Visual Rhetoric Summary

The image under consideration is a political cartoon from a conservative newspaper. In the image, EMTs are loading a stretcher into an ambulance labeled "Health Care". This ambulance is nested inside a larger ambulance labeled "Government". Although the image provides very convincing rhetoric without a caption, one of the EMTs is stating that loading the health care ambulance into the government one should "make health care more affordable".

The image can be interpreted on several levels. Obviously, the caption is there to insure that the cartoon argues against the health care reform. The ambulances can be seen as symbolic of injury or brokenness. Under this analysis, the cartoon admits that the current health care system may not be perfect; however, loading it into an even bigger government ambulance (implying an even more broken state), does nothing to help either one.

On a slightly less obvious level, the cartoon examines the health care system in terms of economic cost. The government ambulance is much larger than the health care one. A larger ambulance would require more gas and therefore greater expense to maintain. The way this interpretation is hidden in the broader statement of the image could be the artist's way of showing hidden costs in the current health care proposal.

In summary, the image portrays a small emergency being turned into a larger one. The use of ambulances not only fits the topic at hand, but also symbolically illustrates the costs and cautions of placing health care under government control.