* Nate Beeler was laid off from the Columbus Dispatch after seven year as its editorial cartoonist. The quality of cartoonist expressing outrage proves very impressive. Beeler's departure looks to be part of this Gatehouse Media general pruning: a series of strategic deep cuts -- in part because they're all deep cuts at this point -- that will mitigate the damage as it goes along by tossing in a number of newsroom shifts along with the cuts. I personally like Beeler and hope he ends up on his feet with only a little dust to brush from his shoulders; his best work is ahead of him. One thing that might play into it is that Columbus is one of those cities that looks at talent as a civic resource: the self-conception of how a city works when it's a first-class city involves being able to feature a working editorial cartoonist. I'll return to this one a few times, I hope.
* intriguing follow-up facts from Daily Cartoonist: Rick McKee at the Augusta Chronicle was also fired. This leaves Gatehouse with one staff cartoonist on their 150-plus newspapers. We may be down to fewer than 25 staff positions.
* Nate Beeler 
