In the 10 or so years that I’ve been doing this comic, I’ve mocked a wide variety of politicians. Many of them, sadly, are already long forgotten. Here’s a refresher on some of the faces you’ll see in the archive.

Part I, Canadians — Part II, Americans — Part III, Foreigners

CANADIANS:

STEPHEN HARPER, prime minister of Canada 2006— A longtime conservative activist, Harper was picked to lead Canada’s right-wing Reform Alliance Party in 2002, replacing Stockwell Day. He then proceeded to initiate a merger with Canada’s other conservative party, and became supreme leader of the new super party, creatively titled the Conservative Party of Canada. In 2006 Harper rode a wave of popular discontent with the ruling Liberals and defeated incumbent PM Paul Martin to become Canada’s 27th prime minister. Though Harper faces a lot of criticism for being “too right-wing for Canada,” he hasn’t actually done a whole lot in office.

MICHAEL “Iggy” IGNATIEFF, Liberal Party leader 2008— Micheal Ignatieff (pronounced Ig-natty-eff) was a big important professor at Harvard before he moved back to Canada to become leader of the Liberal Party. Iggy’s considered fairly conservative by Liberal Party standards, and was appointed leader largely as a moderate alternative to Stephane Dion, who came before him. He has yet to go up against Prime Minister Harper in a general election, however. Like any new guy, it remains to be seen how effective a leader he will end up being. It’s not entirely clear what his defining message intends to be, other than “Harper sucks.”

STEPHANE DION, Liberal Party leader 2006-2008 Stephane (pronounced Stay-fan, not Stephanie) was a law professor who was chosen to lead the Liberal Party of Canada after Paul Martin resigned in defeat. His big thing was the environment, which he wanted to save, and a “carbon tax” which he wanted to implement to help save it. This was not a popular idea, and Dion failed to defeat Prime Minister Harper in the 2008 general election. He then proceeded to launch a weird sort of coup-ish thing a few months later, and tried to get the Governor General to fire Harper, but that didn’t work either. Having failed at everything, Dion was forced out in shame, and Michael Ignatieff replaced him.

PAUL MARTIN, prime minister of Canada 2003-2006 Paul was a wealthy steamship line CEO who wound up serving as finance minister in the administration of Prime Minister Chretien. He was considerably more conservative than the PM, and advocated various spending cuts tax breaks and other things to get Canada’s finances in order. For helping steer Canada from an era of deficits and debt to an era of record surpluses, he earned great praise from the finance scene, and became the most popular politician in Canada. In the early 2000s, much of Canadian politics was dominated by Martin’s efforts to force Chretien to resign, so he could rule Canada unopposed. This finally happened in 2003, but Martin proved to be a fairly lackluster prime minister once in office, and had no real idea of what to do with himself. He lost his 2006 bid for re-election to Stephen Harper.

Jack Layton, NDP leader 2003 — Layton was a city counsellor in Toronto before being chosen as leader of the social-democratic NDP, or “New Democratic Party” in 2003. Like all NDP leaders, Layton has been a loud, left-wing critic of both the Liberals and Conservatives and has tried his best to benefit in typical third-party fashion. During the Martin years, the Liberal Party only held a plurality of seats in the Canadian parliament, which gave Layton, as leader of the swing faction, a lot of power over the government’s agenda — or so he imagined. Having led his party through three federal elections, Layton has proved himself to be a somewhat successful party boss, and has increased NDP standings in parliament from 13 to 37.

Gilles Duceppe, leader of the Bloc Quebecois 1997 — Gilles Duceppe (pronounced by English-Canadians as Jills Doo-cep) is the second and fourth leader of the Bloc Quebcois party, and the longest-serving party leader in contemporary Canada. He’s led his party through five federal elections and may very well serve forever, for all we know. Duceppe’s party is part of the French-Canadian separatist movement in Quebec, which favors independence for the French-speaking province. This is a vaguely treasonous idea, so mainstream English politicians like to denounce him as a wicked and hateful guy. He is very popular in Quebec, however, and the Bloc Quebecois party continues to win the majority of Quebec seats in the Canadian parliament year after year after year.

JEAN CHRETIEN, prime minister of Canada 1993-2003 Chretien served as prime minister of Canada for ten long years, having successfully ended an equally lengthy reign of Conservative rule in the 1993 election. With the assistance of Paul Martin, his government helped steer Canada’s economy from the brink of collapse, and into an era of great peace and prosperity. He won re-election twice, for a total of three terms, and soon saw himself as one of the great juggernauts of Canadian political history. Chretien was quite crooked and schemey in his own way, of course. He was a master of parliamentary tricks and gimmicks, and consolidated ever-greater power in his own office. He learned a lot of this during his long tenure as a cabinet minister in the government of the great Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau. Chretien’s third term was dominated mostly by infighting with the Paul Martin-supporting faction of the Liberal caucus, and rumors of an elaborate money-laundering scandal in the province of Quebec. He stepped down for the good of his party in 2003.

STOCKWELL DAY, leader of the Alliance Party 2000-2001 Poor Stockwell Day was a bit of a flash in the pan, as you can see from his dates. The 1993 election saw the dissolution of the Progressive Conservative Party into two factions, one moderate, one farther right. Stockwell was the leader of the right-wing faction from 2000 to 2001, and as Alliance leader served as head of the second-largest party in the Canadian parliament. He was young and charismatic, but had a sort of goofy style, and was widely mocked for being an outspoken evangelical Christian. After losing the 2000 federal election to Prime Minister Chretien, many Alliance people demanded Day resign his leadership position. Day refused to do so for a very long time, creating this big protracted crisis. Eventually he did step down, and Stephen Harper became Alliance leader, and later prime minister. Stockwell Day is still around, however, and serves as minister of something-or-other in the Harper cabinet.

AMERICANS:

BARACK OBAMA, president of the United States 2009— Barack is the first non-white President of the United States, which is considered a very big deal in race-obsessed America. By historical standards, he’s also one of the most novice politicians to assume the presidency, having served less than a single term in the US Senate prior to his election. The upbeat Obama was elected at a time of massive political disillusion in the United States, spawned by the disastrous presidency of George W. Bush. He promised lots of “hope” and “change” but it remains to be seen how successful he will be. To date, the President’s greatest successes have been the passage of massive health care reform and a variety of stimulus plans to resuscitate the lagging American economy. He also won a Nobel Peace Prize.

GEORGE W. BUSH, president of the United States 2001-2009 The former governor of Texas and the son of President George H.W. Bush, Bush Jr. became president following one of the closet races in American history. That election badly split the country, and polarized opinion dominated his two terms. The Bush presidency was largely dominated by the so-called “War on Terror,” which was initiated when Bush invaded Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks. He later invaded Iraq as well, for far more hazily-defined reasons. The Iraq war in particular became increasingly unpopular as the years went on, as did the President’s efforts to limit civil liberties for security reasons. Then the economy tanked in 2008, and Bush’s reputation as an awful president was pretty much solidified. Naive and impulsive, but also instinctive and thoughtful, the best he can probably hope for at this point is that history will deem him a “complicated” president.

JOHN KERRY, Democratic presidential candidate 2004 Kerry, the second US senator from Massachusetts, ran against President Bush in the 2004 presidential election. If people elected him, he said, America would be “stronger at home” and “respected abroad” or something along those lines. He promised to end Bush’s war in Iraq, and make Europeans like the United States again. And other stuff. Before he became a politician, Kerry was a distinguished soldier in the Vietnam War, and won three purple, heart-shaped medals. He later became an outspoken critic of the war, which was controversial because soldiers are not supposed to have opinions. After he lost the 2004 election, Kerry went back to the Senate, where he serves to this day.

DICK CHENEY, Vice president of the United States 2001-2009 Cheney served as Secretary of Defense under the first President Bush, where he was known for his hawkish administration of the first Gulf War. Tapped as George W. Bush’s running mate in the 2000 presidential election, he quickly became characterized as a sort of substitute father-figure for the politically naive commander-in-chief. During his eight years in office, Cheney tended to embrace the most extreme solutions to domestic security problems, having supposedly been radicalized by 9-11. He was a huge proponent of the 2003 Iraq War, and had he been president, there would have probably been wars with about another dozen countries, too. Though not a terribly old man, Cheney has been plagued by continual heart problems, many of which he experienced while in office.

JOHN McCAIN, Republican presidential candidate 2008 A moderate Republican by contemporary standards, McCain, an elderly senator from Arizona, first ran for president against George W. Bush in the 2000 GOP primary. He quietly minded his own business for the next eight years, then ran again in 2008, this time clinching his party’s nomination. Though supposedly the ideal “sort” of Republican for a national ticket, McCain’s age and awkward charms never could quite compete with the youth and natural charisma of Barack Obama. He lost the presidency once again, and returned to the Senate. McCain’s most lasting legacy may very well be Sarah Palin, his unconventional running mate who ended up eclipsing what little star power the Senator had left.

FOREIGNERS:

SADDAM HUSSEIN, President of Iraq 1979-2003 One of the most horrific dictators of the 20th Century, Saddam ascended to the presidency of Iraq on a wave of purges and killings. Once in power, his reign was marked by almost constant war. In 1980 his regime invaded Iran, triggering an eight-year conflict between the two countries, then in 1991 he invaded the small oil-rich nation of Kuwait, promoting the intervention of American and UN forces. After the attacks of September 11, Hussein was declared one of America’s primary enemies by the George W. Bush administration, for his supposed links to organized terror and “weapons of mass destruction.” In 2003 American and British forces invaded Iraq and overthrew Saddam. The new Iraqi government put him on trial for war crimes, and in 2006 he was executed.

VLADIMIR PUTIN, ruler of Russia 2000— Putin served as head of the post-Soviet KGB for a number of years before being appointed prime minister of Russia by President Boris Yeltsin in 1999. When Yeltsin resigned the following year, Putin became president automatically, and moved quickly to consolidate his power. In contrast to his predecessor, Putin has moved Russia back towards an authoritarian model of government, with tighter limits on press freedom and elections that are not quite so free and fair. His government has also sought to meddle more actively in the affairs of Russia’s neighbors, and ensure Moscow-friendly regimes are not threatened — with force if necessary.

OSAMA BIN LADEN, leader of al-Qaeda 1988— Born to wealth and status in Saudi Arabia, Bin Laden emerged as the black sheep of his influential family. Embracing an extremist, highly radical vein of Islam, as a young man he traveled the world supporting various “holy wars” against so-called “infidel” armies and governments. In 1988 he founded the radical terrorist network al-Qaeda, dedicated to the destruction of the non-Islamic world through epic acts of indiscriminate violence. After successfully orchestrating several smaller attacks, in 2001 Bin Laden came to worldwide attention when al-Qaeda successfully blew up the World Trade Centers in New York City. He remains the most wanted man in the world, though 10 years later, it doesn’t seem the world is any closer to tracking him down.