Sebastian Tanti Burlo’s cartoon today
Some of you will ask why Joseph Muscat isn’t considered a chicken too, in this cartoon. Simple: the cartoon reflects the sentiment I wrote about as soon as Simon Busuttil announced that he will be voting for spring hunting.
People took it for granted that Muscat would back the hunters – yes, even those who described him as liberal because of divorce and same-sex marriage, even though they struggling hard all over Facebook to square this particular circle.
And equally, we all took it for granted that Busuttil would vote against, that he is the sort of person who would naturally be opposed to killing and trapping birds in the mating season.
Muscat doesn’t disappoint because our expectations were low or just not there (we expected somebody like that to be OK with shooting birds in the mating season if it brings him votes). Busuttil disappoints because our expectations were completely different and a lot higher.
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Even because Muscat promised a monthly test.
Castaldi Paris this week’s.
Yes. The derogation was 10 years ago and things change. I felt hurt when I read that the PN leader will be voting for the slaughter of birds returning from their migration to hatch their new generation.
Cannot fathom how it makes sense to anybody, unless using twisted logic.
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/ui_frontend/thumbnail/684/0/john-dalli-honours-former-pn-leader-in-urbino-20120526.jpg
Things never change. Not in the Partito Nazionalista. I thought Busuttil would bring change but he hasn’t.
[Daphne – How is Busuttil to blame for Dalli’s neurosis and misplaced nostalgia?]
He is to blame for following the line that the party never wavers from its beliefs – that it stands by everything it’s ever done. That then determined his referendum choice.
They don’t http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2015-02-01/local-news/Eddie-Fenech-Adami-says-he-would-have-announced-position-on-spring-hunting-6736129831
Perfectly right Baxter.
The only thing that I don’t agree with you is”” They never change.””
Yes they do, FOR THE WORSE.
If people have low expectations of Muscat and Labour in general, then why do they continue to vote for them?
To avoid disappointment.
Going to vote NO. Let’s show Muscat and Busuttil we can still do it without their help. It’s my first time that I am voting differently from the leader of the PN (and I am proud of it)!
It will be my second time. I obviously voted for divorce legislation.
I will be doing the same.
I will do the same whole-heartedly.
Busuttil did the right thing.
If the NO vote win, it will be recorded as spring hunting ended under Labour.
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/comment/blogs/48872/simons_choice_on_hunting#.VM-5OUffWrU
[Daphne – Oh yes, just like divorce legislation introduced under the Nationalist government, wouldn’t you say. Your reasoning is perverted. The aim here is to end hunting in the mating season, not to deprive Labour of a ‘victory’.]
Excellent point, Daphne. Polarizing the vote as a message against the government will lead to a sure win for the YES.
One needs to understand that although in mid-term, Labour is still massively favoured by the general electorate.
So it is no point to try to score political points in this referendum. Should this happen, Muscat will definitely tip the balance to the his (and the hunters’) favour.
Funny. I thought the job of the Opposition or indeed any political party was to score political points.
Besides being consistent with the derogation he himself helped negotiate, Simon Busuttil did the right thing not to launch a direct confrontation with the Labour Party.
Otherwise this wouldn’t have been a referendum to keep or abolish spring hunting but merely a race between both party leaders.
Considering the proximity to the last general election the victor is quite obvious in such a case. Are we really after a spring hunting referendum or a political one?
Fully agree! I think Simon Busuttil’s saying he was going to vote ‘yes’ was the best way of depoliticising the issue.
Something tells me that if Busuttil declared that he will be voting against spring hunting, Malta Today’s survey would be showing a good advantage for the yes vote.
That is one powerful cartoon! The best I’ve seen for a long time. Congrats to the cartoonist.
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/comment/blogs/49124/hands_off_joseph_this_is_a_peoples_referendum#.VM_aW53F9zt
“A whispering campaign about how people should vote in the April referendum could undermine how certain Labourites would like to vote.”
Balzan knows the PL well. He notes that the PL has embarked on a whispering campaign to encourage its supporters to vote Yes in the referendum.
Another act of deceit by Joseph Muscat.
Well said! We’re kind of screwed.
Is it just me who really dislikes Maltese cartoons?
Here’s the thinking behind this one: Simon Busuttil is a chicken because he’s afraid to take a stand. Great, now I’m going to draw a headless chicken and call it the Opposition Leader.
What?
Why does everything in Malta have to be like a sledgehammer to the head?
Where’s the wit? Where’s the story-arc? Where’s the twist? Where’s the surprise ending which makes you burst out laughing and nod your head in agreement?
Fine, Simon Busuttil is a chicken but a build a story around it. In the massive space afforded to Tanti Burlo in Times of Malta, he could easily fit a four-to-six panel intricately- detailed comic strip.
Tanti Burlo is very clearly a talented cartoonist but if I came across a published collection of his works, I wouldn’t bother buying it because I have no interest in looking at reams of single-panel strips, none of which make me laugh.
The obvious thing to do, and this should have been done years ago, is pair him up with a good writer. It’s a well established model in the comic-strip world. If one can’t do both, one writes and the other draws.
Single-panel strips only work when there are speech bubbles to compensate for the lack of panels.
And the strange thing is that this is not one Maltese cartoonist’s style but all of them. Just take a look at the newspapers and you’ll see what I mean (Wizard of Id doesn’t count because it’s not Maltese).
I have a Daphne-themed cartoon somewhere (l-Orizzont) from many years ago that I keep for sentimental reasons and, true to form, it’s a one panel drawing of a black-cloaked, pointed-hatted witch called Defni (sic) stirring a cauldron.
Really? All that bile and hate and that’s the best they can come up with? Give me a bleeding story. Make me laugh. It’s like reading the last page of a novel to see whether the main character got married or got killed without bothering to read the rest.
Sorry, but it’s boring.
http://www.independent.com.mt/archive/newspaper-cartoon
http://www.stevebonellocartoons.com/editorial.html
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20031019/cartoons/nalizperla.138668
Compare the above to this
https://doltd.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/the-economist-kal-cartoon-1152013.jpg
or this
http://s1203.photobucket.com/user/jennlbennl23/media/Peanuts1996265.gif.html
or maybe this
http://hipsterhitler.com/ironic-invasion/
or even this
http://garfieldminusgarfield.net/page/848
L-Alternattiva se jiehdu gost bik. Dan ir-referendum mhu xejn hlief sfida mill-hodor kontra l-partiti l-kbar. Il-kacca mhi xejn hlief skuza. Il-poplu wera li hu favur il-kacca fir-referendum tal-EU, u fl-ahhar elezzjoni. Iz-zewg kapijiet jonoraw il-vot tal-poplu, l-alternattiva LE.
“Il-poplu wera li hu favur il-kacca fir-referendum tal-EU, u fl-ahhar elezzjoni”.
Idjoziji bhal dawn ma nnizzilhomx. Mela ghidli, sur Hammer, jien li kont favur li nidhlu fl-Unjoni Ewropeja u li jien kontra l-kacca (bhal eluf ohra), kif ridtni nivvota?
Mela l-ghazliet li kelli kienu dawn:
1. Nivvota kontra d-dhul ta’ Malta fl-EU, u xorta jkollna kacca fir-Rebbiegha.
2. Nivvota favur id-dhul ta’ Malta fl-EU, u jkollna deroga li tippermetti kacca fir-Rebbiegha.
Haga wahda hi certa. L-Edukazzjoni f’Malta falliet bil-kbir, meta ghad ghandna ruxxmata nies lanqas biss jafu jahsbu.
‘…Il-poplu wera li hu favur il-kacca fir-referendum tal-EU, u fl-ahhar elezzjoni….’
With such blissful reasoning and sense of awareness, no wonder we continue living in such “interesting times”.
It never dawns to some, that the hunting saga exposes the irresponsible manner in which mainstream politicians “tackle” an issue, and lie through their teeth – and it eventually leads to the citizens themselves to mitigate the damage, considering that the law only “allows” them an abrogative referendum ?
It is quite a bit of a stretch to say that the only thing the EU vote was about was hunting. I was against the derogation but still voted Yes.
This is the same senseless reasoning as thinking that whoever votes PN agrees with Dr. Busuttil’s stand on spring hunting or every other single issue.
But I have seen these arguments from those whose opinion is whatever their one political TV station states. Thinking and then having an opinion is an alien concept to many in Malta.
The end justifies the means. Well done, Simon. It’s about time Nationalist Party leaders realize who they’re up against.
This!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-D54nRdWwik