Political cartoons: David Low:
Colonel Blimp on security and freedom
Gad, sir, Lord Beatty is right. We must build a bigger navy than the enemy will build when he hears we are building a bigger navy than he's building.
Gad, sir, Mr MacDonald is right. We must protect Liberty by taking away Liberty to take Liberty to take away Liberty to take Liberty—Dammit!
David Low first drew his Colonel Blimp character in 1934, a year after Hitler's rise to power. Blimp is a stereotypical jingoistic British military man living in his own vision of a Britain which was still fighting the first World War.
Low was reported to have developed the character after he overheard two army officers in a Turkish bath demanding that cavalry officers should be allowed to wear their spurs inside their new tanks.
All Low's Colonel Blimp cartoons are set in a Turkish bath. In these two, Blimp expresses opinions typical of him just before World War II. Looking at them today, one might be forgiven for thinking that nothing much has changed in the past eighty years.
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Caricatures and cartoons: 3. Political cartoons
Victorian Turkish Baths: their origin, development, and gradual decline
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