Own the Libs - Mark Fiore - Political Cartoon

[Rhiannon12866]

As the omicron variant spreads across the world and COVID-19 keeps killing people around the world, Republican politicians in some states have started to pay people to NOT get vaccinated. Florida, Iowa, Kansas and Tennessee have decided it’s a good idea to cut unemployment checks for people who have been fired from their jobs because they didn’t comply with vaccine mandates. Anti-vaxxer? Here’s your check!

Just when you thought public health and science couldn’t get any more politicized, right wingers start paying off their favorite recently fired anti-vaccine heroes and saying that the omicron variant is a plot by the Democrats. Ugh.

Meanwhile, millions of unvaccinated human petri dishes provide a fine place for the virus to keep cranking out new variants. Republicans aren’t the only ones to blame, however, some conspiracy-minded liberals are also selfishly saying no to getting a life-saving shot. And there’s plenty of blame to go around for the lagging distribution of vaccines around the world . . . but in some cases that can also be traced back to lies from right-wingers in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

[Deuxcents]

1. 😂

[littlemissmartypants]

2. Why do writers use ambiguous words?

For example, "cut" checks at first reading for me means end as in abolish. Here I see now, it's just the opposite. Frustrating.

❤

[TygrBright]

4. The phrase "cut a check" has meant "write a check" in business for a long time.

I can remember in business school in the 1970s bookkeeping classes, the instructor talked about "when you cut a check, you journal a payment"...

Don't quote me on this, but I believe the origin is from the days when businesses had special check-printing machines that worked on uncut roles of special paper, and the machine printed the payment and then cut the check from the roll.

helpfully,
Bright

[littlemissmartypants]

8. I appreciate your explanation.

Too bad it doesn't actually say that. The words "cut unemployment checks" are still subject to a confused understanding of the actions of the states. It's the ambivalent meaning of the words themselves and not the knowledge of a frequently, historically used idiom that creates misunderstanding. If "cut a check" was the language used, I would have understood it immediately. As it stands, I still think that the ambiguity leaves the meaning open to interpretation. That's all I'm saying. Thank you for your reply though, Bright.

❤

[niyad]

13. I had the same reaction you did to that phrase.

[c-rational]

15. Bingo. I had the same reaction, and re-read several times to decipher. Poor choice of words.

[SheltieLover]

5. Might be an old term

Used to work in computer room decades ago & we used to cut checks, print for all employees is a big stack & run them through a "burster," whick snapped them apart.

[littlemissmartypants]

9. Interesting. I'd like to see the burster in action.

❤

[SheltieLover]

11. Lol

Interesting machine actually

One part would strip the carbon paper put & the other would pull checks & computer paper apart.

[Haggard Celine]

7. I've heard people use "cut" as in "cut him a check" a lot over the years.

In that sense, it's easily understood what "cut" means. But in a different context, like the one in this post, it would have been clearer to use a different word. Probably wrote it in a hurry and didn't really think about what he was saying.

[littlemissmartypants]

10. Thank you. ❤

[SheltieLover]

3. K&R!

[LetMyPeopleVote]

6. Lets Go Darwin

Link to tweet

?

[StClone]

12. Remember Darwin's exact quote is not the best gun toter, fastest liar, or smartest inside trader!

But to parapharase the most Liberal at adapting...

...it is not the most intellectual of the species that survives; it is not the strongest that survives; but the species that survives is the one that is able best to adapt and adjust to the changing environment in which it finds itself.

[calimary]

14. LOVE LOVE LOVE this!

“Ooh! You sure showed us!”