chandra levy trial cartoon by mike lester

Caption: Jury convicts Ingmar Guandique, illegal immigrant and MS-13 gang member, of murdering Chandra Levy.

Mike Lester has a super-casual style, quite the opposite of old time editorial cartoons! This take on the Chandra Levy trial is a pretty straightforward idea, but I included it because I agreed with it. :) For one thing, I love trials and murders, and the Opinion pages rarely cover them. More importantly, this cartoon is about the media, which totally ignores important details in stories they cover, if they think it might “taint” the piece.

I remember when I first moved to Los Angeles, I was confused when the LA Times never reported the complete story about criminals or crimes. Was it an illegal alien or gang who did the deed? Wasn’t that, alone, enough to arrest someone? Never! Even when they were indicted, important info about the bad people was kept out of the papers. Mike points out here that Ingmar Guandique, the killer was indeed here illegally (and was already guilty of other crimes).

Chandra lost her life, Gary Condit lost his career. Yet the media, by and large, lets criminals keep their secrets and whitewashes the facts.

obama care cartoon by eric allie

Caption of Obama and Nancy Pelosi looking at Obamacare: We should have spent more time on the birth announcement.

I laughed out loud at this cartoon by Eric Allie on Obamacare! Something about the octopus in the baby carriage…He includes recognizable sketches of Obama and Pelosi staring at their little darling, too! There’s an Uncle Sam running in the corner, a rather tired old symbol, but his bug eyes and running legs are amusing. (Secret PS: I admire Eric for not drawing all 8 legs on the octopus (sorry, no link now, explained below), as I did. He’s carefree!)

dangerous north korea cartoon by paresh nath - naval exercise

Caption: The US and South Korea circle around the shark of North Korea with a big stick.

Let’s get serious, now, less fluff and more danger. And another Uncle Sam, but he carries a big stick, like certain states.

I don’t know if South Korea is really bff with the US, but certainly North Korea is on its own. South Korea wants a strong Navy, and that makes North Korea skittish. Very clever use of Kim Jong Il’s strange pouffy hair as a shark fin! Paresh titles this cartoon Naval Exercise, but I would call it every other country’s idea of America as surfer dudes on water skis.

Most political cartoonists, especially overseas ones, don’t use straight dialogue, and so they’re sometimes forced to add labels. The labels in this cartoon are unobtrusive and clear, and they don’t detract from the amusing and striking drawing, so good enough. I like the monarch floating in the water, too. Will a big stick work to keep him underwater?

Thanks to Cagle Cartoons for all good work from these guys!

My own recent cartoons:

In case you missed it, my DADT cartoon was picked as one of the best cartoons of the year for Slate. (Sorry, no link now. Uclick Gocomics threw away 2 years of my cartoons on Slate, Gocomics and Yahoo News when they kicked me out.)

don't ask don't tell cartoon

Okay, so it’s the last one in the list. Whatever, right?!

I also did this snazzy cartoon on Miss Sarah Palin. (Sorry, no link now. Uclick Gocomics threw away 2 years of my cartoons on Slate, Gocomics and Yahoo News when they kicked me out.)

cartoon of liberals making fun of sarah palin

It has 28 comments so far on Gocomics. (Sorry, no link now. Uclick Gocomics threw away 2 years of my cartoons on Slate, Gocomics and Yahoo News when they kicked me out.)

Related article on examiner.com:

• Cartoons on Obamacare, the media, and North Korea’s dangerous games. (examiner.com)

More cartoons:

1. Who doesn’t hate AIG?
2. Yahoo! News Editorial Cartoon on food stamps.

9-11 Photographer Unknown.

Famous Falling Man photo from 9/11. Apparently the photographer made several photos of this man, one of which shows him aiming straight down, like an arrow.

I’m not sure if this is the same photograph sequence that Esquire talks about, although it’s obviously a tall man.  Esquire gets a little dramatic talking about what the AP photographer, Richard Drew, had in mind with his photos, but this still gives me chills:

They jumped to escape the smoke and the fire; they jumped when the ceilings fell and the floors collapsed; they jumped just to breathe once more before they died.

More cartoons:

1. 9/11 Cartoon in 2009.
2. What Barack Obama could learn from Balloon Boy Dad.

2nd amendment cartoon on the 4th of July

They’re not legal in Philadelphia, either, but they have them in the Amish counties! Yup, Dwight Schrute territory. Right next to the special quilt fabrics and needles.

The writing on the corner is a soupcon of Outsider Art. What crazy people and others do – lots of word and writing to get the idea across.

That little boy looks so happy.

More on gun control to come, of course.

Cartoon caption: Amendment 2a: The right to bear sparklers. Happy 4th to our troops.

More cartoons:

1. Tofu for Thanksgiving cartoon, not necessarily vegan.
2. My first Sarah Palin cartoon, gun included.

soldier's grave and ipad cartoon

This cartoon cracked me up, but I am dark, so dark.

I don’t know who gets my cartoons, really. I’m just grateful that most editors do. But my editor at Slate didn’t put this really interesting drawing, with toned colors and mood and a really funny joke, on the front page! Astounding! Also, annoying.

Yes, I know Memorial Day is to honor downed military. But not everyone gets the gravity, especially young people.  The fact that the delayed health care plan may have killed this guy… and that getting his new iPad was equally as important (and it’s purple, which seems to be allowed at Apple)… This is Saturday Night Live humor, at least in my eyes.

Caption for blind Google: Gramps, thanks for protecting our country…I’m sorry Obama didn’t get the health bill done in t ime for you…and I finally got that iPad I wanted… JACK SHEPHERD, SOLDIER, LOST, HUSBAND and Here lies Politico.

Have a peaceful, honorable, and, yes, funny Memorial Day.

Also, I’m kind of behind in doing my LA Times editorial roundup, but look for one tomorrow.

More cartoons:

1. Ink spill cartoons for the LA Times for May, 2010.
2. 9/11 Cartoon in 2009.

I missed the 60 Minutes interview the LA Times is talking about here. (Is that show still on the air?)

Discussing in strikingly personal terms his order to escalate the war in Afghanistan, President Obama said Sunday that sending 30,000 new combat troops was the hardest decision of his presidency so far.

Can you understand now why I get so annoyed with the Times? WTH, “strikingly personal”??? Because he said he felt bad talking to the cadets? Geez, what a revelation.

First go round of this cartoon concept.

It goes on:

Critics have said his plan is confusing and contradictory because although it calls for the new deployment, it also sets a July 2011 date to start withdrawing troops.

I don’t know about contradictory, but I’ve found that the best way to broadcast your intentions, leak your war plans, and help out the enemy is to put the details on Twitter, Mr. President.

(another version of the cartoon is after the jump)

CNN says:

In his speech Tuesday, Obama said his strategy had three objectives:

• Deny al Qaeda a safe haven

• Reverse the Taliban’s momentum and deny it the ability to overthrow Afghanistan’s government

• Strengthen Afghanistan’s security forces and government

I hope it works out that way. This is a DayPlanner type strategy, isn’t it.

Does this cartoon make more sense? This is the one up on Slate now, but I think I prefer the first one.

Cartoon caption: RAW MEAT. One way to make military decisions. OR Is this the sign that made Obama order 30,000 more troops?

This seemed like such an obvious cartoon idea to me that I had to rush to draw it right away, for fear some other cartoonist would have the same idea, and beat me to it!! This happens to me a lot. As it turns out, other cartoonists don’t seem to think the way I do. There have been a couple of times when I suspected they copied me – will write about this in the future.

But for this event, I’m the only cartoonist who decided that word games was the obvious corollary to declaring war! Yes, RAW on the truck in big red letters transposed easily in Obama’s office, as he sat contemplating in the Oval Office, to WAR. And as war often has casualties :(, that leaves…dead meat, or raw meat laying on the battlefield.

What is really really strange about this is that after I had written, drawn and posted it on Slate, someone pointed out that meat spelled backwards was almost team; ie, which made it read (backwards) War Team.

I didn’t even think about this, but this happens a lot with cartoons, or my cartoons. Like alchemists turning lead into gold, you have the idea, add the drawing, and then things happen. If you’re lucky.

More cartoons:

1. Turn in your red meat! Guns are okay, too.
2. I’m going to the Royal Wedding in a pumpkin.

Since I just started doing op-ed cartoons in February for Slate, I wasn’t sure how to approach this holiday, and what type of editorial cartoon would be respectful yet also cheerful! What do vets do? I don’t know any, except my father. Surely not all of them are decrepit, as so often they are drawn in cartoons. I hate parades. Do I draw another cemetery? I don’t even know what clothes they wear.

Fortunately, Daryl Cagle, who owns and operates Cagle Cartoons, put up a slew of cartoons about Veterans Day last week, so I could at least see what guys had done in past years. Here’s what I decided: better alive than dead, and they wear green with a lot of medals. (fallen soldiers is more Memorial Day.)

The war dog was my own idea, too. Here’s more on War Dogs. (It’s a very messy and unorganized site, but I guess dogs are like that, too. It’s the woof that counts.)

The cartoon: What all Vets want to hear most: GOOD JOB!

I added the colored frame to the 2nd version, and also a star to the dog’s chest belt, to prove he was in the military, too. I couldn’t find any examples of what real military dogs wear, but hope this gives him creds. (He’s also wearing veteran dog tags, but they’re hard to see.)

Happy Veterans Day to all brave men, women, and dogs!

More cartoons:

1. Making raw meat into Obama’s War Team.
2. The Cartoonist Who Cried Wolves! Wolves!

tasers as torture cartoon, 5th amendment cartoon

Nancy Pelosi seems so far away now, doesn’t she? There was a story that didn’t last long. Or tptb buried it! Yet it was just last month…

I’m sure she did know about the CIA tortures in Guantanamo Bay. Politico says she did. She was probably only given a few details, and didn’t quite understand it: no one is proud of torture, even, or maybe especially, the armed services. Many decision-makers just believe it has to be done. I’ve read that it’s not an efficient way to get confessions,  but I’m quite sure I would squeal about anything in the world after about 1 minute of it. Maybe less.

News reports say only 3 of the Gitmo detainees were actually waterboarded, which everyone agrees is the worst kind of torture. One of these guys claimed responsibility for beheading Daniel Pearl – and nothing is more heinous than beheading someone, in my kingdom. But US News & World Report says:

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the mastermind of 9/11, has claimed responsibility for beheading Pearl, but it recently came to light that the al Qaeda operative was waterboarded more than 180 times in 30 days. This has left some of Pearl’s colleagues skeptical of the confession.

Um, me, too, now.   This is certainly going overboard. Who’s telling the truth?

I’ve written before that I hate torture more than murder. Still, I do think that as a LAST RESORT it MIGHT be necessary to save many many more lives. Just seems like common telephone marketers and “people persons” like bomb squad talkers, could do a better job at getting people to talk, doesn’t it?

But let’s jump to our legal torture, Tasers. Police in the US have been using Tasers for what, 8 years? Reading the news, it appears that most, if not all major cities use it. Electrocuting our own people. I remember the first (and only, thank God) time I saw it, on the news, when California Highway Patrol used it to subdue one of those very dangerous people, freeway joyriders, who drive at 40 mph on the freeway, helicopters circling, until they run out of gas. When I saw the officer (using that word loosely) shoot the driver, and saw his body twitching and convulsing for a good minute, obviously in excruciating pain, I burst into tears, and immediately called the LAPD to complain.

Some police have been tasered themselves, as a way for the department to inure themselves to the violence they were about to affect on others. They describe it as unbelievable, excruciating pain that first makes you rigid, as all muscles contract and then release, over and over.

When my first book was published I had a couple of headaches that were nerve based, from my neck, and sent me to the emergency room. It felt like an electric cattle prod is applied to your spine and I screamed and wept because of the jabbing pain. I’m sure the taser pain is much worse, but most of the time, no one remembers it.  They black out because of it, but observers can see them writhe and scream. Short-term memory loss – how convenient for the Taser company.

But beyond pain, how about DYING? Amnesty International has been keeping track of Taser deaths, but I see many more just reading the LA Times than they actually count at AI. In fact, I’ve been cutting out articles for a folder on this, and it’s quite full. People die frequently from getting Tasered. By our own police, to us.

This is a rather gentle cartoon, about a horrifying torture device. The Taser Company itself has a quaint explanation of how they got the name:

The name stems from an acronym created by the original inventor of TASER technology, John H. “Jack” Cover, former chief scientist of North American Aerospace’s Apollo Moon Landing Program. Jack’s favorite book character is Tom Swift of the Tom Swift Series, authored by Victor Appleton in 1910-1941. One of the books, TOM SWIFT AND HIS ELECTRIC RIFLE, inspired Jack to create the acronym TASER.

They have a picture on the home page of a mom and child who will buy one together, all family-like. That sounds like a winning combination.

Youtube of 72 year old grandmother being tasered. USA Today has an article from 2004 that says Seattle police used Tasers 500 times that year. CREEPY.  The UN Committee Against Torture condemns Tasers as being torture.

So do I.

More cartoons:

1. The 405 shuts down, but we gain our lives.
2. The cop who ordered green ice cream.

"So...the Navy will continue to use sonar, but we can pick any beach in the world. To die on." ©D.Barstow

I first read about this last fall. From the Christian Science Monitor:

In a 6-3 ruling on Wednesday, the high court criticized a federal judge in California for imposing restrictions that the majority justices said jeopardized national security in an effort to protect the environment.

MFA sonars send intense pulses of noise through the water that can disrupt or injure marine mammals nearby. Scientists say it can trigger fatal mass strandings under certain circumstances.

Joel Reynolds, a senior NRDC attorney, said the high court left in place undisputed portions of the federal judge’s order concerning Navy training. As a result, the Navy must continue to abide by a 12-mile coastal buffer zone and must continue to avoid the Catalina Basin, an area with a high concentration of marine mammals.

Check out this killer whale video to actually see whales in Puget Sound reacting to Navy sonar.  Umm, how much proof are they waiting for?

Well, that’s the point, isn’t it. The Navy has the proof, they’re just making a judgment call (no puns, thanks.) that they have to keep making the same sonar sounds over and over, like 3 year olds playing with their toys.   I’ve noticed some scientists are like this, too, unfortunately; they base science on a hypothesis, with a provable result, and then spend years doing the SAME tests over and over. That sounds like a video game to me.

Anyway, I see very few editorial cartoons about natural history or science or even technology, and I don’t know why. Do they know something I don’t? Maybe. So I do some, because the world outside of the White House is important, too, but I space them out!  Cbc news agrees with me, and reports on 3 dolphins trapped in ice that locals rescued.

However, human activity that causes a lot of underwater noise might also play a role when the animals are near the edge of the ice, Murison said.

“They may panic and end up in an area where the ice can close in on them,” she said.

The article says more than 40 whales are beached in Nova Scotia each year.  Australia has had more than 400 whales beached this year, although they did save some. From timesonline:

Mark Simmonds, of the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society and an expert on cetacean strandings, said that two species coming ashore together was enough to arouse suspicions of a human factor, including the use of sonar by the military.

When I did this cartoon a week ago, 55 whales had just been stranded in South Africa. They didn’t try to save these whales, like most civilized countries; they just shot them. Even though this is a rather simple cartoon in theory, I still had to do research on what whales look like! Real whales don’t look anything like cartoon whales, as it turns out, but I also didn’t want them to look like dolphins. I hope I made my point anyway.

*An update in the opinion page of the Monitor by a real whale guy: he asserts that sonar has been proved to directly kill whales. Sad.

More cartoons:

1. Farewell to Lost cartoon.
2. Have you ever tried to wipe oil off your soul?