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Trump and the Swamp

Donald Trump promised to “drain the swamp” in Washington, implying that he would be bringing new faces into the administration that were not “politics as usual.” So far, Trump’s picks look like standard politicians Republican fare, straight from the swamp.

Swamp
I love the look of the Creature from the Black Lagoon. Swamp Thing? Not so much.

There have also been reports about Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, nixing choices that are close to New Jersey Governor, Chris Christie, who put Kushner’s father in jail back when Christie was a prosecutor.

I was thinking of the typical swamp cabinet candidate and I thought of the “Swamp Thing” – but when I looked, I realized that what I really had in mind was the “Creature from the Black Lagoon” which has a classic 1950’s B-movie look. The Swamp Thing just didn’t make the cut. That’s the Creature from the Black Lagoon in the photo at the right. And my cartoon is below.

I think the cartoonists will find their Trump-sea-legs soon. If not, we’re in for four (or eight) years of lousy Trump-Monster cartoons – that is, Trump as the monster, which has grown tiresome. One bright spot is Jared Kushner and Trump’s kids, who look like they will be cartoon characters on my palette in coming years. They are wonderful characters!

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Democrat Guernica

There is horror and anguish in the ranks of the Democratic Party these days. Pablo Picasso’s Guernica is probably the best known visual icon for horror and anguish.

Here’s a detail …

democratguernicadetail

Eight years ago I drew a similar cartoon when Democrats won the presidency and congress – to the horror of Republicans.

I’ve had the GOP version up as the top image on my Facebook page for years, And I’ve gotten lots of complaints about it, usually from very literal conservatives who write things like, “Guernica is about the Spanish civil war – it has nothing to do with Republicans!” I also got lots of criticism from conservatives who wanted to point out that I’m not as good an artist as Pablo Picasso. Here’s an image of the real “Guernica.”

guernica750

This David Fitzsimmons oldie about George W. Bush painting Iraq is a nice one.

fitzsimmons-guernica

Worldwide cartoonists like to use flags in their cartoons – the problem is that the American audience doesn’t know their flags. Here’s our Greek cartoonist, Michael Kountouris drawing a combination of the Syrian flag and Guernica.

Here’s my Cuban cartoonist friend in Mexico, Angel Boligan, with Violence in Video Games …

Here’s another nice one from Boligan, simply titled, “Insurance.”

boligan2-guernica

Gotta love Guernica.

 

 

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Ceiling of Support – and Rembrandt

With election day two days away, as pools tighten up, it still looks like Donald Trump is bumping his head on a hard ceiling of support. I suppose this cartoon could be a post-mortem to run on Wednesday, after Hillary wins. I expect to get a blast of cartoons predicting the outcome for newspaper who need a quick option when the election results come in on Tuesday night; some cartoonists will surely draw different versions of different outcomes – I’m working on that now.

This cartoon is inspired by another cartoon I drew some years ago about the debt ceiling, with a Republican elephant. (I like pogo sticks.)

Debt ceilings, ceilings of support – those darn ceilings keep coming back to bite Republicans.

Here’s another oldie that I updated in anticipation of Hillary winning the election. I drew this one in 2012 about the “Republican Autopsy” after Mitt Romney’s defeat. I draw just like Rembrandt, huh?  Things don’t change much.

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E-mail Ouch!

FBI Director Comey threw an ugly curveball at Hillary last week when he re-opened the investigation into her e-mails. I love to draw people throwing ugly curveballs.

Yes, I know I should have done a live-stream video of this one. I’ve been taking a bit of a cold-infused vacation from my video regimen. I’ll start up again soon. Really.

I drew another cartoon about the Russians and Wikileaks that I didn’t color because the Comey investigation news came out as I was starting to color the cartoon; I thought the new story drowned Wikileaks out. Here’s my Russian general that, I would guess, few readers will see.

 

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Trump Accepting the Election Results

After the third debate, the media has been agog about Trump’s refusal to say that he will accept the results of the election. I suppose the threat is that an angry army of Trumpettes across America will indignantly raise more trouble than usual.

I put together a show of Statue of Liberty cartoons for the cartoonists convention in St Just le Martel, France a couple of weeks ago. Liberty represents our acceptance of immigrants along with our general values, our constitution and our patriotic vision of a good, law abiding America – and sometimes she delivers bitter bites. Gotta love Liberty.

Hey, sorry, I didn’t do a video of this one. I’ve had a cold, and nobody wants to see me sniffling, sneezing and coughing my way through a video. I’ll start again soon. Really.

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Trump’s Stinky Quote

I was away at the cartoonists convention in France when Trump’s Access Hollywood tape came out. It always happens that when I’m away I really want to draw a cartoon! So, excuse this one being late, but it is still what everyone is talking about.

Does this fart-face cartoon look familiar? Remember my entry in Iran’s Holocaust Cartoon Contest a while back?

I liked this cartoon, and those darn Iranian folks didn’t choose to include it in their exhibition, so there weren’t many people who saw it – the perfect excuse to dust off this classic for Donald Trump!

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Presidential Debate Garbage

I’ve been hearing a lot about how Hillary Clinton won the first presidential debate, but it seemed to me that there was plenty of garbage and spin from each candidate, so I drew this …

I could call it “trash talking.” I live tweeted during the debate and got a lot of response on Twitter (@dcagle). I should do that more often. Maybe next time.

I notice that the stage at the debate was the same stage they used for presidential debates years ago. I suppose it packs up nicely and keeps well in storage. I don’t see much reason for that strange eagle logo, but I wanted to put them on the right stage so that the only change was their garbage can lecterns. I don’t usually do cartoons with dark backgrounds. Maybe I’m in a rut.

We didn’t see much of them on the stage. Almost all of the debate took place on a split screen, which adjusted for Donald Trump’s height advantage. I understand that the taller candidate almost always wins the election. Also, the zoomed closer on Hillary to make her head bigger and they turned down the color saturation on Trump, to make him look less orange. I love stagecraft.

Everyone is talking about the bait Hillary used to lure Trump into traps, and how Trump jumped to take the bait each time. I suppose that is interesting, but it struck me that this debate didn’t change many minds – fans of each candidate likely thought their own candidate won and I didn’t see anything new – just the same old garbage.

Want to see me drawing this cartoon in real time? Check it out below …

And watch me color the cartoon in the next video …

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Swing-State Twister!

Here are Trump and Hillary playing swing-state Twister. I thought this would be a good one to send out the day before the first, big presidential debate.

Yes, i left out the yellow row on the Twister board – it was getting too complex.

This cartoon is a reworking of another Twister cartoon that I drew back in 2008 with Obama and Romney. It is interesting that the sing states were also the story in 2008, and the states haven’t changes much, except that now we add Pennsylvania and Georgia to the mix. When I drew the older cartoon I was thinking of both candidates being skinny – now both candidates are thick, and I had to rethink how I drew it – but I think the metaphor is still good. I have Hillary and Trump glaring at each other, where in 2008 Obama and Romnay seen oblivious to each other.

Oh! I didn’t forget the yellow row in 2008.

Watch me draw this one in real time in the video below …

Watch me color the cartoon in Adobe Photoshop on my Wacom Cintiq in the next video …

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Voodoo Hillary!

With all the news last week about Hillary’s health reinforcing the alt-right narrative about Hillary being sick and secretive, I got to thinking about how Donald Trump might be spending his play time.

I wanted to make Trump look like a little kid, delighted with his toy, as he inflicts dark magical, medical horrors upon Hillary. Want to see me drawing this one in real time? Check it out in the video below.

See me color this one in the video below!

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Trump/Putin Bromance

Here’s the Donald giving a big bromance kiss to Vladimir Putin. They are both so strong. Mmm.

I futzed around  with this one before deciding on this close-up – you can watch my indecision in the video below.

In the next video, watch me coloring the kiss in Photoshop!

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Trump’s Trip to Mexico

Donald Trump made a surprise trip to Mexico today. He is rather unpopular in Mexico, which led me to draw this cartoon featuring Mexico’s famous Angel of Independence statue reacting to Trump’s greeting.

trumpMexico

The Angel of Independence in Mexico City is the scene of frequent political protests and is an icon in Mexico like the Statue of Liberty is to us. One of my favorite cartoonists in Mexico, Angel Boligan, draws the Angel often, and I thought I would post a few – here she is in one that Boligan calls “Sin City”

sincity

And here she is as a cigarette …

angelCigarette

Here she’s replaced by the police.

AngelPolice

And in this one, she seems to have lost her motivation – or found new motivation …

AngelBed
See me draw this Trump cartoon in the video below …

and see me color the cartoon in Photoshop in the video below …

 

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Trump and Hitler-Hillary!

When I was drawing this Trump – Hillary/Hitler cartoon I was thinking it was pretty silly, but looking at Trumps recent comments about Hillary the bigot, it isn’t too hard to get to the bottom of Godwin’s Law and jump straight to Hitler. That’s Hillary’s official State Department photo from when she was Secretary of State, with her hair made a little but blonder, and blacker.

I recently wrote a column noting how so many cartoonists have been drawing Trump as Hitler. I guess it was time for me to jump on the Hitler bandwagon. I love drawing Trump, but I haven’t quite found the shorthand caricature of Trump that I’m happy with and I struggled a bit before deciding on this face. I’ll get used to Trump before long. Or maybe not.

I had some tech problems with the video of my drawing this one – but I have the coloring video! Take a look below and check out all the cartoons and videos in my archive at DarylCagle.com.

https://youtu.be/D13FXcGtIss