First up, the Wall Street Financial Reforms legislation was finally passed yesterday! That accomplished, the Wall Street Frauds Make Wonderful Cartoons series has reached its end. A concluding episode to wrap the series up will appear next week, using several of my scanned, but not yet posted, cartoons. The Monopolists series, the Charles Jay Taylor W.H.V. 1881-82 Comic Strips, and the Silverthorne, Banker serialization, will all continue to their own conclusions. With that out of the way…

Above, by Daniel R. Fitzpatrick in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Extracted from the May 1931 issue of American Review of Reviews.

This coming Tuesday, with Senator Robert Byrd’s replacement expected to be seated, Democrats will attempt to extend unemployment benefits to those who lost their jobs in George W. Bush’s Depression. Republicans — whose reckless, irresponsible governance during Bush’s eight years, are responsible for these people losing their jobs - will meanwhile attempt to block the extension of benefits, cutting off unemployment to those who had paid into it before their jobs disappeared.

Below, both published during the Financial Panic of 1857, and by artist Frank Bellew (Sr.) in the New York City comic periodical, The Picayune. Left, from the November 28, 2025 issue. Right, from November 14, 1857.

The main (voiced) Republican objection to extending unemployment benefits, is it will increase the national debt (90%+ of which was created by the Republicans when they were in power, with most of the additional debt incurred since, being expenditures made necessary by various disasters messes they created during their eight incompetent years.) Republicans/Tea Party extremists bellieve it would be better to incur debt (as they did when they were in control), by handing out more tax breaks to corporations. So that in something akin to the feudal system, wealth will trickle down from the rich to the poor.

Of course, one reason the unemployed can’t find jobs, is that those very same corporations receiving tax breaks, continue to move jobs to other countries, rather than hire Americans. They will continue to do this, until American workers are reduced to the Third World wages U.S. corporations prefer to pay.

This being our wonderful downward spiral, let’s take a look at still more unemployment cartoons from the past…

Below, two more from American Review of Reviews. Left, from the April 1929 issue, reprinting Rollin Kirby in the New York World the previous month. Right, from May 1931, Daniel Fitzpatrick again, from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Doug Wheeler

NYPicayune BellewSr