated at ground zero in an election year when America is truly at the crossroads. Are low-information voters still receptive to the mendacious messaging peddled so successfully by the Trumpists and pre-MAGA Republicans? Perhaps not - according to a 2024 Gallup poll, only 25 percent of Americans said they wouldn’t vote for a Muslim presidential candidate, down from 38 percent in 2015 - but implanted fears of El-Sayed may bloom in the privacy of the voting booth. That would be unfortunate. To indulge those fears, and elect a Republican senator, is to aid and abet the teetering fascist cult.

If only those who hesitate could at least entertain what George W. Bush said: “The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. That’s not what Islam is about. Islam is peace. Muslims most not be intimidated in America. That’s not the America I know. That’s not the America I value.”

And for the umpteenth time since 2016, we will determine whether that America still exists.

-

Copyright 2026 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes the Subject to Change newsletter. Email him at dickpolman7@gmail.com

Tech lords take over: Top ten cartoons of the week

Daryl Cagle — Mon, 10 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

August is usually a slower news month, but tech billionaires never seem to escape too far from the headlines.

Last week it was Elon Musk, who just littered the moon with space debris after one of his giant rockets crashed hard enough to leave a crater. Other tech lords keep pushing data centers into increasingly-angry communities, all to power the AI-devices working to take over our jobs. Steve Sack's Frankenstein's monster cartoon is especially timely.

In one of our most-reprinted cartoons of the week, Dave Whamond imagined how things might be differed if the Founding Fathers devoted some energy fighting against an all-powerful king into preventing tech lords from controlling so much of our lives. We might need a Declaration of Independence from AI sooner rather than later.

Here are our top ten most reprinted cartoons of the week:

#1. Dave Granlund

#2. Dave Whamond

#3. Christopher Weyant

#4. Bob Englehart

#5. Steve Sack

#6. Bob Englehart

#7. Gary McCoy

#8. Dave Granlund

#9. Jeff Koterba

#10. Paul Duginski

–

Daryl Cagle is the publisher of Cagle.com and owner of CagleCartoons.com, a syndicate that distributes editorial cartoons and columns to over 500 subscribing newspapers. See Daryl’s blog at DarylCagle.com and watch his video podcast about editorial cartoons at Caglecast.com

AI Will End Us All: 70 Shocking Political Cartoons

Daryl Cagle — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 00:00:00 +0000

70 brilliant political cartoons on Artificial Intelligence — the story of the doom of all mankind!



From job-stealing robots and AI overlords to ChatGPT chaos, data-center nightmares, and the end of human work as we know it, the world’s top editorial cartoonists deliver hard-hitting takes you won’t see in most newspapers.



Sit back and enjoy this pure cartoon slideshow of the sharpest, funniest, and most unsettling AI cartoons of the moment.



Daryl also shares his pitch for our free daily newsletter, which delivers the best political cartoons in America straight to your inbox every day.



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Music Credit:

“Good Nightmare” and “Thinking Music” by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/



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Trump catering truck escape

by Dave Granlund, Cagle.com

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The host

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Tuskegee's dress code revives an old debate

Time for reflections as anniversary of mother’s death arrives

As goes the American entrepreneur, so goes America

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Tech lords take over: Top ten cartoons of the week

AI Will End Us All: 70 Shocking Political Cartoons

Do you think you’re cute? 