In Pat Bagley’s cartoon of Jan. 9, he drew an image of the horrible fires burning in Los Angeles and added the caption, “If your politics jump on a natural disaster to score points and spread disinformation ... your politics suck.”
All disasters, natural or man-made, are awful and my heart goes out to those suffering because of them. It is natural and appropriate for us to question (even in the midst of the disaster) “how could this have been avoided?” or “did it really have to be this bad?”
In situations like the fires in California, those honest and genuine questions seem to be answered to some extent by identifying certain actions or inactions by local, state and federal government. I believe elected leaders should be held accountable and it is appropriate for their decisions to be questioned.
Bagley’s cartoon, though, came across as judgmental and dismissive of actual governmental failures that could have mitigated or prevented the horrible loss of life and destruction of property.
A quick search of Bagley’s archives finds his own instances of political commentary in response to disasters, including commentary on the federal government response to Hurricane Katrina in September 2005 and commentary about then-candidate Donald Trump after Hurricane Helene in September 2024.
Bagley seems willing to politicize natural disasters when they cast a poor light on Republican leaders, but then argues politics shouldn’t be part of the discussion when it happens under the leadership of Democrats. This feels hypocritical and deserves to be called out.
Perhaps Bagley should hold his crass comment about responding to disasters politically up to a mirror and consider his own behavior.
Jordan Muhlestein, Orem
