Archive for obituary
Green Finger
Posted by: | CommentsThis cartoon was drawn in 2004 by my nephew, Matt Carey. Matt passed away last week. He was 30 years old. He leaves behind a beautiful baby daughter, Ellie, wife, Kimberly, and stepdaughter, Whitney.
While at the University of Kentucky Matt drew cartoons for the student newspaper, the Kentucky Kernel. He was a good cartoonist and hoped to make a living at his craft but held a real job as a hedge.
The family suspected Matt would be a cartoonist when, at a young age, he painted his little brother Jimmy green. Jimmy laughed.
Obit Week
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The year 2011 was the end of the line for guys who changed the world – Steve Jobs in one way, Vaclav Havel in another. Anne Applebaum tells how Havel ‘s essay “Power to the Powerless” changed the world. His great insight was that all totalitarian regimes are based on a lie. If individuals “live in the truth” the lie dies and the regime collapses. That’s what happened with the velvet revolution in Czechoslovakia.
As it happens, Havel was overshadowed in death by the totalitarian leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-Il. Or Kim Jong-Dead, as Rush Limbaugh kept referring to him yesterday.
The Dear Leader’s birth on a sacred mountaintop is said to have been announced by a talking swallow. In addition to his miraculous golf scorecard, he claimed the power to order up perfect weather for his birthdays. He wasn’t completely without humility, though, having never claimed to cause the planet to heal or the oceans to recede.
Many tree bark eating North Koreans who mourned the death of their epicurian leader (his annual bar tab for Hennessy Cognac alone was over half a million dollars) don’t seem to be “living in the truth” so much. But then what would you expect from a nation of racist dwarfs.
Christopher Hitchens, RIP
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My favorite atheist has moved on to meet his maker. He deserves extra credit for his independent mind, brilliant wit, courage, and humanity.
Here’s a link, sent by another Hitchens fan, to a speech he made to the Christian Academy in Texas.
“Take the risk of thinking for yourself, much more happiness, truth, beauty, and wisdom will come to you that way.”
Steve Jobs
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Here’s an interesting WSJ column by Walter Mossberg about his personal relationship with Jobs.
The quote in the cartoon is from his commencement speech at Stanford in 2005.
Rapid Robert
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Here’s a nice video interview with Bob Feller from the New York Times “Last Word” series.
Byrd of a Different Feather
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I guess we shouldn’t be surprised that a senate that passed an 800 billion dollar pork packed stimulus bill would go all out for the the passing of the king of pork. Jonah Goldberg has the bad manners to also bring up the Exalted Cyclops’s KKK organizing days here. Michael Barone admires Senator Byrd’s interest in the constitution, in a more balanced view here.
He Fed the World
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Norman Borlaug died on September 12. He was an agronomist. He saved billions of lives with his Green Revolution. Here’s the story by Gregg Easterbrook in the WSJ.
Legacy
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Obit cartoons are the hardest. Especially when it comes to Ted Kennedy. The Lion of the Senate was a good father to his children and a father figure to his nieces and nephews. Republicans like John McCain admired him and respected his willingness to reach across the aisle.
I doubt if Robert Bork shared that view. Kennedy said that a Supreme Court with Bork on the bench would mean a return to back alley abortions and segregated lunch counters. If someone on the right side of the aisle were say something that stupid about, say, Justice Sotomayor, to pull a name out a hat, he’d be outcast to the far reaches of wing-nutdom.
Anyone not named Kennedy who swam away from Chappaquiddick island would probably have served more prison time than the Lockerbie Bomber.
Toward the end he had a letter hand delivered to the Pope.
Uncommon behavior for a man with such a common touch.