Sunday morning toons: Actions have consequences

This week:

Rod Blagojevich turns penal justice lemons into lemonade (thereby triggering a Harmonic Toon Convergence).

Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin finds it surprisingly hard to win even a fixed election (thereby giving the systematic vote suppressors of our own Republican Party some food for thought).

Newt Gingrich moves ahead in the Iowa polls (thereby offering yet another reason to scale back Iowa's disproportionate position in the primary/caucus season).

Obama seems to have no concerns on the morning after (thereby pissing off still more Democratic voters -- or, if you prefer, pissing them off still more).

Donald Trump continues to occupy a position of authority in the Republican Party (thereby making the claim of the GOP to any authority of its own just that tiny little bit less convincing).

Today's selections have been meticulously hand-selected from the week's political cartoon pages at Slate, Time, Mario Piperni, About.com, and Daryl Cagle:

p3 Picks of the Week: Mike Luckovich, Matt Wuerker, Nate Beeler, Chad Lowe, Steve Kelly, Eric Ramirez, Matthew Bors, and Monte Wolverton.

p3 Best of Show: Jimmy Margulies.

p3 Legion of Excellence: Pat Bagley.

p3 “Thanks for an Image I Can Never Get Rid Of” Award: Pat Oliphant.

p3 Award for Best New Use of an Overworked Meme: Nate Beeler.

p3 Certificate of Harmonic Toon Convergence: John Darkow, Glenn McCoy, and Ed Hall.

p3 World Toon Review: Cristo Komarnitski (Bulgaria), Cam Cardow (Canada), Patrick Chappatte (Switzerland), Ingrid Rice (Canada), and Paresh Nath (India).

Ann Telnaes take Syrian president Bashar al-Assad at his word.

Mark Fiore explores the difference between Mitter and Anti-Mitter, with a little help from Suzie Newsykins.

Taiwan's Next Media Animation has the story of Alec Baldwin's mysterious disappearance.

Tom Tomorrow presents a brief guide to class conflict in America. (Watch for a cameo by “Chuckles,” the sensible woodchuck!)

The K Chronicles examines the tricky business of language.

Tom the Dancing Bug reveals the most important rule in drawing Doug, and other treats from Super-Fun-Pak Comics.

One of the amusements that keeps us going here at p3 Sunday Toons is the discovery of instances of harmonic toon convergence (see above). Alas, Comic Riffs reports that a recent work by p3 Sunday Toons semi-regular Jeff Stahler appears to have converged perhaps a tad too much with the work of New Yorker cartoonist David Sipress.

At Red Meat, Milkman Dan wrestles with his conscience.

The Comic Curmudgeon examines the endless cycle of depression that is “The Family Circus.”

Portland homeboy Jack Ohman puts the sad decline of the Republican party in perspective.

Another world: It's amazing to be reminded what American conservatism looked like in the years after World War II: Last week, p3 presented “Make Mine Freedom” (1948), a sermonette about the dangers of “isms” in post-war America. “Going Places” (1948) has the same provenance: Sponsored by the conservative Harding University and produced by John Sutherland. This time, the topic is the value of hard work and initiative (it's noteworthy that Freddy never gets to go fishing and have fun, which was his original dream; my guess they found him at his desk one morning, of a heart attack at age 50). The Econ 101 tropes about the free enterprise system will probably sound familiar, but its view of the American business world would be almost unrecognizable today. Plowing profits back into R&D and benefits for employees (including high wages, steady employment, vacation time, and health insurance)? Learning his lesson about the evils of monopolistic practices and the wisdom of government regulation? Fair dividend prices creating more jobs? Building a strong labor-management team? Please. Taxes as a healthy system by which the government provides the infrastructure that business needs to flourish? Get real. You know what they call that kind of thinking today? Kenyan socialism. Despite Harding University's impeccable conservative credentials, American Tea Party “Starve the Beast” conservatives would chase them and John Southerland up a tree and set fire to it for advocating planned/mixed economic ideas like this and calling it free enterprise. On the other hand, the Rockefeller Center-esque “Soap City” is a pretty amusing image.