How would Joe Biden look at the anvil? Traditionally, political cartoons have portrayed US Presidents as blacksmiths and, sometimes, farriers. Here you see President Woodrow Wilson portrayed in 1917 as a striker, not the smith. Uncle Sam is the smith, and he is urging Wilson to swing and hit, while the iron is still hot. The shoe has "crisis" written on it; it probably refers to the hesitation of the United States under Wilson to abandon isolationism and enter World War I on the side of the Allies. This old political cartoon by William Allen Rogers is from the archive of the Library of Congress's Cabinet of American Illustration. |
Saturday Night Live notwithstanding, there hasn’t been much to laugh about when it comes to US politics lately. And ever since former-farrier Lincoln Chafee dropped out of the Democratic primaries back in 2015, there have been almost no tie-ins at all to hoofcare, horseshoes or even horses.