Sunday morning toons: Special "Whine and Cheese" Edition

First the whine; the cheese will come later.

Not surprisingly, the number of political toons this week covering Obama's tour of the Middle East and Europe overwhelmed the number of toons devoted to McCain's feeble campaign events here at home. But don't expect the McCain campaign to add that to its list of things wrong with the world this week. Sadly, yet predictably, even the toon coverage is mainly interested in charting the ups and down of the candidates' relationship to the press--as opposed to what they're actually saying they'd do as president.

But what the hell. Let's get started--by dipping into Daryl Cagle's toon round-up for the week.

p3 Picks of the Week: Mike Lane, John Trever, Jerry Holbert, Patrick Corrigan, Mike Lester, David Fitzsimmons, and Mark Streeter.

And, in a unanimous decision of the judges, the p3 Award for Conspicuous Cynicism While Saying Something Essentially True goes to Daryl Cagle.

Good news: Batocchio published the 31st edition of his Right Wing Cartoon Watch this week. It's not just for the toons--it's the more-patient-than-they-deserve debunking of them that Batocchio provides. Must-read.

Ann Telnaes considers the pain of actually getting what you asked for. (How can we not make Hulk angry when Hulk angry all the time anyway?) Oh, Ann, when will your toony goodness be available to us as embeddable links? (7/28 - link reparied. Thanks, Anonymous.)

Opus shudders at the reality of American justice.

Hey, Boit! C'mere! As the domestic economy geared back up following WWII, "the house of the future" was a recurring meme in pop culture. Here's a minor classic of the genre, "House Hunting Mice," a 1947 Looney Tunes featuring Bertie and Hubie. This is the "cheese" part of today's menu, promised above. Enjoy.

Odds are, you recognized Mel Blanc, the man of a thousand voices, as Hubie--but how about Bertie, the other voice? (Answer: It's Stan Freberg. Readers under 50 might need to go here.) Raymond Scott's "Powerhouse," the musical theme of the cleaning robots, was a Warner Bros. staple, and musical director Carl Stalling reached for it every time he needed to convey the idea of modern technology on the verge of running amok. Ditto with the repair-robot's theme, a well-known bit of Stalling's own "Anxiety Montage," usually called up for images of whirling, fast-moving machines, but not necessarily dangerous ones.*


p3 Bonus Toon artist Jesse Springer is off the radar screens this week (vacation? parachuting behind enemy lines? broken point on the #2?). So let's pull up one from the archives--sorry to say, it works just as well now as it did 18 months ago when it was first published (click image to enlarge):




(*Hat-tip to Jerry and Todd. They know why.)