Vanity Fair.com has a nice gallery of George Dubya caricatures up, featuring Ed Sorel, Drew Friedman, Gerald Scarfe (pictured), and others. 

Mr. Tim Lane of St. Louis, MO has kindly supplied us with a batch of signed book plates for his debut book Abandoned Cars, and they are now newly available. A bookplate may be obtained exclusively from Fantagraphics when ordering the accompanying book, at no extra charge! Some conditions apply; click here for more details and the complete list of books available with this FREE premium!

Monologues for Calculating the Density of Black Holes
By Anders Nilsen

Monologues for Calculating the Density of Black Holes takes up where the artist’s first volume, Monologues for the Coming Plague, left off. Like Coming Plague, Density of Black Holes is a creatively experimental laboratory, comprising a collection of free flowing stream-of-consciousness gags, strips, and drawings that slowly coalesce into an unexpectedly compelling and complex narrative. The hints of story that came together in Coming Plague are extrapolated and expanded upon and grow to incorporate some of Nilsen's other outré strips from the anthology MOME, two of which are reprinted here in expanded form. The book is an audacious investigation into the rhythms of storytelling, the blurring of media, and an exercise in reconciling contrasts. It is playful, provocative and serious all at once — another tour de force by Anders Nilsen, impeccably and uniquely designed, in monochrome and full color.

400-page monochrome/full-color 5" x 8" softcover • $22.99
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Getting quiet out there:

• Review: Rob Clough on Abandoned Cars by Tim Lane

• List: In The Cultural Gutter, Carol Borden lists Hall of Best Knowledge by Ray Fenwick as one of "10 Comics I Liked in 2008"

Colleen Coover indulges in a little "Fantastalgia" in this recently rediscovered panel. Read more about it and see a larger version on her new blog.

Time for the new installment of Steven Weissman's in-progress pages from "Blue Jay," an epic 32-page story from Chocolate Cheeks, the next collection of the Yikes! gang's adventures. Steven sez: "Watch in this and next week's installments how a frightened Chubby starts to resemble an Ariel Bordeaux character."

And don't forget to catch up on our current 5-day chunk of Martin Kellerman's hilarious Swedish smash-hit Rocky, updated Monday-Friday! This week, Rocky's misadventures abroad in New York City continue!

 I read that one of the crucial plot points of Marvel's big Secret Invasion crossover involved newly-elected President Obama bouncing Tony 'Iron Man' Stark from leading the Avengers and replacing him with mass-murdering psychopath Norman 'The Green Goblin' Osborn, creating some king of supervillain Illuminati and making Marvel the new Jack Chick. Shrewd move. 

And now "Obama" is making another crass Marvel appearance in some kind of Spider-Man variant collectible bullshit issue. I'm loathe to link about it, but this Wonkette quote was too rich to pass up: "Who is that mysterious black person in a business suit who looks absolutely nothing like Barack Obama, your new president? It's COMIC-BOOK Barack Obama, that's who! Jesus fucking christ, could Marvel Comics maybe hire somebody who can maybe draw something vaguely resembling the president-elect, rather than 'random negro dude in a suit who also seems to have neck tumors'?"

I actually thought there was some kind of particular law (for better or worse) against trying to profit commercially off a president's likeness in a way not protected by Fair Use (and I doubt limited-edition variant covers qualify as Fair Use), but I guess I totally made that up.

Okay, yeah, I GET why the TMNT have a bad name. I do. But not all fans are looking to depict Raphael nude with towel, or Leonardo "brandishing his Katana." I feel very sick about this.

...and to buy: John Hankiewicz is offering three small drawings for sale. Actually there will probably only be two left by the time you read this.

Tim Lane presents a new page from a new story, "Hitchhiker." Read more about it on Tim's blog.