"Politics of Political Humor Panel"
Guests Include:
- Matt Cooper, Time Magazine
- James Downey, Saturday Night Live
- Bob Gorrell, AOL Political Cartoonist
- Bob Somerby, The Daily Howler
- Ann Telnaes, syndicated editorial cartoonist
Guest Bios
Matt Cooper, Deputy Washington Bureau Chief, TIME
Matthew Cooper joined TIME as Deputy Washington Bureau Chief in July 1999. Previously, Cooper was Deputy Washington Bureau Chief and National Correspondent for Newsweek. He joined the magazine as Deputy National Bureau Chief and National Correspondent in August, 1996. His coverage of national affairs included the Clinton scandals, the impeachment trial, Newt Gingrich's resignation and the ensuing power squabble in the GOP, the aborted tobacco settlement, U.S.-Iraq relations, and the upcoming 2000 presidential campaign.
Prior to Newsweek, Cooper was a senior editor at The New Republic, where he wrote the acclaimed "White House Watch" column. He profiled many political insiders. Previously, Cooper was a White House correspondent for U.S. News & World Report, where he covered Clinton's 1992 presidential campaign. He also served as the magazine's Atlanta Bureau Chief. Cooper was also an editor at The Washington Monthly, where he wrote and edited articles on culture and politics. From 1986 to 1987, he was a Washington correspondent for Thompson Newspapers, and from 1984 to 1986, Cooper served as a writer and researcher at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
Cooper moonlights as a stand-up comedian, and in November 1998 was named "Washington's Funniest Celebrity" after an evening of comedy at Washington's Improv. His Clinton impersonation has been praised by Vanity Fair and New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd praised him for an ability to "spin whimsy out of smarmy," proclaiming, "I want to be more like Matt Cooper."
A New Jersey native, Cooper is a 1984 graduate of Columbia College in New York City and lives in Washington D.C. with his wife, Mandy Grunwald, and their son.
James Downey, Writer, Saturday Night Live
(bio currently unavailable)
Bob Gorrell, AOL Editorial Cartoonist
Born and raised in Greensboro, North Carolina, Bob Gorrell attended the University of Virginia as an Echols
Scholar and graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1977. He was a staff artist at the Ft. Myers News-Press in Florida, and worked
for the Charlotte News and Richmond News Leader before moving to the Richmond Times-Dispatch in 1992. He served there as
editorial cartoonist until resigning in January 1998 to concentrate on syndicated editorial and comics page features. From November 2000
until August 2001, Gorrell served as editor at iPipe, Inc., where he managed the distribution of feature content to major
Internet portals and where he developed the editorial cartoon site Edivu, which was named a Best of the
Web winner by U.S. News & World Report. In October 2001, Gorrell was named Editorial Cartoonist for America Online News, giving
him one of the nation's largest daily audiences through that outlet's 33 million subscribers.
Gorrell's work has appeared through syndication in hundreds of daily and weekly newspapers, including The Atlanta Journal, The Portland Oregonian, The Providence Journal, USA Today, The New York Post, The Washington Times, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. His commentary has been featured in Time, Newsweek, National Review, and other prominent periodicals, and college papers receive his drawings through the U.S.I.C. Educational Foundation. Gorrell cartoons have been used on CBS television's Face the Nation and on C-Span, and he himself has guested on CNN's Crossfire as well as other television and radio broadcasts. His work has been included in numerous cartoon anthologies, and is available along with cartoons by Gary Brookins in their jointly-published Pen Pals. During 1995, Gorrell compiled a solo collection of his cartoons for national distribution titled Affairs of State.
Gorrell and Brookins collaborated on the comic strip Cobwebs from 1985 to 1986, and they co-produced the op-ed cartoon feature Muddle America from 1996 to 1998. In September 1998, Gorrell launched the comic page panel Toby with Creators Syndicate, Inc..
Winner of the 1997 National Press Foundation's Berryman Award as Editorial Cartoonist of the Year, Gorrell has received numerous other accolades. Cartoons by Gorrell have been cited for excellence by the Fischetti Editorial Cartoon Competition, the Overseas Press Club of America, the Mencken Awards, and the Dragonslayer Editorial Cartoon Competition. Gorrell won first place for editorial cartooning in seven Virginia Press Association Awards competitions. Gorrell is a member of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists, the National Cartoonists Society, and the Newspaper Features Council. His drawings have been solicited for numerous exhibitions in galleries throughout the United States, and they are frequently requested for purchase by private collectors. Samples of his work are on deposit with museums of cartoon art in Washington and Ohio State University.
Bob Somerby
Editor of The Daily Howler, he is best known in Washington as one of the city's most popular topical comedians. National Journal's Hotline recently called him "one of the top political/consumer comedians of our time."
But years before he began his career as a topical humorist, Bob Somerby, editor of THE DAILY HOWLER, was an op-ed writer in the Baltimore Sun, writing on a variety of political and social issues.
After graduating from Harvard in 1969, Somerby came to Baltimore as a fifth grade teacher in the Baltimore City Public Schools. His first articles in The Sun, in 1978, dealt with issues of educational testing.
He has consulted for a variety of network news shows on issues of educational testing. He has written articles for the Sun on issues ranging from the outrageous treatment of poor Nancy Kerrigan right on through Medicare funding.
As a comedian, Somerby has been praised by a variety of major publications. Of his one-man show, MATERIAL WORLD, the Washington City Paper said: "Somerby turns a stand-up act into stand-up art. Material World is high comic art." The Washington Post recently said of the show: "Think Will Rogers without the corny rope tricks...Somerby offers a rare treat: jokes built on ideas."
Through the 1996 election cycle, Somerby published a humorous weekly mailer, THE ELECTION TOWN CRIER. The Washington Times said The Election Town Crier was "the newest, hottest Powertown tip-sheet since The Weekly Standard and George."
Somerby has appeared on a variety of national TV shows, including Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher and Equal Time with Mary Matalin and Dee Dee Myers.
Ann Telnaes
Ann Telnaes, one of the few women in the field of editorial cartooning, is known for her clean and striking drawing style that is as pleasing to the eye as her cartoons are thought provoking. Her work, syndicated by Tribune Media Services, has appeared in such prestigious publications as The New York Times, USA Today, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Newsday, The Baltimore Sun and St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
In 2001, Telnaes became the second woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning. She has received many other professional awards including The Press Club of Atlantic City's National Headliner Award for editorial cartoons in 1997, the 1996 Population Institute XVIIth Global Media Awards for Best Cartoonist and the Sixth Annual Environmental Media Awards in editorial cartooning. She was a finalist for the 1996 National Cartoonists Society Reuben Awards in the editorial cartoon category.
Telnaes' television appearances include PBS' "The NewsHour" with Jim Lehrer and C-Span. She has also appeared on "The Editors," an annual show on World Affairs Television in Canada.
Before beginning her career as an editorial cartoonist, Telnaes worked at Warner Bros. and Walt Disney Imagineering. She has been an animator and layout designer for various animation studios in London, Los Angeles, Taiwan and New York.
Telnaes was born in Stockholm, Sweden, and graduated from California Institute of the Arts with a bachelor of fine arts degree, specializing in character animation. She resides in Washington, D.C., with her husband, David Lloyd.