On election night last week, the family was scattered around the living room, paying as much attention as they could to history being made. My kids (aged 10 and 13) surprised me by how much they enjoyed watching the talking heads stall for time and play with their big Etch-a-Sketches of the USA–but they also surprised me with how much they new about the electoral college, Congress and the rest of the arcana of our grand old land. They certainly knew more than me at that age.
Killing time as we waited for the polls on the West Coast to close and Obama named the winner, Number One Son grabbed a piece of newspaper and quickly sketched the caricatures of the four candidates shown below. He said he’d been working on them in school for a week or so, to amuse his classmates, and had perfected a few but not all. Looks like he could be on his way to being the first manga-inspired editorial cartoonist (but I can’t tell whether Joe Biden at the bottom is answering questions or summoning the mystic energies of a long-dead sorcerer to channel through his lapel flag pin).
A reference to Obama’s home state.
Not quite crotchety enough.
Price tags a nice touch.
He IS good. These are cool.
They might be even better if he spent more than 30 seconds on each one. That will have to come with age?
Well, some of the best work comes when you do it in an instant, when you think you’re just tossing something off.
He got Obama’s chin and ears right, but McCain looks like he came from “Dune”.
It will be interesting to see how Obama is caricaturized as he progresses in office. It’s always interesting to see what makes the cartoonists click. Who’d’ve thought that Bush would be reduced to a smirk and some rabbity ears?