Barack & The Babe

Bill Gallo's been drawing sports cartoons since long before I started reading the NY Daily News back in the '70s. Taking a crack at politics in the drawing above, his blue-collar sensibilities put America's new president in an unfamiliar, but perfectly appropriate, milieu. In a column sure to enrage disgruntled Republicans who've labeled President Obama 'The Chosen One' or 'The Annointed One', Gallo compares Obama's inheritance of a nation in strife with Babe Ruth's rescue of America's national pastime from the Black Sox Scandal of 1919:

I think of another time when a grand institution was in danger of being destroyed, but these four words ('lots on the ball') -- and one man -- saved it, and the game has flourished ever since.
I refer to the game of baseball -- which, in 1919, went through its most dire days because of dishonesty, greed and stupidity.
You, Mr. President, who I understand to be an ardent sports fan, know what I'm about to recall. But I bring it up once again because it's germane to this message of change and saving a troubled America.
Today even a non-baseball fan can tell you something about what shame occurred when the supposedly most honest sport in the country deliberately and without conscience, threw a World Series for money.
{... snip ...}
Was anybody going to trust this once-pure game ever again? Of course not! Baseball was forever tainted! Who, if anyone, could possibly patch up all the broken pieces? Was there such a person in this country to do it? There was. And he came into the picture just in time to not only cure baseball, but to change it. As if sent from heaven, along came a burly, confident young man named George Herman Ruth.
The Babe came on the scene to change baseball from a singles game to the more exciting and appealing home run game. While Ruth was starting as a pitcher and sometimes outfielder for the Boston Red Sox, his esteem as a player was looming larger and larger. By the time he came to the Yankees in 1920, Ruth would sell out any ballpark.
The Sultan of Swat, with his prowess on the field and his happy and ever-popular personality, was capturing the fans. And without realizing it, Babe was also winning back the fans' trust.
One man saved a wonderful American game that desperately needed saving through change and honest indulgence. I use this as just one example to show how, in our country, there is always someone who comes along at the opportune time.
President Obama, America has faith in you, and even for the little we know you, we don't see you ever letting us down. Our view of you from television is that of an intelligent individual who is honest to the core, and one who can deliver the goods.