Cartoon: Mac on the Hatton Garden Heist and the Barclays Libor-rigging Scandal

This cartoon by Mac from the Daily Mail links the so-called Hatton Garden Heist (in which thieves broke into an underground bank vault and stole millions of pounds worth of property from safe deposit boxes), and the Barclays Libor-rigging scandal (in which Barclays Bank traders manipulated foreign exchange markets).

The cartoon shows the Barclays traders drinking champagne and laughing in amazement at the lengths the Hatton Garden gang went to in order to steal the money, whereas all they had to do was change a few figures on their computers. The latest news is that a number of arrests have been made in relation to the heist (whereas all of Barclays rogue traders remain free).

VOCABULARY
1. Quaint means strange and unusual in an old-fashioned and charming way. • On Saturday we lunched at a quaint old inn he had discovered.
2. Chap is an informal British English word for a man, especially one that you like. • Bill’s such a nice chap.

Cartoon: European Lifeguard

BACKGROUND
EU leaders agreed to triple the funding of naval search and rescue missions in the Mediterranean. However critics are displeased, believing it’s a face-saving measure, especially as some EU leaders still advocate blowing ‘illegals’ out of the water. The move comes after an overloaded migrant boat coming from Libya sank on Sunday, killing up to 900 people. Only 28 people are believed to have survived the disaster, making it the worst on record involving migrants fleeing Africa through Libya. The EU has been facing a growing wave of criticism for not doing enough to save the migrants fleeing to Europe. Full story >>

THE CARTOON
The cartoon by Chappatte from the International New York Times shows a lifeguard wearing a suit, and clearly meant to represent the EU (the sunshade makes that obvious) telling a boat that is sinking under its load of migrants to 'Go Back!' The people on the boat are waving for help, and some have already fallen into the water and are drowning.The lifeguard is sitting in one of those high chairs that lifeguards have so that they can see better, and using a megaphone to call to the boat. A lifebelt is attached to the side of the chair. The skies are stormy, adding to the danger.

COMMENT
The message is fairly clear — the EU is not doing enough to save the migrants fleeing to Europe from war-torn Libya and other Africa countries across the Mediterranean Sea.

Cartoon: Drone Condolences

BACKGROUND
The White House was forced to concede on Thursday that it killed two innocent hostages – one American, one Italian – in a drone strike that targeted an al-Qaida compound despite officials not knowing precisely who was in the vicinity. The deaths of Dr Warren Weinstein, a US government aid worker, and Giovanni Lo Porto, an Italian aid worker, who were being held captive in the Afghanistan and Pakistan border region, have placed unprecedented pressure on Barack Obama’s secret program of targeted drone killings. They mark the first time a US drone strike has inadvertently killed innocent hostages, and have forced the Obama administration to disclose an unprecedented amount of information about what would typically be a highly classified operation. Full story >>

THE CARTOON
The cartoon is by Steve Sack, editorial cartoonist for the Minneapolis Star Tribune and winner of the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning. An unmanned drone is shown firing a missile at 'America's enemies', while simultaneously dropping 'sympathy cards for innocent bystanders' by parachute. The point the cartoonist is making is fairly clear — it's not only terrorists who are being killed by indiscriminate US drone strikes.

VOCABULARY
A bystander is someone who is in a particular place by chance when an accident or an unusual event happens but who is not directly connected with it. • Three innocent bystanders were wounded in the explosion.

NOTES
1. This is one of two cartoons in the latest edition of Cartoons for the Classroom, where you can also find some discussion questions. The Cagle Post also has a cartoon collection about drone warfare.
2. Drone warfare is also the subject of the new movie Good Kill, which stars Ethan Hawke as an Air Force drone pilot who begins to question the ethics of his job.

Cartoon: The Great Kate Wait

BACKGROUND
Royal baby number two is five days overdue, according to Whitehall sources, prompting speculation that Kate Middleton may have her labour induced in the next few days. Sources have told the Daily Telegraph they were briefed that the Duchess of Cambridge's due date was Thursday 23 April. One parent whose children were born in the Lindo Wing at St Mary's Hospital in Paddington told the newspaper: "The doctors don't normally wait for more than a week." Full story >>

THE CARTOON
The cartoon by Mac from The Daily Mail shows Kate lying on a hospital bed. She is surrounded by doctors and nurses. Prince William is also in attendance, holding a bunch of flowers behind his back. One of the doctors is listening to the unborn baby with a stethoscope, and reports a message from the baby, relayed in Morse code!

EXPLANATION
The joke is that the baby doesn't want to be born until the 'boring' UK General Election (due to be held on May 7th) is over.

LANGUAGE
1. If you say that something is over, you mean that it is finished or has ended. • Winter is finally over and spring is here.
2.  A common mistake that English learners make to confuse 'I am boring' (=I am not an interesting person) with 'I am bored' (=I have nothing to do). See here for a video on this point.

Cartoon: Baltimore Riots

BACKGROUND
More than 3,000 police from Maryland, New Jersey and the District of Columbia, and National Guard members in helmets, took up posts in front of businesses and hospitals in Baltimore a day after the worst rioting in the United States in years. Shops were looted, buildings burned to the ground, 20 officers injured and police arrested more than 250 people in the violence that erupted following Monday's funeral of a 25-year-old black man who died in a hospital on April 19 a week after sustaining injuries in police custody. The death of Freddie Gray gave new energy to the public outcry that flared last year after police killings of unarmed black men in Ferguson, Missouri, New York City and elsewhere. Full story >>

THE CARTOON
The cartoon by Chappatte from the International New York Times shows a group of heavily-armed National Guardsmen standing behind an armoured vehicle as a riot unfolds a short distance away. On of the guards tells his companions, "We lost Iraq and Afghanistan. We can't afford to lose Ferguson and Baltimore."

LANGAUGE NOTES
1. To lose is an irregular verb: lose, lost, lost.
2. If you can't afford to do something, you must not do it because it would cause serious problems for you: We can't afford to make any mistakes at this stage in the project. 

ALSO SEE
• Baltimore Riot Cartoons (Cagle Post)

Cartoon: Mac on Voting Labour

BACKGROUND
We've entered the final day of campaigning before the UK goes to the polls tomorrow. In case you hadn't noticed it's not just the politicians on message this General Election campaign. The nation's newspapers want you to vote too and some of them have been a little more obvious than others about which way you should cast your ballot. With one day to go until the biggest political day of the year we decided to take a look... Read more >>

CARTOON
The Daily Mail is traditionally a Conservative paper, so it's no surprise that they are urging their readers to vote Tory in tomorrow's general election. They've even published a guide on how to vote tactically to keep Labour out of Number 10. And today's cartoon by Mac from the Daily Mail suggests that you'd have to be a sadist or a masochist to vote for Labour. The scene is the The Sadist and Masochist Club, where members are inflicting all sorts of pain on themselves. One says to another, "Yeah. Roll on tomorrow. I'm voting Labour, too".

LANGUAGE
If you say roll on (whatever), you mean that you want a particular time or event to come quickly. • Roll on the holidays!

QUIZ
See if you can match these actions to the people in the cartoon.

sticking pins in yourselfhitting yourself with a boxing glovesitting on a stovehitting your toe with a hammercatching your fingers in mousetrapshitting yourself on the head with a malletputting your fingers in an electrical sockethanging yourself up by the wrists in chains