Ted Rall by Ted Rall

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HUMPHRIES said, 2 months ago

This is supposed to say something !?
cdward said, 2 months ago

Yeah, Ted. I don’t get it.
Ted Rall said, 2 months ago

Finally, there’s a way for the deaths of soldiers who get killed in Afghanistan to have meaning.
aeogia said, 2 months ago

From cannon fodder to lawn fodder…very creative!

Each generation of soldier must die to justify the meaningless war (and deaths) that came before.

The tree of liberty is fertilized with the mulch of patriots…
scottfreitas said, 2 months ago

You people whose brains malfunction on such a level as to even pretend to understand Rall’s gibberish never cease to astound me.

I am convinced Rall writes and draws these strips while both high on crack cocaine and severely sleep deprived… in between trying to make sense out of a two-paragraph thought balloon inside an old “Silver Surfer” comic book, which he hopes to later plagiarize…
dtroutma said, 2 months ago

there’s been a long discussion on the “poor condition” of the National Mall, and the lack of NPS funding to maintain, or repair things. Methinks Rall is offering an example of how all the war memorials might be maintained.
Ted Rall said, 2 months ago

dtroutma, Correct.
Ted Rall said, 2 months ago

One of my constant concerns is that people who read my cartoon don’t necessarily read the news.
Corosive Frog said, 2 months ago

Sooky Rottweiler says;
Reminds me of my human’s mother. She freaks out if I poop in her garden flowers, but buys sheep poop as fertilizer.
Beebee’s human, an old man, buys anti-daisy pesticides then buys greenhouse daisies to replace them…

Can anybody get me a book called “Understanding dummies for dogs”? It must be near “Understanding dogs for dummies”.

Ps, want to know the worst part about the expensive greenhouse daisies story? My human bought some!
scottfreitas said, 2 months ago

Nice, Ted. I actually read and watch the news. I’ve heard of the sorry shape some of our national monuments are in. But how does that lead in to the strip you did today?? It seems like typical leftist knee-jerk anti-military silliness, to me.

“Gin up” a war? You been to New York lately? There used to be a pair of REALLY tall buildings there, and around 3,000 additional office workers who weren’t just particles of ash floating along the jetstream…

Until y’all do a strip proposing a viable solution to the millions of Islamists who want to turn you, me, and everyone else into either added air pollution, or else frightened drones kneeling atop a prayer rug facing Mecca (while probably thinking only of what Miley Cyrus would look like naked), i am going to continue supporting even OBAMA’S efforts in Afghanistan…
Bill_Clay said, 2 months ago

Today’s strip failed on multiple levels. Not only was it in bad taste, but it wasn’t even humorous or insightful. Mulching dead soldiers? Way to push that envelope, Ted!
cdward said, 2 months ago

scott: Miley Cyrus? Well, that gives us a clue about your age.

ted: I did not know about the condition of the lawn, though it makes perfect sense given the lack of funding. However, while I appreciate the sentiment of the cartoon – that the soldier have died for nothing – I have to admit this one did not work for me.
Palestino said, 2 months ago

scot,
your Islamophobia is becoming hysterical..
take my advice and go check yourself..
DrCanuck said, 2 months ago

This ‘toon is WAY over the line. I love it.
Corosive Frog said, 2 months ago

Sooky Rottweiler says;
Yeah, expand your mind, scotty! I don’t like chihuahuas, but my human says I shouldn’t hate a dog just because he’s a chihuahua! Same with cats; they have claws, but they are not all the same.
omQ R said, 2 months ago

As someone who escaped being cannon fodder, it hit home.
dtroutma said, 2 months ago

Being on the agent orange register (with some physical problems therefrom-+ other stuff 100% disabled with VA) with a son about to get disability retirement from the Navy after “playing” in Bosnia, Iraq and elsewhere, putting his “liberal” buttocks on the line, giving him the right to call “neocons” “Nazis”(expletive part deleted). Some of the nut cases claiming only libertarians (Bush and Cheney sure didn’t show up) put it on the line for our country- I’m getting more than fed up with the charge from those with only data from Faux news, and other cowards, with loud mouths and weak minds, like, well, chubby Limbaugh.

Ted has it right, they’re great at starting endless new wars, as long as THEY DON’T have to fight them.
believecommonsense said, 2 months ago

^ and with this war, Bush and Cheney found new ways to give their friends massive taxpayer-funded gifts …. has any other war seen the sort of no-bid, cost-plus (with the contractor defining “costs) contracts to one contractor and its subsidiaries?

Ted, some of your readers not only don’t keep up with news, they know nothing about history
M Kitt said, 2 months ago

Not bad, Ted. Fodder for the cannons indeed.
NaderVoter said, 2 months ago

Hard truth folks. Our soldiers are the best trained, most dedicated and selfless cannon fodder in the world. I stand in awe of them, and yet, they are treated like lawn fertilizer by our politicians that send them to useless wars (that means you Bama) without proper equipment (you Rumsfailed).

Such dedication and sacrifice should only be employed in only absolutely necessary circumstances.

9-11 was not that time. It was an inside job, if not in fact engineered by the shadow government, at least allowed to happen so that the no bid money profiteers could enrich themselves at the cost of young American lives. That is a crime as great if not greater than any Islamic attack on us.

By the way, for you dumb ones out there, Rall employs IRONY.
dsped said, 2 months ago

I’m sure the poppy fields of Afghanistan were in fine condition this year. How’s that for irony?
parkersinthehouse said, 2 months ago

Rall you’re too young to remember an anti-war (in Viet Nam) song that sang, in part

where have all the flowers gone
young girls picked them, every one

where have all th young girls gone
married young men, every one

where have all the young men gone
gone for soldiers, every one

where have the soldiers gone
gone to grave yards, every one

where have all the grave yards gone
gone to flowers
every one

when will they ever learn

i guess your toon reminded me - it’s a pretty true, sad cycle any way you say it
annamargaret1866 said, 2 months ago

Parker, I think “Where Have All the Flowers Gone” predates even the Vietnam War.
anatheist2009 said, 2 months ago

Apparently it comes from a Ukrainian folk song mentioned in ‘And Quiet Flows the Don’ by Mikhail Sholokhov published around 1928.
Seems like some things never change.
ahab said, 2 months ago

Ted , good cartoon. The politicians make better fertilizer, lets use them instead. Ewww, Limbaugh could permanently fertilize the whole country, … and does.
bikerusl said, 2 months ago

Where have all the flowers gone is a song from The Great War isn’t it? That war to end all wars that also had a sequel? We use to sing that song at Remembrance Day assemblies (Vancouver, BC) in elementary school.

My favourite anti-war books:
-All Quiet on the Western Front (great movie too, one of the few great adaptations of a novel that worked)
-Catch-22
-The Journal of Albion Moonlight
-Homage to Catalonia

Please add your favourites to this list!

My favourite anti-war poem is still:

We soldiers of all nations who lie killed
Ask little: that you never, in our name,
Dare claim we died that men might be fulfilled.
The earth should vomit us, against that shame.
We died; is that enough? Many died well,
Of both sides; most of us died senselessly.
Ask soldiers who outlived us; they may tell
How many died to make men slaves, or free.
We died. None knew, few tried to guess just why.
No one knows now, on either side of the grave.
If you insist you know, by all means try,
That being your trade, to make the knowledge
save.
But never use, not as you honor sorrow,
Our murdered days to garnish your tomorrow.

James Agee [1945]
believecommonsense said, 2 months ago

^ thank you for sharing that … an excellent poem.
whitenoise said, 2 months ago

Excellent contribution bikerusl.

Less germane to this conversation but still one of my favorite anti war poems:

Dulce Et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.

Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime …
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Wilfred Owen (1918)
whitenoise said, 2 months ago

Incidentally, I believe what Rall is saying here is that “mulching” our soldiers is little different sending them to die in a pointless, misdirected war.

Scottfreitas: others might point out that while we should defend our country, we were attacked by Al Qaeda, not by Afghanistan or Iraq.
rikoshayrabbit said, 2 months ago

Greatest anti-war novel of all time?? “Johnny Got His Gun” by Dalton Trumbo. The only book I’ve ever read non-stop from beginning to end.
charlie555 said, 2 months ago

This stuff falls flat when our military is all volunteer.

All it does is call them stupid. What intelligent person would sign up for a “senseless” death in a “meaningless” war?

God bless our soldiers.
ReasonsVentriloquist said, 2 months ago

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

— Lt.-Col. John McCrae (1872 - 1918)

It goes back further too (I’m sure this toon, for all its graphic excess is just the latest in a list as long as war)

This version of the lyrics date back to the early 1800s.

“O bury me not on the lone prairie.”
These words came low and mournfully
From the pallid lips of the youth who lay
On his dying bed at the close of day.

He had wasted and pined ‘til o’er his brow
Death’s shades were slowly gathering now
He thought of home and loved ones nigh,
As the cowboys gathered to see him die.

“O bury me not on the lone prairie
Where coyotes howl and the wind blows free
In a narrow grave just six by three—
O bury me not on the lone prairie”

“It matters not, I’ve been told,
Where the body lies when the heart grows cold
Yet grant, o grant, this wish to me
O bury me not on the lone prairie.”

“I’ve always wished to be laid when I died
In a little churchyard on the green hillside
By my father’s grave, there let me be,
O bury me not on the lone prairie.”

“I wish to lie where a mother’s prayer
And a sister’s tear will mingle there.
Where friends can come and weep o’er me.
O bury me not on the lone prairie.”

“For there’s another whose tears will shed.
For the one who lies in a prairie bed.
It breaks me heart to think of her now,
She has curled these locks, she has kissed this brow.”

“O bury me not…” And his voice failed there.
But they took no heed to his dying prayer.
In a narrow grave, just six by three
They buried him there on the lone prairie.

And the cowboys now as they roam the plain,
For they marked the spot where his bones were lain,
Fling a handful o’ roses o’er his grave
With a prayer to God his soul to save.

And then (since we’re talking movies and songs) here’s the one that brings a tear to my eye every time! (Crap, there they go!)

Momma, Look Sharp
From 1776

Courier:
Momma, hey momma, come lookin’ for me
I’m here in the meadow by the red maple tree
Momma, hey momma, look sharp, here I be
Hey, hey, momma look sharp

Them soldiers, they fired. Oh ma, did we run
But then we turned round and the battle begun
Then I went under, oh ma, am I done?
Hey, hey, momma look sharp

My eyes are wide open, my face to the sky
Is that you I’m hearin’ in the tall grass nearby?
Momma come find me before I do die
Hey, hey, momma look sharp

All:
I’ll close your eyes, my Billy
Them eyes that cannot see
And I’ll bury you, my Billy
Beneath the maple tree

Courier:
And never again will you whisper to me
Hey, hey, momma look sharp
audieholland said, 2 months ago

Great cartoon, Ted.
I like the deliberate ugliness in your drawing style.

Thanks for mentioning the Depleted Uranium. Talking to people who weren’t born at the time, they don’t know depleted uranium was used to ‘improve’ the 30mm cannon rounds for the A-10 Thunderbolt (Warthog). One of the few things that would save us from the Warsaw Pact steamroller.

When they started using the A-10s in Desert Storm, it didn’t ring a bell with me at first. Depleted Uranium: the best thing since Agent Orange! Guarantueed to last a millennium…
fennec said, 2 months ago

Benjamin Britten, “War Requiem”

Farley Mowat, “And No Birds Sang”

(To add to the lists)
DrCanuck said, 2 months ago

fennec, I should have you for a Farley Mowat fan.
fritzoid said, 2 months ago

“This stuff falls flat when our military is all volunteer.

“All it does is call them stupid. What intelligent person would sign up for a ‘senseless’ death in a ‘meaningless’ war?”

If they knew that the war they were signing up for was meaningless and that their death would be meaningless, yes I would argue that this is evidence of a lack of…not intelligence, perhaps, but foresight.

A volunteer enlisting in the military has no ability to choose the combat which he may end up facing. After 9/11, many men and women volunteered to help “get” the ones who “did this to us.” An admirable, patriotic, and brave thing to do, for sure. But where were they sent?

1: Iraq. Nothing at all to do with 9/11. Not a threat to U.S. soil. Every U.S. soldier who has died there has died a senseless and meaningless death.

2: Afghanistan. Peripherally involved in 9/11, at least in the sense that the non-governmental planners of the WTC attack were being sheltered there. But there’s no objective, no exit strategy. What the hell are we doing there?

Pat Tillman gave up an NFL career to enlist following the WTC attacks. He was killed by friendly fire, which the Army then covered up. What meaning did his death have?

Again, once you sign up you have no choice but to go where they send you. The responsibility lies with those in decision-making positions, true, having volunteered you’ve placed yourself in that position.
parkersinthehouse said, 2 months ago

it’s hard to see through the tears you guys - when it starts coming back there’s no stopping the flood

matter of how we see it, i guess, but i would never tell a soldier that her life was given in vain or tell another that he died for nothing. they did exactly what the commander in chief demanded of them and what they did, in that case, was honorable

it’s bush’s albatross - and he’ll carry it around his neck forever
d_legendary1 said, 2 months ago

It may be something he carries with him but it does not mean that he feels remorse over his actions.

Until that S.O.B. is in jail justice for those that died in a senseless war (along with those innocent Iraqis that had nothing to do with this war other than being sitting ducks) will be for nothing!
fennec said, 2 months ago

IMHO, all wars signify failure. This is not to say that I would at all condemn anyone for doing what they see as necessary to defend those for whom they have responsibility, just that having to go to such an extreme is a failure of our so-called ability to think/reason. (But maybe we are a bit too sanguine about our ability to think.)
Metzengerstein said, 2 months ago

Ted, I read your cartoons so I don’t HAVE to read the news.
edmondd said, 2 months ago

When you erroneously step on the head of a snake, do you remove your foot?

Ted, one has to acknowledge that getting out of any war is not that easy either.

It would have been better not to have gone to Iraq and Afghanistan of course.

Ironically, had there been a massive amount of forces, theoretically speaking, war would be resolved without firing a single shot.

But to avoid more unnecessary wars, the draft should be restored. But if the draft is not restored, then soldiers must have a say through a democratic vote, if most opine they should go then they go, otherwise they send the men behind the desks who have never served.
fritzoid said, 2 months ago

edmondd, I think the idea of polling the soldiers on whether a war is worth fighting is a better idea if the draft IS reinstated.

One thing charlie has right is that, in an all volunteer Army, soldiers have voluntarily given up having any say in the matter. They chose to put themselves in the position of mandatory compliance with the chain of command. But to perform well in an unjust war is hardly “honorable”, I think. A German foot soldier in WWII may not have shared the ideology of his commanders, but he is still fighting for the Wrong Side. Have you seen “Inglourious Basterds”? there’s a young German who is hailed as a Hero of the Folk for having killed 300 or so Allied soldiers from a sniper tower. What that highly competent soldiering? Yes it was. Was it brave and remarkable? Yes it was. He committed no war crimes or atrocities, just engaged the Enemy (i.e. us) to the best of his ability. It was heroic individual action in an evil cause. After the Nuremburg trials, it has become axiomatic that “I was just following orders” is insufficient in terms of absolving underlings from the responsibility for the lives they take.

In the book “Corelli’s Mandolin”, the highest praise Captain Corelli gives of one of his men is “He has many medals for saving lives, and none for taking them.” Would it were always so.

In 1984, I enlisted in the infantry (11-Charlie, mortars). I was honorably discharged prior to the completion of my enlistment, but had I stayed in might well have been sent to Panama. Before my Reserve commitment ended, I might have been sent to Iraq. If I had lost an arm or an eye in either theater, or been exposed to depleted uranium ordnance and developed radiation sickness, I would now be looking back and saying “Boy, was I stupid to get myself in this position.” If I had died, of course, I would not be in a position to look back on anything.
Ted Rall said, 2 months ago

If a war were truly necessary, it would be so politically popular that you wouldn’t need a draft or a volunteer standing army of poor mercenaries. Ordinary Americans would rush to recruiting stations to defend their country.
fritzoid said, 2 months ago

My own favorite anti-war song, since we’re posting them:

On the side of a hill, in a land called Somewhere,
A little boy lies asleep in the earth,
While down in the valley a cruel war rages,
And people forget what a child’s life is worth.

On the side of a hill, a little cloud weeps
And waters the grave with its silent tears,
While a soldier cleans and polishes a gun
That ended a life at the age of seven years.

And the war rages on in a land called Somewhere,
And generals order their men to kill,
And to fight for a cause they’ve long ago forgotten
While a little cloud weeps
On the side of a hill.

– Paul Simon
(portions of this song were later worked into the “Canticle” lyrics behind “Scarborough Fair”)
fritzoid said, 2 months ago

“If a war were truly necessary, it would be so politically popular that you wouldn’t need a draft or a volunteer standing army of poor mercenaries. Ordinary Americans would rush to recruiting stations to defend their country.”

Not sure I entirely agree; one could argue that it should not have taken Pearl Harbor to convince the average American that intervening in WWII would be a Good Thing.

And of course, even if your premise IS correct, it does not follow that all popular wars are necessary. People in England, Germany, France, and the U.S. were itching to start shooting at each other in 1914 (although the Americans wouldn’t get to join the fun until 1917). The Great War, the War to End All Wars, was completely unnecessary, solved nothing, and set the stage for a sequel which was, alas, ENTIRELY necessary.
fritzoid said, 2 months ago

My own idea for killing two birds with one stone (not that I’m advocating indiscriminate bird-killing) would be to reorganize the Armed Forces along the Swiss model (modified).

Reduce the standing army to a skeleton, but expand the reserves and the National Guard. Unlike the Swiss, no individual would be required to maintain combat arms in their home, but anyone (male or female, young or old) who wanted to own any sort of firearm would be required to report regularly for military training. You want to own a hunting rifle? FIne. Make yourself available for national service. A Saturday Night Special? Same deal.

There would be mandatory, generalized safety training for whatever type of gun you own (as well as training in combat weaponry), discipline, command structure…

In the event of a true national emergency (i.e. an actual invasion of our soil), it would be easy to mobilize an effective response at a local level, but if the politicians decide they want to send troops overseas it’ll be difficult (as it should be; we must not intervene elsewhere without great cause). Those troops which are called to report would already be trained in soldiering, so our initial casualties (which has traditionally been a big problem, when we’ve had to rely on large numbers of fresh recruits) might be lower. Having to pluck citizen soldiers from their regular lives every time we want to stick our noses into somebody else’s business might make the Brass think twice; one of the biggest reasons for the unpopularity of Bush’s wars has been the extended disruption to the lives of reservists. If the vast MAJORITY of our soldiers were in that position, the impetus to get in and get out as quickly as possible would be hard to ignore.

So if you want to own a gun, fine, but under my system you’d have to make yourself available for a “well-regulated militia”, which seems to me what the Framers had in mind.
ReasonsVentriloquist said, 2 months ago

Ted, please remove that post. Come on! You can’t put your mind to it and really believe that 1. Popularity makes right. 2. That the people in this country would be able to assess the risk of war and assemble for it until it was too late already.

You’re not a freshman frat boy in college anymore. Statements like that one are just rainbow ends and butterfly effect dumb!
fritzoid said, 2 months ago

RV, I believe you’re mistaking his point, at least with regards to (1).

His statement “If a war were…necessary, it would be…popular” does not logically lead to “Popularity makes right.” Ted’s position is “Right (necessity) makes (would make) popularity.”

“If A ,then B” does not lead to “If B, then A”, but it DOES lead to “If not B, then not A.” So the contrapositive inference of Ted’s position would be “If a war is not popular, it cannot be necessary”, with which, as I’ve stated, I don’t agree myself.
ReasonsVentriloquist said, 2 months ago

Well said Fritzoid.

However, in the real world what is popular and what is necessity have nothing to do with each other. Pet Rocks were wildly popular.

Given the reality of corporate owned media, popularity and neccessity are goals. They create both.

Here’s a perfect example (or two). 1. Jimmy Carter called the solution to our dependence on foreign oil “The Moral Equivalent of War!” and still today people sneer at that with one face while demanding that we “drill, baby drill!” in order to cut back on our dependence on foreign oil with the other face! Energy consumption has robbed this nation of its treasure, it is a “war” that we lost. And how many of us showed up to battle?

Secondly, Health Care. Talk about your getting skrewed! And yet, many/most in this nation can’t even see the threat. (not least of all being because there are media outlets with a vested interest in the SQ). The only ones volunteering for the fight are fighting for the other side!

As to your WWI observation, no.

First of all WWI was necessary if you were French! Especially if you wanted to stay that way. The Germans weren’t effin around, they meant to put the final blitz into France and take it over once and for all. And that meant that they would have had to destroy Belgium, but so what?

As far as the Brits were concerned… They didn’t really want to help the French in the first place but they felt forced into it because if they didn’t then it would put the kibash to all their other treaties which means that no one would be obligated to watch their overextended tail ends.

Also, understand, that what WWI was really about was the right to rule. Where did that right come from? For most of the world, the answer still was God. France had adopted democracy as had Italy. But central and Eastern Europe were still royalty based. WWI pretty much finished that.
dtroutma said, 2 months ago

Ted is right. At the onset of WW II Americans did rush to enlist. Just found a letter of my dad’s lamenting his 4-f status when his brother went with him to enlist. My uncle and father-in-law were probably within a few hundred yards of each other at the Battle of the Bulge, both were tank commanders, both wounded.

I find it interesting, considering the oft repeated charge against liberals, that my right-wing brother, like Cheney, thought enlisting was “beneath him”. I, and my son, are the “libs” who’ve served this country in the military, both now disabled as a result of service, and proud we did serve, but quite unhappy with the “conservatives” who wage wars so poorly, and without true popular support. Remember, it was Nixon who prolonged Viet Nam, for longer than Johnson(who WAS wrong!).