The "Nation of Cowards" May Be Made Up of Political Cartoonists

Attorney General Eric Holder said we're a "nation of cowards" because we don't talk enough about race. Well, there may be some cowards out there and they draw political cartoons:

Cartoonist Lalo Alcaraz was in front of a classroom full of black and Latino kids, drawing presidents. He sketched Bush, then Clinton. Next came his favorite, the man he voted for: Obama.

"Hey, those lips are big," Alcaraz heard a black girl say from the back of the room.

Alcaraz was disturbed. "I try to bend over backwards not to make him look like a cartoon stereotype," and certainly not a racial stereotype, he said.

Editorial cartoonists are bending over backwards a lot these days, as they try to satirize the nation's first black president. And when they don't, the result is the kind of outcry that erupted this week after a New York Post cartoon featured a bloody chimpanzee — intentionally or unintentionally evoking racist images of the past.

The problem is, cartoonists make their living by making fun of people — especially presidents — and exaggerating their features and foibles.

Can you blame them for being nervous? Just look at the fury directed at the New York Post because some people can't read a cartoon featuring a chimp without discovering thinly veiled racism.

Cartoonists and comedians are in for a hard four years. They can't keep trotting out old routines about Bush and expect to keep an audience.