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. Mark E. Kelly, your wife called.
2. What would Sarah Palin do? What will she do?

TV is my crack – at least certain shows, but this summer, only three are on my list. :( But DWTS starts up soon, so here goes!

Sorry, no Sarah cartoon today, but I found this on Facebook – the best dancing dog video I’ve ever seen. Look at his tail wagging the whole time! It brought tears to my eyes!

And Television Without Pity is my favorite place to play. So, anyway, lots of guessing about who the pros and who the stars will be each season, and last week it was rumored that Bristol Palin will be one of the “stars”!

Now, we all know she isn’t a star. At all. I think it’s terrible she wasn’t using birth control, and I do believe in abortion, which I know disappoints some conservative readers, but there you go. She’s just a kid.

But how fun would it be to see lovely Sarah each week in the audience, however long Bristol can be voted to stay in?! Ooh, I just found that I made a joke about Sarah and Obama on Dancing with the Stars back in 2008. How prescient am I?!

From a commenter at TWOP:

Bristol Palin would be a dealkiller for me. The message would be: get knocked up as a teenager and have a fundie lunatic for a mother and you too can be on Dancing with the Stars. Apparently ABC wants to give Sarah Palin free publicity because you know that every show will include at least 5 shots of her sitting in the front row.

No thanks.

—————-

I have nothing against Bristol, it’s better than if we end up with some Jersey Shore moron. And Sarah tends to stick to FOX News since they gave her that fat contract, so we may not see her as much as you think.

———————

I thought it was tough to watch Heather Mills, I thought it was tough to watch Tom Delay. Kate Gosselin almost did me in. I’m sure Bristol is a nice person but…maybe I should take this season off.

I liked Heather Mills and Tom Delay, and even Kate! So this might be a good season for me!

Other stars rumored to be on the show, according to Daily Kos:

A friend at ABC Entertainment informs me that Bernadine Dohrn, professor and former Weather Underground militant, is among contestants soon to be announced for “Dancing with the Stars.”

Along with Dohrn, the newly added contestants include:

Chris Kattan, comic actor
Nastia Liukin, Olympic Gold Medal gymnast
Ron Gettelfinger, former union president

They join the “stars” announced earlier:

Bristol Palin
David Hasselhoff
Brandy, R&B singer
Audrina Partridge of “The Hills”
Mike “The Situation” Sorrentino

Politico reports it, too. But I don’t believe the rest of this list at all. ABC keeps the cast under tight wraps, and always lists fake ones each year! The leaks this year are coming mostly from Twitter – actors and dancers cannot keep their mouths shut. (Who didn’t know that?)

Other rumors:

I’m not sure how credible Star magazine is, but according to them, Audrina, Jennifer Grey and Florence Henderson are signed up for this season.

Michael Bolton & Kym
Rick Fox & Edyta
Mike “The Situation” & Cheryl
Kurt Warner & Cheslie
David Hasselhoff & Karina
Troy Aikmen (or whatever male star) & Lacey

Bristol Palin & Mark
Brandy & Maks (just don’t give my girl Alec lol)
Margret Cho & Louis
Florence Henderson & Derek (one can hope right lol)
Jennifer Grey & Tony
Audrina Patridge & Alec

There will be a Press Conference! tonight on Bachelor Pad about the cast, so stay tuned!

More cartoons:

1. Dancing With the Stars leeches off of The Bachelor. Thanks, ABC.
2. Debating candidates for Dancing with the Stars cartoon.

I see Top of the Ticket in the LA Times just reviewed Going Rogue: An American Life. No, not really! Instead, Andrew Malcolm just quoted from a review in the WaPo written by Ana Marie Cox, the original Wonkette from Gawker.

One thing is clear: No one can say today with any certainty what lies ahead in national politics for the hockey mom and Todd’s biggest snow-machine racer fan.

Now, one minor disclaimer: We haven’t actually read Palin’s new book. Not one single page. We have a copy. We intend to read it. And we imagine it’s fairly entertaining, perhaps revealing, as self-serving inside political stories go. We may even autograph it to ourselves from her.

Also, hopefully, it’s short on exclamation marks!!!

But after reading the Washington Post’s review of “Going Rogue” the other day and the reviewer’s candid confession that she hadn’t really had time to finish the book that she was writing so authoritatively about, we realized this is the latest thing in U.S. society and journalism.

Why bother reading any of it? Just talk about it.

Well, if I get a review copy – and I don’t know why I would, although that would be swell – I’ll review it here! Go, Sarah, Go!

Meanwhile, let’s see if it turns up in Oprah’s Book Club…

To set up the drawing, I wanted to pay homage to a wonderful painting of Soul or Spirit touching man, when their fingers almost touch, but I can’t find the name of it or a photo of it! I saw it in the Huntington, I think. Does anyone know the name of that painting?

Instead I found this, The Creation of Man by Michelangelo, a fresco in the Sistine Chapel. Okay, Oprah as G-d! I love it! And at the last minute I tossed her book in, as if she was playing booksie with Oprah. I think there is some great strong tension in this cartoon. Happy.

Photo of Michelangelo borrowed from here.

Cartoon caption: If Oprah can shake hands with Sarah Palin…why can’t we find peace in the Middle East?

More cartoons:

1. The vampire and Sarah Palin.
2. Do pregnant women have sex?

Sarah, I’ll never forget you! Everyone knows Sarah Palin dropped out of her cool Governor job in Alaska to be… well, so far, an author -with her first book. Whoa, it gets released on November 17, but it’s on sale now for only 9 bucks! Is that good or bad?

I want to support her, really, but dropping out at this stage of the game was a mistake. I know, she didn’t “drop” the GOP, but Going Rogue? maybe in other things, but not this. What does she think will happen, after her book? Books are fun, as I know from my own, but it’s not like you feel like you’ve made it afterwards. What’s next? Well, when I looked this up on Google, I find a blog with that title! What’s next Sarah? (with no comma). It says:

Sarah Palin is going to be on Oprah publicizing her book “Going Rogue” on November 17, 2009. Check your local t.v. listing.

Okay, then!

Cartoon caption: “Sorry! I was going to go as Sarah Palin Sarah Palin Sash And Glasses Halloween Costume Kit, but I decided to drop the party, and write a book, instead.”

As you can see, I’m still perfecting my skill with the horizon fade, which I still forget the name of. I only used it once this time. I’ve been leaving my people’s skin all white, no flesh color this week – just seems right for Halloween, more ghost (or corpse)- like.

I was going to make the cat all black, but that’s very difficult, because then you can’t see the face at all. The real expert in drawing black cats is the cartoonist for Kit N Carlyle, Larry Wright, who is also a very talented editorial cartoonist. I wish he had a website! I found a book, Kit ‘N’ Carlyle, but it’s over $250!

The other colors just dropped in very nicely.

There’s always a story behind the gag, and I do feel kind of bad for her Significant Other, who’s all dressed up on his lonesome, as a vampire! Look, he even had to put a frilly shirt on! Do you think he’ll still go to the party? I think yes, and he’ll persuade her to go, too. She just started to identify too much with the character of Sarah Palin. It’s Hollywood, it happens.

More cartoons:

1. Halloween party for liberals who worry.
2. Sarah Palin drops in on Oprah. But leave Oprah’s Book Club out of this.

"Let's role play. You be Sarah, and I'll be the big, bad, moose." Copyright D.Barstow

Ahhh, I tried. But Wordless Wednesday isn’t for me. I’m a cartoonist, and we believe a picture is worth a 1,000 words, so long as we write some of those words.

I wrote this as a New Yorker style cartoon. Okay, it’s sex play, role play. Do you have a problem with that? I suppose I could have used it in Slate, but this was before I started in there. And there really is a big difference between New Yorker cartoons and political cartoons.

New Yorker cartoons are more selfish and self-centered. And, um, as has become obvious to me in Gocomics, readers of the New Yorker might not be as smart as they think, but they do understand parallel universes.

More cartoons:

1. Lysistrata is about withholding sex for peace.
2. Men like to talk about sex.

"What will Sarah do?" woman wears tshirt ©D.Barstow 2009

As promised. Two different versions. (Another cartoon after the jump!)

The hate and mockery continue against Sarah Palin, of course. Found this link on Salon by Camille Paglia from the impressive and productive Andrew Breitbart:

In a way, this is part of her virtues — her complete freedom from routine micromanagement and business as usual. She does her own thing with seat-of-the-pants gusto. It’s why she remains hugely popular with the Republican grass-roots base — as I know from listening to talk radio…

Whether Palin has a national future or not will depend on her willingness to hit the books at some point and absorb more information about international history and politics than she has needed to know in her role as governor. She also needs a shrewder, cooler take on the mainstream media, with its preening bullies, cackling witches, twisted cynics and pompous windbags…

I wrote this in response to a cartoon by Gary Varvel, that Daryl Cagle linked to on Facebook:

She absolutely is hated, mocked, despised, everywhere. For what?? She didn’t cheat on a spouse, hurt anyone, throw billions in bailouts into the wind, etc. (Hate her environmental tude, though.)

Daryl said it’s the first cartoon he’s seen that takes Palin’s side.  Um, what about…me? (disclosure: I know Daryl well, great guy, but am not in his cadre of good cartoonists. By choice.)

I liked this cartoon so much I had to do it twice! This 2nd version is a stronger graphic, and doesn’t have the distraction of the t-shirt the guy has on: We did it – from the Obama campaign, of course. Obviously – or, I hope it is obviously – this is a takeoff on What Would Jesus Do?

Woman wearing t-shirt in city: What Will Sarah Do? ©D.Barstow

More cartoons:

1. The vampire and Sarah Palin.
2. My first Sarah Palin cartoon, gun included.

(To be honest, I didn’t remember Michael Jacksn’s Thriller and the claw hands, didn’t know what the lean was until I saw the cutest boy in the world (Derek Hough) do it and post it on Twitter, so then I had to look it up, and found that BoingBoing had an explanation of how Jackson did it in his performances, and it’s taken almost a week for me to learn that Jesus Juice  was a term he invented. (I think it means wine, right?))

But Sarah…That was the season when I actually paid attention to the campaigns and elections, and she was electrifyingly real. In character, and a character. Mesmerizing, even in, or especially in, her most humiliating moments. And I always thought she was beautiful, and I loved her voice.

The Governor's New Clothes - Sarah Palin ©D.Barstow2008 All rights reserved. I drew this in fall 2008, when the ridiculous clothes scandal came down. She never spent too much - have you priced men's suits??

Oh, did I forget to add that she was a cartoonist’s dream girl? A poster girl, a pin-up girl for cartoonists. (Okay, maybe especially for bloggers.) I did this for Slate, but it didn’t run until after the election, so not many people saw it. And she won’t be Governor for much longer, so time, people, time. I’m working on a new cartoon for Monday, so check back!  

She’s not dead, and I have to stop talking about her in the past tense. BUT…what is going to happen to her now? Did she ruin any possibilities for running as President in 2012, as many pundits and analysts have said?

Top of the Ticket is the LA Times biggest blog, and they made some guesses:

Professionals watching a withdrawal like this conventionally and immediately wonder, what bad news don’t we know about her that’s about to come out? Is there some scandal, indictment or personal revelation that would cause her to step down even before its announcement? Friday, especially a pre-holiday Friday, is usually a time to announce what you don’t want heard much…

What she’s decided to do, as a former championship basketball player who sees the bipartisan opposition has gained momentum, is take a timeout, get out of the line of fire awhile, write her lucrative book, take care of her children, blog and travel a lot without the responsibilities of elective office. Free her family from scrutiny.

Everyone’s just guessing. But it’s fun to guess! A mystery for the 4th of July.

Robin Abcarian in TOT quotes political analyst Michael Carey:

“I think it’s irresponsible for her to quit as governor,” said Carey. “It’s not like she’s infirm or in poor health.”

Agree with this, but she does have a kid with Down’s syndrome, and her other kids keep getting into trouble. We don’t have the facts yet.

One thing I’m sure of: from the violent, vindictive hate talk  and scorn I see all over the internet, twitter and even Facebook, sexism is alive and thriving in politics, STILL. Sarah Palin can do no good in these spewings, even when she steps down. It was so rampant and obvious when Hillary Clinton came close to getting nominated as President that I actually felt scared at peoples’ (mostly men, though not all) diatribes. I mean, she’s not exactly a rabble-rouser; it was unreasonable hatred towards her, not just political attitudes. Sarah is more kooky than many politicians, somewhat uneducated, and of course, vulnerable.

The last is the scary part. I wish her all the best.

More cartoons:

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

"Has this ever happened to you? "You look slutty. And did you gain weight, or are you pregnant? Why are you so upset? I was JUST KIDDING." ©D.Barstow 2009

No, really, has this ever happened to you? I know it has. David Letterman is a naturally funny funnyman, and I used to watch him religiously. Not sure when I stopped, but haven’t seen him in a long while. (I watch Jimmy Kimmel instead, but sometimes he’s just stupid or gross.)  Anyway, Letterman does have good writers and good Top 10 lists, but it was really really inappropriate to have him include a joke about Arod (Alex Rodriguez) and one of Sarah Palin’s daughters!    Who cares whether it’s the 14 year old or the already kid-out-of-wedlock 18 year old mother – to get knocked up suggests something horrible for a teenager when a 33 year old man is involved; she’s either been seduced, raped, or is a Lolita herself. Worse, she’s now preggers and in a pickle that will change (ruin) her entire life.

On the other hand, his comment about Sarah Palin looking like a slutty stewardess is funny to me because of the alliteration, and the fact that her hair and sometimes clothes have that fifties feeling of Come Fly with Me… But I’m surprised his writers picked that up.  And of course that’s also insulting, but she is a public figure, and a grownup.

It was his first attempt at explanation: I WAS JUST KIDDING! that got to me.  I think men say that too much. On the other hand, I don’t think he had to apologize formally to her. A simple, sorry, I’m a dumbass comedian, would have been fine.

The Cartoon I redrew/rewrote this slightly, to change “mad” to “upset”. She’s obviously crying. What a crass man her significant other is! Obviously, I’m exaggerating the situation for the cartoon, but I think a significant amount of women have had one of these comments hurled at her at one time or another. Even if the comments weren’t this mean, I have heard “I was JUST KIDDING!” way too often in my short life!

I don’t think you’ll ever see a cartoon like this in the mainstream papers. Sigh. It’s topical, it’s newsworthy, it’s true, and I hope it’s a little bit funny. Great colors, too. On the other hand, I had been asking Uclick (who supplies the cartoons for Slate) to please put a category in Slate for Entertainment. Not just in Los Angeles, the biz is a big business, newsworthy in every sense of the word, and one of my favorite topics. So they finally did with this cartoon, so go Hollywood, kids! (they only have 7 cartoons in there so far, as it’s new starting last week.)

More cartoons:

1. My first Sarah Palin cartoon, gun included.
2. California is the place you ought to be – maybe.

"Add hair of Sarah, eyerolls of McCain, wool of Obama, and Biden's slip of the tongue...and we get a pretty tasty election!" © D. Barstow, 2008

I hope you don’t have to know Macbeth to understand this cartoon; just a rudimentary knowledge of witches is helpful, however. They do like to cook, they have unusual spices, and they’re passionate.

Plus, they like to stir up trouble for this election! You go, girls.

The Drawing
This is a rough. The lettering for the caption was so bad I had to re-caption it in my Wacom, with a decent font. I also gave it a quick wash. You know, I just love this energy! Sometimes the first time is good enough.

Calling all illustrators and cartoonists, if you know how to keep the freshness and energy of a rough, while doing the finish, please share! We all wish roughs could be finals.

So Happy Halloween, everyone, and don’t forget to vote with your mouth this Halloween! Or happy All Saints Day, depending when you read this. Still, have a happy mouth.

More cartoons:

1. Debating candidates for Dancing with the Stars cartoon.
2. I need to frequent more bars.

I’ve never done any editorial cartoons before. (My father used to suggest that if I did them, I would be a “real” cartoonist,  but fortunately – I think it wasn’t until he held my first book in his hands – that mantra has stopped, or at least slowed down. Well, here I am, Dad!)

I don’t know any cartoonists who mix the genres, actually; you’re either funny or serious, and I always choose funny! (Plus, what about those arrows and signs and symbols and nametags and scrawling ink splotches all over everything in editorial drawings? Kind of messy.)

Sarah Palin as a child with gun in hand. "They're not toys, they're trophies."

I have certainly made my opinions known about Los Angeles political figures in my Los Angeles blog, but I’ve never thought of cartooning as my favorite way to prove anything. Words are faster.  So no LA cartoons…but national politics are easier to find the humor in, I find!

This current campaign season certainly has the drama, and so I’m ready to dive right in and try something out of my comfort zone! (Plus I always like the challenge of studying something new to make fun of.)

One of the caveats of this project was: Don’t try out for a Pulitzer, please.

Speak for yourself, sir. Aim high. I have a few ideas simmering, but I thought I’d present this one here, as an example of how to rework, work it, baby.

The Drawing
Hope you can read the caption: Sarah Palin as a child with gun: “They’re not toys, they’re trophies.”

This is my first try at lettering with my Wacom tablet and pen, and boy is it hard – my hand has been cramping up.  (Any suggestions, cowboy cartoonists?) But the Wacom is much easier to color with, for sure. Doing text with a tablet pen is hard because the work space on the tablet is a different proportion than the screen or real paper.

But I do like young, innocent Sarah!

More cartoons:

1. David Letterman has a secret crush on Sarah Palin.
2. What would Sarah Palin do? What will she do?