Super Hero, or super villian?

Mirror, Mirror....

So... 'W' says that Iraq is like Vietnam after all... (in a weird sort of way). Well guess what 'Dub? History repeats it self in all kinds of ways...

I juxtaposed Ronnie and Dick just for the fun of it.

The Colonel

Inspired by a report on where Senator Fred's major support would be coming from. I keep trying to improve my printing, especially because veteran cartoonists, experts and editors (like Daryl Cagle) frown on using actual computer fonts that look like cartoonist printing. But I'm still very self conscious of my penmanship. Maybe I need a bolder pen or even a felt tip marker. I guess it's just like how people hate to hear their voice on recordings. Ick.

NOTE: This cartoon didn't run in the PRESS. I don't know what the issue was, room, time, lost the file, or editorial prerogative- but in hind sight I think it may be a little over the edge. Not because it accuses Southerners of being sexist or racist, or because it uses the word "colored," but because cartoons usually accuse politicians of things, this one accuses you the reader. So if you feel accused of liking Fred Thompson because he's a male, white, protestant, conservative- sorry, but do examine your own heart and remember, "walks like a duck, quacks like a duck..."

Stupidity

I was listening to the radio around Aug 27 and I swear I heard a sound byte of Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley saying something to the effect that "you don't just fire someone for being stupid."
The next day I tried to google the quote but all that any newspapers are running is "he did a lot of stupid things," but left out the good stuff.

This was one last chance to take a stab at the now former Attorney General who's been a favorite target of mine. It was the first time I tries to draw Grassley, who has a wonderful, wrinkled, complicated, Iowa farmer kind of face. He reminds me either of Dr. Seuss's Grinch or one of the weird aliens in Jim Hansen and Frank Oz's fantasy sci-fi movie, "the Dark Crystal."
I was proud of this cartoon, but of course, they run a week later so they're old news. Gonzo resigned on a Friday, this was in the news Monday, I drew it Tuesday but that same Tuesday the gay Senator from Idaho soliciting a cop in an airport bathroom eclipsed it in the news. But I guess that won't be news by the time it reaches readers mailboxes two Thursdays later.

Ch-ch-ch-changes...

Well, they finally went and did it. They combined the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and the Schleswig LEADER into their flagship, Mapleton PRESS. I threw this scan up here in case web readers don't know or believe that I'm actually published in a real newspaper.
I hope/think that readers will like the new paper. I like that it's a heafty 14 pages as opposed to 4 or 6. Except that we didn't have color, I think it stacks up pretty good next to about any other weekly or biweekly I've seen.

I have to admit, however, that it's kind of intimidating. For one thing, I went from two newspapers with around 500 subscribers each to one that (before the merger, already) had a circulation of about 2,535 with an estimated readership of around 5,070. I realize that the Denison papers are over 7,000 and the Des Moines Register is in the neighborhood of 302,896, which pales by comparison to papers in Chicago, L.A., D.C., and New York, but it's still intimidating to me.

I'm also intimidated because Mapleton is where my wife works. Now, not only can she be embarrassed by me in front of her relatives and neighbors, but her colleagues, administrators, students and their parents may occasionally say something to her about her obnoxious, over opinionated husband.

I guess this all hit me when I got my copy and opened it up to page 6. Everything was so huge! For years I felt bad because my cartoons were squeezed into a 3.792 inch space atop of a two-column wide column. So now, a full 5.750 inches seems ENORMOUS. And, in what Garrison Keillor would tell us is typical Midwestern/Lutheran fashion- I feel like I don't deserve it. It's so conspicuous that I feel a little guilty. It LOOKS just like a major metro daily. Yikes.

Well, guess like the Country band 'Big and Rich' like to sing, I'm livin' in the big time. Well, okay, so it's still not the big show, this is still the Farm Leagues, but it is probably like going from the B-Leagues to "AA." I sure hope I'm up to this. Hope I can fill the space and prove myself worthy. I just wish I wasn't feeling so scared about just continuing to do what I love doing. Let's face it, it may be a dream to make it big, but basically it's just a hobby.

Not your father's GOP

We have friends visiting us from California this week. One of them has his PhD so it's really intellectually challenging to debate politics with him. He suggested the idea for the above cartoon to me. This will run in the Aug. 30 issue.

Good Riddence

After our back-to-school teacher meetings, I SHOULD have been cleaning my classroom or getting ready for school to start Wednesday, but I was so excited about the great architect leaving, I had to do this one a week early.

Roid Monster

So, first I drew each of the baseball legends. Ruth as a little frumpy and tubby, Aaron as pretty much a nice guy, and Barry -as Bob Costas recently described him, "super-human."
Next, I put them together in PhotoShop and saved it as a TIFF to use in the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and Schleswig LEADER.

Finally, I went back to PhotoShop and added color so that it would be a little more fun on by blog and other webpages. Then I emailed it to my favorite baseball fans. Who no doubt, will chastise me because I used the Atlanta Brave's logo rather than the Milwaukee Brave's logo and I got the Giant's uniform all wrong. But hey, like I said on my column blog, if he played for Oakland, he'd be green like the Incredible Hulk that he is.

Bush #43; Nixon II

Did you know that John Mitchell was the commander of JFK's PT boat group in WWII? Weird coincidence. But hey, Rupert Murdoch supports Hillary Clinton, and Ken Starr's law firm has contributed more to her campaign than to the top 4 Republican candidates combined.

I don't know, maybe this is dull as political cartoons go. I was to lazy to use color this week. I like the smoke from Mitchell's pipe, though. I'm worried that I'm getting in a rut of just doing caricatures with captions. Hopefully my brain will come up with something different next week.

Contempt

Sensational Pseudo-Journalism

Note; It really tans my hide when people whine about the "Liberal Media." Duh, how about the Corporate-tool media, as in NBC=GE, CBS=ViaCom, ABC=Disney. Or how about the COMMERCIAL media, as in selling something and making money- hello? THAT's what all TV news is, selling us exactly what we want- and guess what? "The customer is always right." Oh, except of course, FOX News, which of course is SO fair and SO balanced (and NOT Republican propaganda in any way shape or form at all, NOOO.)

What ever happened to Aaron Brown, anyway?

Sooome pig!

Editorial Cartoon for the July19, 2007 Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and Schleswig Leader.

Another agricultural oddities. You can't ALWAYS have a political point- besides, politics is a little too surreal lately. Besides, E.B White would be proud.

Paris and Scooter

Gulliver's travels

Here is my comic for the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and Schleswig Leader for July 5, 2007

And by the way, here's the sketchbook page that I originally scanned into PhotoShop

Mayorial Mogul

No sooner than I posted this, than I seem to want to draw one about how Dick Cheney is his own rogue nation, since he's neither part of the Executive nor the Legislative branched of government! Man, truth is stranger than political cartoons lately!

The Pupettmaster

Undeclared heavyweights

Wow, these guys were hard to caricature. I'm still worried that my Fred Thompson looks too much like Jack Cafferty on CNN. My Al Gore has come a LONG way- I did a pretty weak one back in January. Gore has my vote, although, between the three of them, I'd most like to have a President Jack Cafferty!

Blood for Oil?

Editorial Cartoon for the May 31, 2007 Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and Schleswig Leader.

Man, this guy burns me! Everyone is angry that the House Dems gave Bush what he wanted on the Iraq Funding bill, but the fact is that part of the pressure they're facing from Republicans is because of this dweeb from Connecticut. If only South Dakota Democrat Tim Johnson would get healed-up and head back to DC.

On the technical side. I spent WAY too much time on this cartoon and I'm afraid that I relied on the "warp" tool in PhotoShop too much, instead of my own caricaturing skills. Be that as it may, I kind of like how it turned out. I think it looks like some REAL professional cartoonist somewhere did it, instead of me.

HillBillies

I'm not a huge Hillary fan, but there is a bizarre affectionate place in my heart for 'ol Bill, so I hope you Republican friends appreciate this one- it wasn't easy for me. My charicatures of them crack me up too. Not a bad Bill, eh?

Ronnie Copies

Yipee- an excuse to get to draw 'ol Ronnie! Long may he haunt political cartoonists!

Learn it in a book

Tim Allen would be proud

Johnny Haircut

Proof for my Republican friends that I CAN criticize Dems too- at least when they do things that are absolutely STUPID like Edwards did. As a liberal, it made me very sad because he really was the only one who was talking about poverty. Such are politicians. Vanity of vanities.

Go Gonzo

The Tantrum

This week, I took so dang long to create my cartoon that I've decided to show you step-by-step what the process is like.First, I drew the President as a little kid throwing a tantrum. This is actually my second try. His face was too fat and the mouth just didn't look. His eyes were open too and frankly, he just looked possessed!
Next, I drew the sandbox. Okay, I'll confess, I pretty much traced some piece of clip art, but I made the shovel bigger and I changed the truck into a tank.
Then, I drew the "Mom & Dad," Speaker Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Ried. I started with him first and was a little worried that he looked too much like former Defense Secretary Rumsfield. In the end, they remind me a lot of Grant Wood's Farmer & daughter in "American Gothic." Of course, he always did- he's just too square to represent Las Vegas. As you can see, I had a little trouble with Madam Speaker's hair. For one thing, she has it fixed different in different photos. I also had some trouble finishing her body. She's a very lovely woman, but being in her sixties, I didn't want to overdo her femininity. I think I probably did over do the mascara and the smile, but maybe that will make my Republican readers happy. I had meant to give her a forced grin like June Cleaver when she's really lost her patience with the Beaver, instead it's bordering on clownish. This is when I pretty much decided to put the parents in the foreground, so I could cut off most of their bodies.
I love how this turned out. I wanted to show a child's scream and I knew that neither my pen or any computer font would do it. I thought about a Sharpie marker, but I decided that that would be too smooth. So, I went with a charcoal pencil. PERFECT.
Believe me, this is about as good as MY handwriting gets.
Oops! I can't believe I forgot to just draw a baloon around that. Oops! I hate how I never remember how to spell "b-a-l-l-o-o-n."

All the King's Men

They're all "bad-eggs." Whew! I think this whole process took almost two hours and was pieced together from four drawings. Would you believe my inspiration was Easter Eggs? With all that's going on between the U.S. Attorney firings, the Plame/Wilson leak, Libby trial, the Congressional battles over an Iraq exit deadline, and now the saber rattling with Iran, the Nixon-esque Humpty Dumpty/All the Presiden't Men analoy seemed appropriate.

What's up, Chuck?

How about that?! I CAN draw a whole cartoon without using photos off of the internet or computer fonts. Not a bad Hagel charicature either, even if I do say so myself- makes me hope he runs and wins, just because I can actually draw him. Last week, I think my Cheny was lousy and my Scooter Libby looked a little like Al Gore. Of course, by the tim ethis runs it will be 2 and a half week old news, but whatchyagonna do?

Bringing down demagogues

This in no way even begins to relay the anger and frustration that I feel toward this administration. I can only pray that cartoons like this are somewhat prophetic. John Conyers said today that he plans on opening hearings on the Libby vertict and hope to bring to light what Cheney did or ordered done in the Plame outing.

But here I am using photos from the web and computer fonts again. Oh well, someday I'll have some skills.

Travis Bickle would be proud

Two nuts practicing brinkmanship. Only WWIII may be at stake.

I had to take a picture with the digital camera since I was snow bound when I drew this ( the scanner I usually use is at school). Hard since I want to try to draw more and college less. I also want to work on improving my handwriting instead of using computer fonts. This may be a quixotic quest anyway, serious professional cartoonists and editors consider this a dying profession. Guess I just can't let the dream die without a fight.

A little religious humor

Monsters of the Middle East

Sometimes you find images that just illustrate your concept better than you could with a drawing- so why not a collage? Juxtapositioning is as meaningful as drawing, and faster.

True colors?

Some of my Republican friends like to give me a hard time because they think I never draw cartoons that pick on Democrats. Well, here ya are. But now to make up for it, I wrote a firey anti-Bush column that week.

Joe's gaff was an editorial cartoonist's DREAM. It was TOO easy to nail him, regardless of party.

In the interest of self-disclosure; I really like Biden. I don't think he could get elected even if he hadn't put his foot in his mouth this way. As much as I like him, I liked Obama more- even before this incident. Biden is smart as a whip and has tons of experience. President Obama would be smart to bring him on board as a foreign policy adviser. That would give weight to all his talk about healing and "one America" too.

Who pulls the strings?

Protect us, PLEASE

One of my New Year's resolutions was to make the editorial cartoons that I do for the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper and the Schleswig Leader lighter. They print darker anyway, so I'm trying to not shade darker than 50% and to use it more sparingly. I think my George W. is getting better, don't you?

I worry that with so many readers over 60, who don't have computers or lots electronics at home, whether the surge protector analogy will even make sense.

I have this goal of being clipped out and hung on peopl'e refrigerators, I'm just afraid that I'll have to do something cute and sweet like Bill Keane's 'Family Circus' for that to happen.

I've gotten several compliments from real right-wingers on my column lately and I just know it's because I haven't been writing about politics.