TOW #6 Political Cartoon

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This is a political cartoon that is dealing with the many delays and problems Obamacare faced in the early fazes of its implication. In emphasizing President Obama’s features, personifying Obamacare as a turtle, and juxtaposing the two images this cartoon hopes to poke fun at Obamacare and convince the reader that it is ineffective and make a statement about the president. This cartoon extenuates the president’s features; it makes his ears, which are received by the public as abnormally large, lips and nose abnormally large, and his head much smaller in comparison. While this cartoon hopes to make the president look ridiculous, it makes itself seem very racist by bringing out stereotypically large features among the black community and very degrading by making his head small which makes it look unintelligent. The cartoon also juxtaposes the turtle and Obama, to make Obama look ridiculous. The cartoon also chose to present Obamacare as a turtle flipped on it’s back; turtles are slow and lethargic animals and when flipped on their backs are immobilized and have no way to flip back over. By choosing to represent Obamacare as this, the cartoon states that Obamacare was slow at the start, but not that it has encountered these problem it has “flipped on it’s back” and will not be able to progress from this point. President Obama and this turtle are put side by side to compare them and to make a statement about the president’s policies. The cartoon hopes to make a fool out of Obama by showing him backing something so ridiculous as this turtle. It also seeks to compare the president to this turtle so say that Obama is not going to change anything and will just continue to lie on his back like the turtle. This cartoon, while witty and slightly amusing, comes off as stupid and a bit racist.