Chicago Tribune Censors Doonesbury over Sarah Palin Book

The Chicago Tribune censors a Doonesbury cartoon series making fun of Sarah Palin, perhaps the most immensely hypocritical, ridiculous whack-job figure who more than any character in American politics, in the history of American politics, cries out for ridicule and imprecation.

The Joe McGinniss Sarah Palin Book, ‘The Rogue’ is set to hit bookstores on Tuesday, September 20.

Notes the Huffington Post, “McGinniss famously moved into a house next door to Palin’s Wasilla, Alaska home to write his book — prompting the Palins to accuse him of stalking them. They built a high fence along their property to protect their privacy.”

Hey, has anyone asked John McCain recently how that Sarah Paliney thing worked out for him?

By Jeff Simpson

This week the comic strip Doonesbury, is running a story arc based on the the new book on Palin by Joe McGinniss. There are some very serious allegations in this book and Gary Trudeau grabs a few of them and addresses them in his strip.

The story here though is not Doonesbury but the Chicago Tribune who has decided not to run the strip this week.  From the Trib comes this explanation:

By Geoff Brown

We thought we’d give TribNation a little more information about our decision not to run ‘Doonesbury’ strips this week.

Tribune Editor Gerould W. Kern states on Page 2 of Tuesday’s newspaper:

This week we are not publishing ‘Doonesbury’ comic strips because they do not meet our standards of fairness. We are substituting another strip instead

The Doonesbury strips refer to allegations purportedly contained in an as-yet-unreleased book about former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. The book is not yet available for verification or review by the Chicago Tribune.

To be sure, Doonesbury is a satirical cartoon, but the remarks are serious enough that we cannot publish the strip without more information, context and a response from Palin.

Readers have offered the following comments, and we respond to them here:

I looked at Monday’s strip online and didn’t see anything objectionable.

True, the storyline begins slowly, but as the week progresses, the remarks become increasingly serious. Rather than interrupt the narrative, we decided not to run any of the strips.

This is censorship.

This is a judgment call, and we make them every time we have sensitive stories as well as cartoons that do not meet our standards of taste or fairness. And, of course, Doonesbury can be found easily online.

I find it extremely troubling when newspapers engage in censorship. I know they denied censoring the material but when its okay one day and not the next, it is censorship pure and simple. They have decided what is ‘appropriate’ for their (dwindling) readership and that is indisputable. I wonder if every time a politician has been mentioned in a newspaper if they have been given a chance to respond or if the Tribune is just hiding behind that? No wonder people do not read newspapers anymore.

The full feed for the week can be found here.

Here is one of the strips:

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