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7 Superhero Analogues of Past and Present Political Figures


By Mo Fathelbab

It was recently rumored that Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack Obama would make a campaign stop at this year?s Comic-Con in San Diego. And with this now famous photo….
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….it?s hard for us to not think he might fancy superheroes. Heck, he might even fancy himself a comic book superhero in general, or even Superman in specific. So far, he?s tried to make his case by withstanding the dark powers of Clintonite (a hard to resist pun?not like you never thought of it). If Obama can be Superman, what superheroes/supervillains can other American political figures pass for?

1) Thomas Jefferson and Iron Man
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Both Jefferson and Stark invented cool things (the swivel chair and Iron Man suits, respectively), had to battle enemies, external (Great Britain, Mandarin) and internal (a tendency to sleep with female slaves, alcoholism), and had to rail in friends who went off into the deep end (Aaron Burr, James Rhodes). Ultimately, they both became treasured American heroes.

2) John Adams and Professor X
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Both Adams and Xavier were bald, intellectuals (Adams was a lawyer while Professor X is…. a professor) who saw both sides of their external struggles (U.S.-British, mutant-human) yet believed firmly in their cases. Adams, though, wore a powdered wig. Made him look like an ugly fat girl, which is why Paul Giamatti is playing him in the new HBO miniseries.

3) Andrew Jackson and Magneto
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Jackson, like Magneto, was a strong-willed, polarizing figure with a devoted following for their sometimes heroic stands (Magneto: attacking anti-mutant humans, Jackson: The Battle of New Orleans in 1814). They also believed in the misguided superiority of their own race of people (Magneto: mutants, Jackson: White people). Signing The Indian Removal Law which lead to the forced ?re-location? of Native Americans from their lands in the Southeast to ?Indian Territory? in present-day Oklahoma, goes down as a dark blotch in American history.

4) Harriet Tubman and Barbara Gordon/Batgirl
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Tubman is the epitome of female empowerment not only because she fought hard to abolish slavery but because she also took up the cause of women?s suffrage in the turn of the 20th Century ? dealing with two civil rights issues in one lifetime. And she did it despite suffering from temporal lobe epilepsy – which started after a slave owner hit her over the head with two-pound weight – that left her debilitated on many occasions up till her death in 1913. Though is hard to compare real-world heroics to that of fantasy, the Barbara Gordon character (as Batgirl) would go on to be an advocate for equal pay in the 1970?s and, after being paralyzed by the Joker in ?The Killing Joke?, an inspiration for the disabled by becoming Oracle.

5) John F. Kennedy and Hellboy
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Both were spawns of demons?Joseph Kennedy was an anti-Semitic Nazi sympathizer with ties to Joe McCarthy, who also had his daughter Rose Marie lobotomized because she wasn?t on par with the rest of the Kennedy clan, while Hellboy’s pappy is a devil? but they used their powers to help others. They both also indulged in their own vices: Hellboy chomps on cigars while Kennedy chomped on Marilyn Monroe.

6) Hillary Clinton and She-Hulk
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Both Clinton and Shulkie are established in their own rights despite being related to more famous men (Hillary?s husband is, of course, Bill, while Walters is Bruce Banner?s cousin). They?re both attorneys. And they both mean well but you wouldn?t like to see them when they?re angry?like trying to take over the world, or beating them in a highly contested presidential primary.

7) Dick Cheney and Galactus
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This one?s a gimmie: They are both devourers of worlds.