Vanishing ink: Cartoonists fade

You might want to have a look at the political cartoon on the adjoining page. Its creator, Dwane Powell, is part of an endangered species.

Increasingly, political cartoonists are the spotted owls of the American newspaper landscape. Over the last 20 years the number of newspaper cartoonists has dropped from more than 200 to fewer than 90.

Their numbers seem to dwindle daily. Last week, prize-winning cartoonist Kevin "KAL" Kallaugher was one of 70 Baltimore Sun staffers to accept a management buyout offer. The Sun, a Tribune Co. paper, said he will not be replaced "for the foreseeable future." Two weeks earlier, The Los Angeles Times, another Tribune newspaper, laid off Pulitzer-winner Michael Ramirez, who also won't be replaced. The Chicago Tribune itself never replaced cartoonist Jeff MacNelly after he died in 2000.

Just down the road, J.P. Trostle will stop drawing political cartoons for the Chapel Hill Herald, after his recent resignation from the parent Durham Herald-Sun. Earlier this year The Herald-Sun axed the Durham paper's full-time cartoonist, John Cole, as part of a wholesale staff layoff at the paper.

In protest of the cuts, newspaper cartoonists around the country plan "Black Ink Monday" this week, when they will use their pens to draw attention to the plight of cartoonists and newspaper staffs in general. You should be able to see the drawings tomorrow at www.editorialcartoonists.com .

At The News & Observer, Powell has been poking fun at people in power since 1975, making him one of the deans of his inky tribe. His name is one of the most recognizable at the paper, and his work often the most controversial. A cartoon last month skewering Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, for example, drew this reaction from Raleigh reader Jamie Gregory: "I know that the editorial page is supposed to be biased, but this morning's cartoon by Powell is so blatantly misleading that it deserves rebuke by you and maybe some others."

Powell is used to such heated reader reaction and indeed thinks he wouldn't be doing his job if his drawings weren't elevating blood-pressure readings. He has a low outrage threshold himself, especially when it comes to the misdoings of the powerful.

"You can count on there being somebody running things who is doing the wrong thing and doing it in a way that makes me want to put pen to paper," he says.

Much of the criticism of Powell is that he is too liberal for The N&O readership, but Powell places himself in the middle of the political spectrum. "I would say my point of view is pretty close to the average American." Yes, he is hard on the Bush administration, but that's because they're the crowd in office. He was critical of Democrats during the Clinton administration and recently has been aggressive in lampooning the troubles of Democrat Jim Black, the North Carolina House speaker embroiled in controversy over the state lottery.

Still, it's a sign of Powell's cachet that, no matter how acid his depictions of politicians, they love to hang his cartoons on their office walls. Black has refused to talk to N&O reporters for months, but he recently had an assistant call Powell for copies of the latest Black cartoons. He happily complied.

It should be noted that Powell does not have a completely free hand at the paper. His cartoons are reviewed by Editorial Page Editor Steve Ford, both in the formative and final versions, and they regularly involve give-and-take discussion -- much the same as the editing process between a columnist and an editor. Powell says he sees his cartoon as his own opinion, not that of the paper, but Ford notes that it is "generally consistent with the paper's editorial position." N&O publisher Orage Quarles III, Powell's ultimate boss, says he doesn't see the cartoonist position going away.