Hot Spots Posts

Last week someone emailed me complaining that I “explained” my cartoons. Let’s call him “Chris.”

Well, my main issue is that not only do I often not understand them, it’s that you often admit in the commentary below your cartoons that you have grave doubts that your audience will understand them. I think there was one in which you said you didn’t even get it yourself. Other times, you go to great lengths to explain the cartoon and why you think it’s funny. Chris

ESL cartoon English as a Second Language

Another man wrote me to complain about the cartoon above. (We’ll call him Anthony, since his name is Anthony.)

I saw this cartoon and decided immediately that you are out of touch with reality.  For you information, even school districts in Kentucky, (not known as a bastion of education reform) require all students in high school to take Spanish as a second language. It’s obvious from your cartoon your are a RACIST AND BIGOT!

Spanish is spoken by thirty four million Americans in the U.S. and that number is growing. Only right wing, Bible thumping school districts, like those in Texas, would not teach the fastest growing second language in the U.S.!

A little education for you, since it’s apparent you failed your ESL!

Spanish was the language spoken by the first permanent European settlers in North America. It was brought to the territory of what is the contemporary U.S. in 1513 by Ponce de León. In 1565, the Spaniards, by way of Juan Ponce de Leon, founded St. Augustine, Florida, the oldest, continuously occupied European settlement in the continental U.S. …

Your Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh mentality is apparent!

Chris, meet Anthony.

California, here I am Freedom Cartoons

Will BP PLC do anything they promised? We’ll see. I wish they’d save the money they spend on their TV ads, and spend it by helping clean up their mess, but that ship has already sailed. Losers.

Nothing funny about this environmental and financial disaster, but cartoonists have a way of pointing their pens towards BP’s negligence in a way that the newspapers and sources have only begun to do the last month or so. News sites were so neutral before, it was disgusting! That’s not reporting, that’s siding with the enemy! I think cartoonists are more honest.

The great eight

daryl cagle at cagle.com
daryl cagle oil spill at the dance cartoon, at cagle.com

I was really impressed by Daryl Cagle‘s cartoon of Obama dancing with the devil BP (who looks rather like a Smurf. And is that a Snidely Whiplash mustache on Obama?) I’ve seen dancing steps before, but not in oil!

Side note: I wonder if Daryl is a fan of Dancing with the Stars…:)

Green Cartoons

Freedom Cartoons Notable Holidays

It’s a beautiful new week for cartoons! This roundup for the LA Times is for cartoons published the second week of June, 2010.

Since I’m editor here, I shan’t go into my personal  stuff – like my car accident, dealing with 2 insurance companies, aftereffects of the accident, a new problem in the car, which wouldn’t start, and now is in the shop for a possible VERY expensive bill, which may or may not be connected to the accident, my dentist as a result of the accident, and the fact that malware infected my computer for 4 days, and completely disabled my internet connection as well as my Task Manager, which I finally eradicated through an antivirus program with the regrettable name of SuperAntiSpyware Free Edition. But at least it worked. Most of the others wouldn’t.

All is calm today, anyway, so I hurried to the new cartoons to see what had happened this week while I was missing! (I explain how and why I do this roundup over here.)

hagen cartoon on nuclear disarmament from gocomics.com
hagen cartoon on nuclear disarmament from gocomics.com

This cartoon by Hagen from gocomics.com,  made me laugh out loud! Mr. Hagen, from Norway,  might not be interested in partisanship, but this is EXACTLY how I view Democrats 99% of the time! Tossing off a loud reproof in the general direction of a problem and not doing a thing about it.  The chasm separating the Dems from taking action is astounding.

I love Obama’s little squat here as he tries to speak a little louder, to get his point across. The man on the other side is holding a nuclear weapon. Who is that guy? Is it just Iran? I don’t know, and so I declare right this moment that I won’t do a cartoon on nuclear bombs until I figure out who this important person is. 

LA Times Editorial Cartoons

Who ya going to vote for in the California Primary?

I thought everyone could use some help on this. I’ve been doing cartoons on California and the upcoming elections for almost 6 months now for CalWatchdog, this extraordinary journalism site for a think tank in Northern California, but haven’t posted many of them here yet. It’s time.

demon sheep campaign by
demon sheep campaign by Carly Fiorina vs Tom Campbell

Okay, now this was  a pretty impressive campaign move. This Youtube on Tom Campbell as a demon sheep – or is it all other Republicans in general are sheep? – by Republican Carly Fiorina is classic Hollywood, and it went viral in days! Gather calls it “the most bizarre political ad ever.” And oddly enough, the makers of this video, just set up their own website 2 days ago, calling this a trilogy!

I think Fiorina’s…exaggerating. Plus, it’s not my voting dealie, so no comment on that election. More cartoons below.

California, here I am Green Cartoons Pick a Political Party!

I had a rough week, so sorry about that. Could this be why I couldn’t find any funny cartoons for the third week of May?! Maybe! I did find some clever ones, however, and clever is a close cousin to funny.

Of course, the PB oil spill continues to be the biggest story around. In one way, I’m happy about that, but before you label me an oil-hugger, let me explain that it’s because environmental issues, or green, as the kids call them, are almost always B or C stories in the news. Just blips most of the time. And now everyone is seeing what a terrible natural disaster (MANMADE, you BP asshats) does to the whole world.

Also, this is a great issue for cartoonists to dive into. Yes, it took an oil spill tragedy to get cartoonists to STOP dwelling on Sarah Palin. You forgot about sniping on her for a while, didn’t you, guys? SNAP.

Speaking of, I’ll do another oil cartoon roundup later this week, as there are a couple of great cartoons on that, but will focus on other news with this LA Times editorial cartoons selection.

nate beeler  on incumbents from politicalcartoons.com
nate beeler on incumbents from politicalcartoons.com

I thought I knew what incumbents are – those people already in office- but wondered why there were a number of cartoons about them recently. Ask and ye shall receive. Half hour ago from the LA Times:

Discontent with incumbents and anti-Washington anger are adding up to a potentially record-breaking crowd of congressional challengers this election year.

More than 2,300 people are running for the House and Senate in the midterms, the highest number in at least 35 years…

Like Senator Specter was tossed out on his heinie. Well, there aren’t any dramatic incumbents in California, but I think LA needs to think about other cultures, like the East Coast, more. Like this homeless man. He’s very rude, which is natural back there. Nobody in LA would ever talk like this, nor would they throw food. ( I thought this was a general wearing medals at first, but now I see that it’s fruit on his suit.) However, we’ve all worked on or visited a movie set, so we get the pandering part.

International cartoons LA Times Editorial Cartoons