Popular Culture Review Vol. 16, No. 1, Spring 2005 | Page 123

P o g o and Liberal Satire
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Napalm, Great Society . . . Moon, yet. Labels for ego all.”9 However, only in
1968, perhaps the worst year of the decade with its wrenching social and
political turmoil, does Kelly and Pogo focus on the war. The year included a
presidential election that was dominated by Vietnam and Kelly satirized it by
drawing in a group of wind-up toys let loose in the swamp. For the first time in
Pogo's history the faces of actual candidates were used. In the past the faces of
Joe McCarthy, Nikita Khrushchev and Fidel Castro had been seen on animal
characters in the Okefenokee, but never those of presidential hopefuls and never
on any kind of toy. In 1968, this custom changed and most of the field of
candidates made an appearance.10 This included George Romney as a “model
that talks too much” and had a “built-in trick.” It started to talk and “presto, it
puts its foot in its mouth.” Nelson Rockefeller was a “cute fox” that walked a
tightrope, Ronald Reagan was dressed in a clown’s outfit and Richard Nixon’s
face featured an elephant’s trunk. He was a toy, it was said, “that runs at the
drop of a hat.” George Wallace was Chicken Little (“The Sky is failin’”) riding
a white horse backwards.11
The candidates who were the most linked to the issue of the war,
however, were Eugene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy. McCarthy was depicted
in the strip as a knight with a gaunt face riding a zebra. At first, Kelly had him
riding a wooden horse and then, without explanation, he changed mounts.
McCarthy carried a pennant with “Wholly Grail” written on it and he spent most
of his time spouting off pious poetry:
And if we once a gala had
a gala Party now in sad
flight from sureness
pugned with pureness
was nobleness a shallow fad?12
His promise consisted of having “no more war games,” a pledge that led some
swamp folk to complain that he should offer more. “He wont’ get no-wheres
promisin’ ‘no more’ of anything.”13
Along the way McCarthy picked up a hitch-hiker, a wind-up runner
with the face of Robert Kennedy. From then on, as Knight McCarthy moved
about, Kennedy is seen holding the reins of the zebra. He keeps saying, “Let me
show you the way from here on.” To complete Kelly’s take on the McCarthy-
Kennedy rivalry, he has the knight protesting each time: “Stop helping me!’
Eventually, as the two figures run through the swamp, side by side, fresh from
the Oregon primary (that McCarthy won) they are last seen moving off to
California. It was wondered “if they still sees eye to eye and tooth to tooth.
As it turned out, of course, it did not really matter, as McCarthy lost the
California primary and Kennedy lost his life to an assassin waiting for him in a
hotel kitchen.