Rex Babin

I’m very sad to report that my friend Rex Babin, the brilliant cartoonist for the Sacramento Bee and a longtime contributor to Cagle.com, passed away this morning after a two year long fight with stomach cancer. A little over a year ago, Rex took a medical leave from his position as the paper’s staff cartoonist, and has been drawing off and on since.

Rex was a friend, and a mainstay of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, serving as president in 2010.  He was the winner of the National Press Foundation’s 2001 Berryman Award and was a finalist for the 2003 Pulitzer Prize. His cartoons were nationally syndicated by King Features.

My thoughts go out to his family, especially his wife Kathleen and their son Sebastian. What a sad day and a terrible loss for the profession.

Here is his last cartoon, which appeared in the Bee on March 4:

Pat Bagley / Salt Lake Tribune (click to start slideshow)

Every Friday, we collect the best political cartoons of the week and stuff them into one big, glorious slideshow.

So just relax and catch up on a week’s worth of news with our Best Cartoons of the Week slideshow.

Leave it to our conservative rabble-rouser Gary McCoy to rile up our readers yet again. Fresh off the heels of his Sandra Fluke cartoon controversy, McCoy’s most recent cartoon calls out the President for politicizing the murder of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin…

I’ve asked Gary to write something about the cartoon, and here’s what he sent me:

And so it goes… I do a cartoon on President Obama politicizing the Trayvon Martin death, and thousands of spastic, hyperventilating leftists reached for their inhalers in unison, collectively raising CO2 levels, and melting the polar ice caps. All the while I celebrate their anger sitting in my comfy arm chair and watching the ice melt in my glass of scotch, with a warm, smug grin on my face.

Why is it that my conservative editorializing rubs liberals raw like Rosie O’Donnell’s bicycle shorts? What we have here is our country’s most narcissistic president ever, unable to keep from making every major story about him if at all possible (unless it’s high gas prices, a still sluggish economy, high unemployment, etc.). The Trayvon Martin story is about a black teen that was tragically shot by a neighborhood watch volunteer. Those are about the only facts we know for certain. The shooter, Mr. Zimmerman has not been tried in any court of law to have been found guilty of anything. As of now, we do not know if he was justifiably defending himself or acting outside the rule of law. Yet every Supreme Court Justice wannabe is posting with certainty like this is the next Dred Scott case. The bizarreness of Obama stating that if he had a son, he would look like Trayvon is nearly unfathomable. Yes, Mr. President, we know you’re black (half black technically), but really, what’s your point? Mr. “let’s all come together, and not make race an issue” can’t seem to keep from waving his giant, novelty, double-laminated race card whenever he smells political opportunism wafting in the air.

I can always tell when my critics have no substantive argument to make in their defense, for that’s when the shallow charges of “horrible cartoonist” and “racist” start to fly. The latter of which is a hilarious label on a guy who married outside his race and has a bi-racial child. But I guess when you’re tutoring a kindergarten class, you’ve got to leave the slide rule at home and bring the crayons instead.

Here are what some readers had to say about the cartoon:

Betty C.: “Don’t see any humor in this cartoon! Disgusting to say the least about the content!”

Debbie C.: “This is a racist hateful cartoon…there is freedom in this country to be able to say things like this, however, this is a bad bad cartoon.”

e-socrates: ”Oh no, politically incorrect speech! Time for the jackbooted boycott vigilantes to put a stomp to this! Go get ‘em Blackshirts!”

Bridget R.: “I’ll play devils advocate and ask anyone to give me an example of other presidents talking in the media about a local murder case. I’ll wait.”

Tom H.: “This is one of the most disgusting cartoons I’ve ever seen. The cartoonist should be deeply ashamed of himself.”

Nomorenicksleft: “If Zimmerman had only ordered a drone strike on Trayvon without due process, Obama would have rubberstamped it.”

WhiteDawg: “Breitbart was a despicable individual, but at least he came up with some of his own material. McCoy is just trying to illustrate Rush Limbaugh’s thoughts as offensively as possible.”

What do you think of the cartoon? Let us know by commenting below, or leaving a note on our Facebook page.

Nate Beeler / Washington Examiner (click to start slideshow)

Every Friday, we collect the best political cartoons of the week and stuff them into one big, glorious slideshow.

So just relax and catch up on a week’s worth of news with our Best Cartoons of the Week slideshow.

Daryl Cagle / msnbc.com

Satirist Will Durst opines about Goldman Sachs, the money-sucking Wall Street 'Vampire Squid' everyone loves to hate, apparently for good reason...

Not easy being a Muppet. Referring to Greg Smith, formerly of Goldman Sachs, who wrote an op-ed in The New York Times about getting the hell out of Dodge, due to his company's relentlessly spiraling moral depravity. According to Smith, associates are encouraged to pursue profit above all else, and that includes ripping out the eyeballs of their own billion-dollar clients at the same time they mockingly scorn them as Muppets. 

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. A complete shocker -- big-time brokerage firm with little or no conscience. My God. What next? High school prom parties where beer is served? Charlie Sheen coming to, on the floor of a Vegas hotel after noon? Drive-through food that tastes like hot, damp, glued-together bar coasters? Mitt Romney making his own robocalls? 

Romney loves to hype his history as a private equity investment banker, so it's not difficult to imagine him as another of the sucking pods on a waving tentacle of the vampire squid. Wrapped so tightly in the "Me First," and "Success at any Cost" culture that he squeaks money when he moves. A sound that surely acts as a predatory mating call. 

We're all Muppets to him. On a daily basis Mr. Bain Capital will say or do whatever he thinks might possibly help on the campaign trail. "Pro-choice, I got your pro-choice. Oh wait, not pro-choice; well, then neither am I." "What happens in the sanctity of one's own bedroom is nobody's business. Oh, Yes It Is!" Surprised every time he's not photographed wearing one of those whiplash neck braces from the twisting and turning necessary to cover his wide panoply of paradoxical convictions.

Recently, this shape shifter comically sucked up to the South, pretending to like cheesy grits. Mitt, nothing personal, but if ever there were a non-cheesy grits-eating kind of a dude, it's you. Even while referring to your NASCAR- and NFL-owner buddies, you still don't have a song in your heart. Probably consider them nothing more than slightly better constructed sock puppets. More realistic button eyes. 

Adam Zyglis / Buffalo News

That's it, isn't it? We're all annoying obstacles to be overcome in order to better provide for your family. Who would be well advised not to get too comfortable, if there is anything to be learned from the fate of your valiant Irish setter,Seamus. Is that going to be your solution to everything: hose us down? 

The Politicrats even have a name for our particular kind of Muppetism; they call us Low-Information Voters. People not paying too close attention. The ones that pretty much believe every ounce of slop our leaders shovel at us while greedy fingers fiddle at our orbital sockets. 

Consider the 50 percent of Republicans in Mississippi and 45 percent in Alabama who still believe President Obama is a Muslim. While the hard-of-hearing think he's muslin, a loosely woven cotton fabric.

Maybe that's the ultimate goal of Republican kingmakers like the Koch Brothers. Get rid of the messy, unpredictable human element and create their own Muppet mouthpiece. Fold a spool of muslin into a head-shaped ball, stick a hand up it, and have it say exactly what they think we Low-Information Voters, LIVers, want to hear. Or did they already do that and call it... Rush Limbaugh. 

Will Durst is a political comedian and columnist for Cagle Cartoons Inc. Read more of Durst's columns here. 

Rob Tornoe / Media Matters

Independent Eye columnist Joe Gandelman weighs in on Rush Limbaugh's continued loss of advertisers...

After nearly 30 years of rapid growth that saved the sagging AM radio format the question is being seriously asked: is conservative talk radio as we know it on the way out?

According to reports, conservative talk titan Rush Limbaugh has lost 141 advertisers due to his three-day, bordering-on-slander verbal assault on Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke. The company distributing his show has suspended his national advertising for two weeks.

Various analysts note that former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee is launching a radio show April 2 in direct competition with Limbaugh. There are rumblings that some stations might decide to replace Limbaugh with Huckabee. Why? Huckabee has shown wide appeal in his Fox News show where he comes across as a thoughtful conservative who prefers discussing issues to polarizing polemics.

Meanwhile, The Daily Beast's John Avlon points to a list that Premier Networks, which distributes Limbaugh and various other conservative talkers, put out containing 98 companies that don't want their ads on controversial political radio shows anymore.

John Cole / Scranton Times-Tribune

This comes, Avon writes, "at a particularly difficult time for right-wing talk radio. They are playing to a (sometimes literally) dying demographic. Rush & Co. rate best among old, white males. They have been steadily losing women and young listeners, who are alienated by the angry, negative, obsessive approach to political conservations. Add to that the fact that women ages 24—55 are the prize advertising demographic, and you have a perfect storm emerging after Limbaugh's Sandra Fluke comments."

The bottom line: conservative political talk may be outdated business model.

Talk to many young people and you'll find most dismayed or amused by the anger and rage talk show hosts direct at those with whom they disagree. This is partly generational. Some top talk show hosts are baby boomers. I've always said American politics will be better off when all of the baby boomers (except me) die off. Many baby boomers seem frozen in polarization stemming from the 1960s' great war/anti-war divide.

Much of talk radio IS hate radio. Republicans hate Democrats. Democrats hate Republicans. Conservatives hate liberals. Liberals hate conservatives. And they all hate moderates. When the liberal talk network Air America bombed big-time one reason was that its talkers tried copying the Limbaugh talk show model and offered strident liberal talk shows that tried to do to conservatives what Rush does to liberals. One tiny problem: Limbaugh has broadcasting talent and they didn't. 

Today's conservative talk is now experiencing entertainment's traditional cyclical nature. The genre could eventually go the way of TV variety shows and soap operas. Plus, with heightened competition from the Internet, social media, and an increasing number of Americans unwilling to continue accepting demonizing or demeaning polemics without a strong push-back, the old formula is frayed.

R.J. Matson / St. Louis Post-Dispatch

The lingering question: Exactly when did we make the shift where it was considered "entertainment" to listen to a radio talk show host for three hours a day five days a week demonize another political party and anyone who sympathized with it? When did negatively politically defining talk become so much "fun" for millions and why? One reason: a charismatic talk show host becomes a listener's trusted friend whose viewpoint is believed -- and absorbed.

Market forces propelled talk radio and now market forces seem poised to force its evolution. And what have been its key impacts? Greater citizen involvement, increased interest in politics — and promoting the notions that compromise is a filthy word, big umbrella coalitions are for the weak, and that demonization and denigration of opponents can be fun and profitable in terms of revenue and in getting out the partisan vote.

It makes sense that it's time for an adaption or shift: after years of the "dumbing down" of American politics, it's time for a smartening up — which is apparently what's happening now with some of talk radio's potential listeners who seem to crave hosts who have open minds versus perpetually open mouths.

Joe Gandelman is a political comedian and columnist for Cagle Cartoons Inc. Read more of Gandelman's columns here.