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December 20, 2003
Anti-Bush Toon Gets Spiked
By Matthew Rothschild
After Bush gave his infamous "Bring ‘Em On" statement in July, Dennis Draughon, cartoonist for the Scranton Times and Tribune in Pennsylvania, drew a cartoon with Bush at the podium saying those words, while in front of the podium were four caskets draped in American flags (above).
The cartoon never ran.
"That’s not going to fly," Pat McKenna, associate editor of the paper, told Draughon, according to the cartoonist.
Draughon wasn’t surprised.
"Anything I do about Bush has to tread a fine line," he says, adding that he’s under strict orders: ‘No more Bush cartoons.’"
So when his editor, whom he admires, said no, Draughon took it in stride.
"I knew that before I even drew it," he said. "But I wanted someone other than my wife to see it." Once his editor spiked it, Draughon sent it over to a cartoon site on Slate, and it also ran in a newsletter of cartoons. McKenna got a few angry letters when word got out that the paper wouldn’t publish it, and Draughon began to worry.
"I didn’t want to be a poster child of cartoon censorship," he says. "Editors and publishers run what kind of cartoons they want. I’ve learned to live with it."
He also didn’t want to get fired.
"We tried to keep any news of it from ballooning out because if it became that big of an issue, it might very well cost me my job," he says.
For his part, McKenna says, "I don’t consider it censorship. Here the philosophy of the editorial board is that cartoonists represent the paper’s viewpoint. It’s just a matter of policy. Some papers say their cartoonists are like columnists. But our general rule is that locally produced cartoons should reflect the opinions of the editorial board. In this particular case, we felt it didn’t do so."
McKenna says the paper does allow views similar to Draughon’s to be "reflected in syndicated cartoons and other columns."
Ironically, Draughon has a cartoon in a traveling exhibit called "USA Patriot Art: Cartooning and Free Speech." The cartoon is called "Liberty vs. Security," and it depicts an eagle flying freely on one side and an eagle in a cage with the Bill of Rights on the other. His paper did print this cartoon.
The introduction to the exhibit says, "In some cities, cartoonists have been fired or lost freelance jobs because of cartoons critical of U.S. policy or for using ‘wrong’ metaphors."
Draughon recognizes the cost of ‘wrong’ metaphors. "There’s a steadily dwindling rank of cartoonists," he says. "We’re all on tenterhooks to please the people we work for. There are no openings out there."
–The Progressive, August 2003