Sunday, October 24, 2010

Sunday morning toons: Everyday Italian

Today's selections have been lovingly hand-picked from the week's political cartoon pages at Slate, Time, About.com, and -- as always -- Daryl Cagle's political cartoon index at MSNBC.com.

Diverti!

p3 Picks of the Week: Mike Luckovich, Jimmy Margulies, Jerry Holbert, Steve Sack, Stewart Carlson, Rob Rogers, Chan Lowe, Bob Englehart, Tom Toles, and R. J. Matson.

p3 Best in Show" Pat Bagley.

p3 James Montgomery (Defend Your) Flagg Award: Bob Englehart.

p3 World Toon Review: Patrick Chappatte (Switzerland), Stephane Peray (Thailand), Bleilbel (Lebanon), and Cam Cardow (Canada).


Ann Telnaes reviews the fundamentals of speech.


Mark Fiore puzzles out the trappings of gayness -- featuring a fabulous tank!


Hey, Rocky -- watch me pull an obituary out of my hat! The creator of Rocky and Bullwinkle -- and not who you're thinking of -- died last week at age 90. The story of why Alexander Anderson didn't get credit at the time (and rarely does today, even among toonophiles) and Jay Ward and Bill Scott did isn't pretty, but it's a sadly familiar. (Also, there's a quick mention in the article of a dark secret behind Mr. Peabody and Sherman). Loyal R&B fans will spot a howler committed by the author -- the traditional rival of Bullwinkle's alma mater Wassamatta U. is not "Heckwith U," which was a two-second sight gag from Season 1; it's the watchmakers' school known as Tick Tock Tech. Does Time Magazine simply not bother with fact-checking anymore?


Tom Tomorrow revisits one of the sad truths of our age: If you believe in the Easter Bunny, you're a child, but if you believe in an invisible hand that guides our economy for the best, you're a Chicago economist.


Keith Knight wishes you a scary Halloween.


At Red Meat, it's a Karen and Milkman Dan smackdown.


The fine line between "homage" and "theft:" Occasionally the Sunday Morning Toons awards the p3 Certificate of Harmonic Toon Convergence to artists who produced very similar cartoons that week. Nothing nefarious there; it's usually the result of some combination of deadline pressures, the occasional tendency to go a little too quickly for the obvious joke (e.g., the rescue of the Chilean miners suggesting others who need rescuing), and bad freakin' luck. But sometimes something more severe happens, and people start brandishing the P-word. Comic Riffs talks about what happens when things escalate beyond the claim of Eerie Coincidence -- in this case, with South Park.


Everyday Italian, Part 1: And here's a Comics Riff two-fer: In a move reminiscent of Reagan's 1984 re-election campaign unwisely thinking "Born in the USA" would be a pretty keen theme song, the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano has opined that Homer Simpson is Catholic. Unfortunately, I quit reading L'Osservatore years ago, when they dropped Fr. Guido Sarducci's gossip column, and my Italian fluency has suffered.


You saw it here before it (completely) went viral: Here's Virginia Thomas' 7.30am phone message to Anita Hill from last week, as imagined by Taiwan's Next Media.


And here's Barry Blitt's illustration for this week's Frank Rich NYTimes column, "What Happened to Change We Can Believe In?"


Portland homeboy Jack Ohman identifies the subtext of last week's Oregon political high-level meet-up.


Everyday Italian, Part 2: "Coniglio" means "Wabbit." Somehow, having "Rabbitson Crusoe" (directed by Friz Freleng in 1956) dubbed into Italian loses nothing, and in fact makes the match routine even funnier.




p3 Bonus Toon: Jesse Springer included this tee-up for this week's cartoon:


In 1990, former basketball player and gubernatorial hopeful Chris Dudley missed 13 consecutive free throws, setting an NBA record. In 1989, he set the record for most free throws missed in a single trip to the foul line, missing five consecutive free throws after the opposing team committed three lane violations.

News Item: Oregon Republicans are excited about their chances of electing their first republican governor since 1978.




Test your toon-captioning chops at The New Yorker's weekly caption-the-cartoon contest. (Rules here.)

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