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Obama’s  Rhetorical  Appeal    Stephanie  Wilson  

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Stephanie  Wilson  

English  103,  Section  097      

Asher  John,  Instructor    

Rhetorical  Analysis    

09/17/10  

 

Obama’s  Rhetorical  Appeal    

 

It is human nature for a people to judge one another, you and I both do it everyday,

weather we mean to or not. Some openly voice their opinions of others as they pass by, or just

laugh to themselves, and some just keep their thoughts to themselves. On a daily basis, we are

judging almost everyone we see, but no in the United States are judged more then our nations

leader: President Barack Obama. Which is why I decided to put him under my ‘magnify glass’,

and judge him on a specific topic; the media. This political cartoon, developed by Dana

Summers, is conservative opinion of President Obama’s way of handling the media; it coveys

visual imagery and comical symbolism to strikes the audience’s attention that our President is

afraid of the media.

There are many visual aspects in this political cartoon that you can analyze. The image is

taking place in the White House my evidence to support this is the White house’s address in the

background behind the characters, there are also four people standing in the picture. Three of

which are children dressed up in Halloween costumes, there is a witch, a ghost, and most

importantly a fox. We can tell that the image is referring to the present because it incorporates

Halloween, which is coming up in a little over a month. The rhetorical strategy used in this

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particular part of the political cartoon is karios, because it relates to the present events of today

and our most recent leader in the government.

The witch is dressed in all black and has an orange ribbon around her black hat that sits

on top of her stringy dark hair. She is holding an orange, pumpkin-shaped basket, which holds

her candy. The second child, the ghost, has a white sheet over their clothes, and red and white

tennis shoes hanging out at the bottom of the sheet, which has holes cut out so they can see. The

fox is a little kid wearing black tennis shoes, black pants, and an orange shirt, along with a big

fluffy orange tail and a mask that is in the shape of a fox’s head. A rhetorical appeal of this

portion of the cartoon would have to be the color orange, it adds to the whole Halloween effect,

because whenever anyone thinks about Halloween, orange is definitely the first color that comes

to everyone’s mind. This type of persuasion would be pathos, because it appeals to the emotions

that are related to Halloween, fear, excitement, and the viewer’s sweet-tooth.

The fourth character is Obama, who is of course, our president; the face of America. He

is wearing black pants, brown shoes, and a white collared-shirt that has the sleeves rolled up and

a red and black tie. The fact that he looks more informal than professional is an immediate judge

of his character. This is one way for the cartoonist to infer that way our president is not handling

the media in a professional way. Obama has a speech bubble over him that says “Ahhhh,” he is

screaming because he opens the door to find these ‘trick or treaters’. Above the kid that’s dressed

as a fox there is a speech bubble that says, “Trick or treat! I’m Fox news!” This is a great

example of ethos, which is a mode of persuasion that uses ethical appeal, trying to convince the

audience that someone of great importance and worthy of respect, is flawed. Which causes the

viewer’s to question Obamas credibility. A third type of rhetorical persuasion that is used in this

political cartoon is logos, which comes from the image stating that Obama has a fear of the

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media, this is a statement that can be backed up with logical and reasoning when you investigate

the presidents past involvement with the press, specifically Fox News which you can clearly see

because of the frightened look on his face. Obama is being called out on this mainly because he

has only addressed Fox News once, giving good reason for the cartoonist to draw him with a

terrified look on his face.

The cartoonist, who created this image, is an American cartoonist who usually writes

conservative pieces that are entertaining and informative. He graduated from the Boston Art

Institute in 1970, he began working at the Dayton Journal Herald, later he moved to the Orlando

Sentinel, in 1982. Summers’ is now the author of the comic strip ‘Bound and Gagged’. He is also

the co-writer of ‘The Middletons’, with Ralph Dunagin.

The fact that the fox is the only trick or treater that has a speech bubble, automatically

makes the viewer focus on that particular character. Obama’s reaction to this fox is most

important, it is the main point that Summer’s wants to get through to the viewers; Obama has a

bad track record for addressing the media. He is in a way, afraid of the media, and that it

illustrated clearly in the political cartoon. Obviously anyone who is under such scrutiny would

have to be scared, if you think about everyone in the United States, the press included, are

judging his every move. “What we do know is that Obama’s method of dealing with a news

conference is to talk each question to death. In addition, he makes sure that we all know that, no

matter what the problem under discussion, it was all George W. Bush’s fault,” (Caruba). As said

in an article that covered a press conference regarding the oil spill, which was held three hundred

and nine days after the incident. The same article also said talked about how Obama addressed

the issue, “The president then used one of his snore-inducing answers to segue to the usual

blather about a ‘clean energy’ economy. This is pure fiction. America and the rest of the

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advanced nations of the world depend entirely on oil, natural gas, and coal.” This statement is

completely true; our nation needs these materials to survive. This is a great example of Obama

not addressing the specific issue that the media directly asked him.

In conclusion, the overall argument of the political cartoon is clear; President Obama has

a great fear of addressing the media about our nation’s problems. The cartoon is made a comedic

flair that catches the attention of all ages, and is relatable to a large majority of our population.

The image does an amazing job of getting people to really think about the specific way President

Obama has been dealing with the media. The image makes you re-think the topic, and essentially

persuades its viewer’s to take a second look at how our beloved president is handling our

nation’s issues.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Works  Cited  

 

Caruba,  Alan.  "Blah,  Blah,  Blah.  Obama's  News  Conference."  Canada  Free  Press  (2010):  n.  

page.  Web.  20  Sep  2010.  

<http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/23660>.  

"Dana  Summers."  Wikipedia,  2010.  Web.  <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dana_Summers>.  

"Political  Cartoon."  GoComics.com.  Web.  20  Sep  2010.  

<http://www.jillstanek.com/cartoon%2010-­‐25%20dana%20summers%2010-­‐

23%20gocomics%20fox%20scaring%20obama%20halloween.gif>.