Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Appoints Editorial Cartoonist Steve Kelley

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Publisher and Editor-in-Chief John Robinson Block has announced the appointment of Steve Kelley as the Post-Gazette's new editorial cartoonist.

Mr. Kelley was formerly the editorial cartoonist for the San Diego Union-Tribune and the New Orleans Times- Picayune. A National Cartoonists Society Ruben Award winner, as well as National Headline Award winner, his cartoons are syndicated by Creator's Syndicate worldwide.

Kelley has been in the top tier of conservative cartoonists for some time...personally I rank him just below Ramirez.

His art and in particular his lettering are obviously quite distinctive. Whereas Ramirez' vivid, exaggerated art alone often makes his point (his merciless caricatures of the dumpy, jowly Hillary Clinton are some of his best work), Kelley often relies on generic husband and wife figures or the proverbial man-in-the-street with much of the commentary delivered via dialogue (speech balloons). He is notably pithy, droll and dry. And, for better or worse, not above cheap shots at Trump.

That said, this particular appointment took me by surprise. It has been pointed out here and elsewhere that the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ('the PG') has been taken over by a younger member of an aristocratic family who is determined to reverse its leftward course. Despite these claims, the paper's coverage and editorials, both laden with lefty catchphrases and groupthink, haven't seemed to change appreciably.

The PG has long aspired to be the Rust Belt equivalent of the NY Times along with its readership and their armchair socialist nonsense. The sacking of cartoonist and lefty darling Rob Rogers outraged those readers. He was among the worst offenders of repeating and amplifying whatever the current lefty smear of Trump might have been. It makes a sort of convuluted sense that members of the hive mind would enjoy the cartoons of another groupthinker.

This hire is a bolt out of the blue given its timing and contrast with the previous cartoonist. The PG is down to publishing 4 hard copy editions per week and economically one wonders how they could afford to bid/outbid others for Kelley's services. To be fair, a San Diego-based cartoonist (who will likely remain in CA) probably has little knowledge of the history of Pittsburgh and its political scene which is as labyrinthine as its street grid. But there are many cartoonists on the mastheads of various papers who (strictly) adhere to national/international topics.

As you might expect, this move has inflamed the large percentage of PG readers who are lefties. The personal attacks began immediately and, as usual, were unsupported by facts or logic. Kelley 'lacks insight' according to one commenter. But would the paper take an editorial and financial risk on a nationally-known cartoonist already hailed for his wit if he 'lacked insight?' Does not compute.

Funny, I cannot think of a single cartoon of his or even visualize his cartoon style. He has an impressive resumė... Steve Kelley grew up in Richmond, Virginia and is a 1981 graduate of Dartmouth. He has been cartooning for more than three decades, and his cartoons have appeared in The Chicago Tribune, USA Today, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post among other newspapers. He is regularly featured on other news websites, including Townhall and National Public Radio. He has also written columns published in The Times-Picayune, Neiman Reports, and The Wall Street Journal. Not content with amusing people in print, Kelley writes and performs humor professionally. A veteran of seven appearances on “The Tonight Show,” he has performed at The Desert Inn, The Riviera and Harrah’s in Las Vegas, Trump Plaza in Atlantic City and Carnegie Hall in New York City. Mr. Kelley served as a Montgomery Fellow on the Dartmouth campus in 2008. In 2009, Mr. Kelley was elected president of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists. Three years later, Pelican Publishing tapped him to edit the 2012 edition of its popular Best Editorial Cartoons of the Year series.

As a Pittsburgh area resident, I despise the leftie rag, just seeing the lying propaganda anti-Republican headlines when I pass the paper on the newsstand makes me cringe. The Post Gazette has been giving out free weekend editions by throwing them (in a wrapper) in peoples’ driveways in my area. I see them still laying around a lot of driveways all over days later, a lot of folks don’t pick them up. I only pick mine up on garbage day. Why should they inconvenience me like this by littering my driveway?

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