Abbott's Baggage

Anyone elso fed up with 'religious' pollies who seem to lack even a trace of genuine compassion?

This cartoon was intended for this year's NewMatilda.com cartoon competition, but NM just announced it is folding. Too bad. The Oz media landscape is now a particularly barren one.

Ute Gate!

So, the biggest crisis to hit the Rudd government so far is.... a ute that a dealer gave the PM for his election campaign. And Turnbull's riding this one all the way to the stables. It's Swan's scalp he is after, for allegedly misleading Parliament over the affair. If the Treasurer is forced to resign, needless to say, it would be a tough blow for the government, and Rudd's credibility.

My prediction? Nothing will come of this. Howard rode out several crises unscathed. But time will tell...

The Final Heat!

All the heat winning cartoons of the NewMatilda.com cartooning competition are all online in the final heat (including my entry).... Can be seen at http://newmatilda.com/cartooncomp/ (if you read the fine print you will find that you can't vote for the winner this time, unless you are a member of the judging panel)....

Chinalco

OK, so New Matilda did publish my last cartoon, only it's not eligible to win as I won the first heat. It could be seen at http://newmatilda.com/cartooncomp/heat-8/ but now the page no longer exists!
Somehow it didn't get published straight away, so it's a bit old-newsy.

This cartoon is all about China's state-owned (naturally) resource giant attempting to double its stake in Aussie company Rio Tinto to some 20%. I think Wayne Swan would have quietly given the deal the go-ahead if Mal Turnbull hadn't brayed so loudly against the notion. Nothing agaist the Chinese, but do we really want them owning a fifth of our largest mining company? It would be kind of funny if they used our natural resources to build military jets and aircraft carriers, seeing as our new defense white paper is warily predicting a possible military threat from China by 2030! (Shades of "Pig-Iron Bob"...)

Guantanamo Rolf

Somehow, my mind made a connection between water-boarding and wobble-boarding. Apologies to Rolf Harris.

Incidentally, if you think this cartoon is out of date because Obama has closed Guantanomo Bay, well, he HASN'T.

Yet.

Rudd Fails to Blow It

There's a story in the media that the Mighty Rudd, whilst visiting the troops in Afghanistan, lost his temper because he couldn't plug his hair dryer in. Rudd vigorously denies the story...

I drew this pretty quickly, as you can see, using Artline pen on sketch paper. If I have the time, I use a nib and ink on bleedproof paper. I wanted to get into using a brush and ink more, but I find a nib easier to use.

I feel like a bit of a duffer. Here I was scratching my head as to why NewMatilda.com didn't publish my last two competition entries. It was because I didn't read the fine print that said "Entrants are eligible to win one heat only." Well, I already won the first round. Only one bite of the cherry.