The drawings of war

After painstaking deliberation, deep thought and much eraser gnawing (cynics might say dithering), every cartoonist in the free world weighed in on the Afghanistan war escalation last week. But it’s one thing to draw up a plan, quite another to execute it. Pat Oliphant delivered a spectacularly expansive and daunting mountainous quagmire-scape. Steve Sack’s grim reaper counted down to an arbitrary flag-draped deadline. And Adam Zyglis re-raised a wartime classic, planting the president’s buildup banner on some pretty shaky ground.

-- Joel Pett

Joel Pett is the Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist for the Lexington Herald-Leader in Kentucky. His cartoons also appear in USA Today.