Osama bin Laden cartoon of thank you letter to Pakistan

First Osama bin Laden cartoon

I was in shock for the first couple of days – I guess we all were – but the main question that nagged at me,  was why the sneak attack without Pakistan’s permission, and how could he possibly live there, in a bustling city, for so long, without anyone noticing? I can honestly tell you that I would have been on the phone to my Councilman, Tom LaBonge, within days of that house built and mysterious people moving in. So I did this cartoon right away, because I don’t like lying countries.

On the radio Wayne Resnick pointed out that the US is being very circumspect about both exclaiming that there is something suspicious about the whole thing, and yet on all the Sunday news shows, they denied that they have any evidence that Pakistan knew Osama was living there. Can’t wait til more facts are in on THAT one.

Interpretation of cartoon

Cartoon caption: Found in [Osama's] compound: some pressed violets, a machine gun, an old-fashioned photo of Osama bin Laden, and a thank you letter on creamy thick ecru stationary, reading: Dear Pakistan, I just wanted to thank you for giving me a home the past few years! Thanks for putting me up…and for putting up with me! I know I can be a handful, but you have always been a gracious host. You rock! Sincerely, your friend and America’s enemy, Osama bin Lad...and the note ends there, with some scattered drops of blood. We can only imagine what scenario took place there, and why the note ended so abruptly.

Since we kept hearing how the Osama team didn’t let electronics in the house, I wanted to use an old fashioned setup. Victorians were big on pressed flowers! And maybe Osama had picked some to give to Pakistan with the note. And I used an old-fashioned Kodak snapshot, from the 50′s or 60′s, as his picture.

Thank you notes are out of fashion now, but always appreciated.

Osama home videos

Also, I finally saw the Osama bin Laden home videos. Unlike the dog video, they were lame, as I expected. Time says:

But one video screened by the Pentagon offers a starkly different portrait of the infamous recluse. The seemingly candid video (above) shows Osama bin Laden sitting on the floor of his compound, watching satellite television. He holds the remote in his hand as he flips through the news networks to analyze the media’s coverage of him, a vain action he was said to engage in often…

Who writes this crap? Vain? Try living in Los Angeles, with actors everywhere you go. (but I love ‘em anyway!) And like everyone reading this doesn’t look themselves up in Google or post pictures of themselves in Facebook! Gah!

But it is not bin Laden’s vanity that has surprised so many web viewers, but rather his physical appearance. He appears frail and unkempt, with a beard that’s gray overall.

I’ve read this description in other sources, too. He doesn’t look frail to me, he looks cold. And, surprise, in Mideast countries they sit on the floor a lot, and they wear blankets and shawls all the time. It’s not enough that we killed the man – now the media wants to keep stirring the pot by saying silly slurs.

Image via Wikipedia - Osama is an author! He wrote this book!

The only thing I see wrong in the video is that the plugs are in a weird place on the wall, and the TV is much too small. Get a life.

More cartoons:

1. Obama found a horse head in his bed.

He’s dead, as it turns out. I heard the news oh boy on Wayne Resnick, KFI. I always try to catch him each week, but this time I only listened about half an hour before I realized all the TV stations might run the President’s announcement, too, and so they did.

I’m glad they caught that SOB, but at the same time, I honestly don’t feel glee knowing that the Navy Seals set it up like an assassination. I mean, what do you call it when they target someone in particular and shoot to kill? That’s not war, it’s like illegal capital punishment.

And now we find out all the facts, like hiding behind one of his wives, and his being armed, are false. Some kind of mess there, for sure. Daily Caller talks about some of these conflicting accounts.

My first reaction to the announcement of his assassination, in spite of my personal problems swirling around me now, was to make a joke about it on Facebook, and turns out a lot of people liked it. So I’ve turned it into a cartoon. (cartoon after the break)

Osama cartoon about how his death affects single women - is he good marriage material?

Notes on art: one of the best ways to start experimenting in art is to have something happen by mistake. In this case, I just swooshed a bunch of color on the floor, thinking about the pine floor of a bar. Then I used a purply wound color for the background area. I also colored the TV a pale blue in other versions, but didn’t have time to do it here. (I’m going to try this cartoon out in Psychology Today tomorrow. They’re a rather conservative crowd (not in politics, in humor), so I’m not sure how this cartoon will go over there!)

Cartoon caption: Girls Night Out, with 3 women at a bar. One says, Okay, but let’s be honest, girls. Now there’s also one less available man around. Behind them is a TV with the news of Osama’s death.

Ann Coulter says her dog knows more about Arabs than Obama does. I thought she was going to say, knew more about how Osama died – like dogs have better noses, etc.

Image via Wikipedia- a Navy Seal posing

Speaking of Psychology Today, this writer says when we misspeak and say Obama, when we mean to say Osama, that’s meaningless. I’m not so sure. I’ve been doing it myself, and hear announcers say it, too.  Well, at least no one is talking about his birth certificate this week.

No related posts.

Cover of National Velvet with Liz Taylor

Why did she die at a fairly young age, 79? I looked it up in several sources, and it was congestive heart failure. That can slow you down. As I understand it, your heart becomes this squishy thing, not like a strong muscle, so your blood kind of swishes around, instead of squirting properly all over. Your legs are what the medical profession calls a “second heart.” That is, when you walk, they push the blood back up to your heart that gravity has let fall down to your feet. So, it’s healthy to walk. And not so healthy that she was in a wheelchair the last few years.

Turns out I’ve hardly seen any of her movies. Mostly, I admire her for being outspoken, and for appearing in public without much (any?) plastic surgery. You have no idea how hard it is for older women in Hollywood. Hell, even a good number of the girls on The Bachelor have had things done, even at 25! (although it’s mostly boob jobs.)

My Elizabeth Taylor filmography:

Jane Eyre – I think I saw it. I read the book, great girls book.

National Velvet - Yes, read the book (all the horse books I could find) and saw the movie. There may have been some tears.

Little Women – probably. I saw one version, and liked it a lot. Who was she, Jo? And I read the book several times.

Image via Wikipedia - Elizabeth Taylor taking off her shoe

Ivanhoe – I think I had to see it in high school. But I might be getting it mixed up with the Ivanhoe Reservoir I see every day.

Cleopatra – Yes. I remember thinking she didn’t look that beautiful to me. She and Richard B. had some chemistry, though.

Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? – I hate this play. It was originally a play, then a movie. A married couple battle it out, and they’re not as clever as they think they are, but they sure are mean. It makes you squirm. If you saw the Emmy- nominated episode of The Office where Michael and Jan give a dinner party (the only dinner party) — like that.

A Little Night Music – I love this movie! Saw it as a play, too. It’s kind of like Glee for theater-goers, romantics, and sophisticates.

Cartoon after the jump. 

national velvet horse mourns elizabeth taylor's passing

Not what you expected for Ms Taylor’s eulogy?

Rob Tornoe, a talented cartoonist out of NJ,  posted on Facebook:
Who’s going to draw the first political cartoon of Elizabeth Taylor as Cleopatra being carried to the pearly gates?

Which was funny because so many cartoonists will do/have done that. It looks weird to me to have editorial cartoonists draw heaven, just like gag cartoonists do, but I think death is hard to do well.

Daryl Cagle has several blogs, which is very confusing, but I managed to find his collection of Elizabeth Taylor cartoons. I’m not going to name the cartoonists, because there are 3 or 4 of the most hideous portraits I’ve ever seen there, and 4 have the SAME drawing of just her eyes! Poor Liz. You can make up your own mind whether Gocomics (which has most of the same people) is any better.

Interpretation of Elizabeth Taylor cartoon

Cartoon caption: National Velvet, the horse speaks to us about how he misses Liz Taylor. (title) IF NATIONAL VELVET WAS LIKE MR. ED I m-i-i-s-s L-i-i-z! Elizabeth Taylor, 1932-2011.

National Velvet was one of her first movies, when she was just a teen, so I just went with it. I titled it 2 ways: the one above, and also, IF NATIONAL VELVET COULD TALK. I wasn’t sure if most readers would know about Mr. Ed, an old TV show which is still on TV in syndication, and also spawned some fun comic books.  In any case, Mr. Ed, the name of the horse, only talked with his owner Wilbur, so no one else knew he could talk. From the theme song:

A horse is a horse, of course, of course, And no one can talk to a horse of course. That is, of course, unless the horse, is the famous Mister Ed.

Funny set up, but I can’t remember what else happened! Mr. Ed talked with a loud whinny, of course, so I tried to write his words like that.

And that’s my Liz Taylor take.

My latest cartoon for Psychology Today: How to Write a Personals Ad for Love.

More cartoons:

1. Who set the Angeles Station Forest Fire?
2. Political cartoons for teh LA Times for February 2011.

Just Kidding again! I wanted to see if you were paying attention. So not true. He read the Communist Manifesto and was a Liberal. But lefties can’t get their fingers to stop pointing at Sarah Palin for Every. Single. Event.

Sarah is innocent. Okay, Sarah, you did make one mistake: Don’t draw guns or crosshairs on top of anyone. Also, ever since you started your TV show and proved that hunting is a sport for you, I would never vote for you now. Yes, I’m that against hunting. but I’m hoping you’ll come around on that issue Sarah. Guns, okay, killing animals for fun, not okay.

But the media has gone straight from the shootings, to Sarah as a cause. Amazing how non-logical that is. According to Mediaite:

“However unfair the link is,” said [Geraldo] Rivera, “I think that this event affects Sarah Palin’s at least short term political future.” He then offered his prediction that, tomorrow, Palin’s name will (still) be tied to the media’s flurry of reports on the shooting, facing “criticism and scrutiny” for a perceived link to alleged gunman Jared Loughner.

Newsbusters is not exactly a neutral news organization – they’re a conservative group – but maybe they’re necessary in our liberal media world. They point out this ridiculous politicization of the tragedy, by seeking everything Republican to blame. They had a great tweet from Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas:

who tweeted, “Mission accomplished, Sarah Palin

OMG! Needless to say, now we all know the boy shot them on his own, with no help from anyone else, and no indication that he even knew who Sarah Palin is.

This cartoon took me about 5 hours, I’m embarrassed to say. I had to figure out how to do the jigsaw puzzle thing, what clues to include, etc. I rearranged the puzzle pieces for Slate, to make a more pleasing arrangement for teh nutballs over there.

Cartoon Caption: FIND OUT WHO’S TO BLAME! (for the killing of 6 people with Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson.) You know who (Hitler), Jared Loughlin, Sarah Palin, talk radio, Fox News, Ayn Rand‘s book, We, the Living, a semi-automatic gun, a crosshairs, or an editorial cartoon by D. Barstow or any other cartoonist? Cartoon is cut out in shape of jigsaw puzzle. Oh, and the missing glove is here, too. :)
Other sites:

• Sarah Palin, The Real Victim In Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’ Shooting (queerty.com)
• Barbara Walters Feels Bad For Sarah Palin (thehollywoodgossip.com)

More cartoons:

1. What would Sarah Palin do? What will she do?
2. The vampire and Sarah Palin.

Paul Conrad, whose fiercely confrontational editorial cartoons made him one of the leading political provocateurs of the second half of the 20th century and who helped push the Los Angeles Times to national prominence, has died. He was 86.

“When it comes to editorial cartooning, I am unabashedly biased: Paul Conrad was simply the best ever,” Times Editor Russ Stanton said Saturday.

He was great, that’s for sure. He won an amazing 3 Pulitzers. He was an exceptionally wonderful cartoonist, and I can’t imagine why the liberal loving Times let him go – he never got a venue as good as that again. Of course, Russ Stanton wasn’t editor when Paul Conrad was the cartoonist there, and none have been hired under your watch, Russ. So your experience is like, nil. (Side note: The LA Times is 4th biggest in circulation, but has fewer editorial cartoons than at least the 100 biggest papers in the country!)

Conrad was on Gocomics with me in Editorial cartoons – quite impressive and inspirational to me. I don’t look at the other cartoons all that much, but when I was doing my LA Times cartoons roundups here a few weeks ago he had one that caught my eye:

paul conrad cartoon of Obama as Nixon

I just checked, and Conrad is no longer on Gocomics – I don’t know whether they dropped it when he died, or whether Tribune dropped them, but I believe this is the last cartoon they used of his, so I’m glad I saved it.

Love the inky messiness. I know that’s Nixon’s famous victory? gesture, but I don’t know why Obama is doing it. Maybe it  hooked up to a news item a while ago.

I met Conrad a few times, as we were both in the Impolitic gallery in Santa Monica, CA. I wasn’t doing political cartoons at the time, but of course I knew his work – one of the few editorial cartoonists I ever read, with his bold, yet minimal drawings and wry humor. He was sort of egotistical and not very friendly at the parties; so, not a people person, at least at parties. He always had a crowd around him, however.

Paul Conrad via LA Times via Huntington Library ITVS

Paul at work. He kept drawing even during the parties (which were pretty damn great).

Your work was stand-out, Paul. Good job.

More cartoons:

1. Complete list of all Political Cartoons through 2011!
2. Giving out vaccines for Halloween.