The Unpresidential Library / Editorial cartoons / October 18, 2026
Look Who’s Been Left UNSUPERVISED* This Week!
The adults were unavailable. The receipts were not.
By Clayton Hollingsworth · Reporting window: October 12–18
Editorial satire. The receipts are reporting; the commentary and AI-generated cartoons are satire. The illustrated scenes are invented metaphors.
This week, the Department of Missing Adult Supervision discovers three approaches to an inconvenient response: assign blame before the result, scold the audience, or consider building an entirely different store. The suggestion box has been moved somewhere management cannot reach it. The supervisor’s chair remains available to anyone willing to read the room.
The result is pending. The excuse has shipped. AI-generated satire. View full cartoon ↗
01 / The Texas connection
Donald Trump Blame. Delivered early.
The supervision desk
Election Day is November 3. The excuse has already cleared shipping.
There is something almost impressive about preparing the accountability paperwork before the voters have finished their part. Most organizations wait for the project to fail before discovering that responsibility belongs to somebody outside the project team. Here, the blame department is ahead of schedule.
Cornyn has not endorsed Paxton. That is a real disagreement. It is not a time machine that tells us why an election nobody has yet lost was lost.
If only every public service arrived with the speed and certainty of a prewritten explanation for somebody else’s fault.
Supervision order: Wait for the result before engraving the scapegoat’s nameplate.
Live audiences do not come with a mute button. AI-generated satire. View full cartoon ↗
02 / Further evidence
Andy Harris Town hall. Silent mode.
The supervision desk
A debate is an awkward place to discover that the audience has its own audio settings.
Yes, speakers should be allowed to finish. But turning a question about fuel into a confrontation over manners is an expensive detour. The price on the pump remains unchanged while everyone attends an unscheduled etiquette seminar.
There may be an argument worth hearing about refining capacity. It would probably travel farther without a personal dispute riding shotgun.
The Department recommends remembering that a live audience is not a malfunctioning television. The mute button is not included.
Supervision order: Finish the explanation without appointing yourself principal of the room.
Have you tried turning the shopping cart off and on again? AI-generated satire. View full cartoon ↗
03 / Further evidence
Elon Musk Cart blocked. Build a mall.
The supervision desk
Some people encounter a checkout problem and try another store. Others begin mentally zoning a rival commercial district.
The escalation is magnificent: one shopping cart meets resistance, and suddenly the proposed troubleshooting step involves warehouses.
A competitor might be a serious idea someday. For now, it is an unusually large item to add to a to-do list because the robot could not finish the errands.
Supervision order: Try customer support before sketching the loading docks.
