Auchtoon!

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Press, June 18, 2011

As a Detroit Pistons fan, it’s important for all of you to know that I was hatin’ on LeBron James long before it became popular. James and his Cleveland Cavaliers were beating on my Pistons for a number of years, and I took that personally. Similarly, I was way ahead of hating Michael Jordon and his Chicago Bulls significantly before the world turned on him. (If I’m going to embrace the unpleasant human foible of hating somebody I’ve never even met, well, at least I’m not trendy.) Oh, and I still hate Danny Ainge.

I don’t know Bernard Taylor, but I don’t hate him. Taylor is the current (for now) superintendent of Grand Rapids Public Schools. Recently he has been a final candidate for superintendent of some higher profile school systems — one of which was Cleveland. How ironic! (And by “ironic” I mean “coincidental.”) At this point, the Grand Rapids school board is understandably concerned about Taylor’s intentions and loyalties. So as a favor, I decided to draw a cartoon to warn him of how not to announce his future decisions.

For somebody so apparently hateful, I sure am a nice guy.

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Press, June 11, 2011

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Press, June 4, 2011

If you haven’t already seen or heard about the Grand Rapids LipDub, you can check it out here on YouTube. It really is a very, very impressive community effort and a convincing counter to Newsweek magazine’s online article last winter that listed Grand Rapids as one of America’s “dying cities.” Leave it to an editorial cartoonist to find a negative in the positive. But honestly, “American Pie” can be such an earworm!

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Press, May 28, 2011

If I drew this with any sanctimony, it was gone yesterday when gas prices, which had edged down to around $3.80 after the Memorial Day weekend, shot up to $4.19 in West Michigan. I was very much like Uncle Sam in panel 4, except I was directly appealing to a higher authority to smite the bastards who might be profiting from this crazy leap….