AAEC President Clay Bennett Recalls the Year That Was ... Very Busy

By: Dave Astor When Clay Bennett became president of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists last Sept. 1, he thought he'd have a busy year. The AAEC leader was wrong -- it turned into a VERY busy year.

"The job ended up being even more involved than I feared it would be," Bennett told E&P as his presidential term nears its conclusion on Thurs., Aug. 31. He'll be succeeded this Friday by President-elect Rob Rogers of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and United Media.

Bennett -- whose Pulitzer Prize-winning Christian Science Monitor cartoons are syndicated by that paper's news service -- said things were busy "right off the bat" last year. A new management group was starting to run the AAEC's business operations, and the AAEC's Web site (EditorialCartoonists.com ) was going through a massive expansion.

Then, in November, the organization learned that its Denver convention hotel for June 2006 was pulling out. So the AAEC had to scramble to find another hotel in Denver barely six months before the meeting. "Luckily, we didn't have to camp out behind Mike Keefe's home," quipped Bennett, referring to The Denver Post/Cagle Cartoons editorial cartoonist who co-hosted the convention with Ed Stein of the Rocky Mountain News and United.

As fall turned into winter, two Tribune Co. dailies -- the Los Angeles Times and The Sun of Baltimore -- eliminated their staff editorial cartoonist positions. (Mike Ramirez was laid off by the Times and Kevin "KAL" Kallaugher took a buyout from The Sun.) Around the same time, the AAEC held its massive Black Ink Monday protest, in which 80-plus cartoonists created about 125 drawings criticizing the shrinking state of their profession.

Bennett said the action unfortunately didn't get any cartoonists rehired or create many new positions. But he said it drew attention to the problem -- and generated more than 1,000 e-mails to the Tribune Co.

Then the Danish cartoon controversy exploded. While Bennett was a very visible AAEC spokesperson on other issues, he kept a low public profile on the Muhammad drawings to avoid any chance of endangering kidnapped Monitor colleague Jill Carroll. Rob Rogers and AAEC Vice President Nick Anderson, the Houston Chronicle/Washington Post Writers Group cartoonist who'll succeed Rogers as President-elect this Friday, did most of the organization's talking, though Bennett helped behind the scenes. In early February, the AAEC issued a statement supporting freedom of expression for cartoonists while also noting that Islamic anger over the Danish drawings was understandable -- but violence was not.

A few days earlier, the AAEC was involved in supporting Tom Toles of The Washington Post and Universal Press Syndicate after the Joint Chiefs of Staff criticized a Toles cartoon about the carnage caused by the Iraq War.

All in all, "it was a very active year for cartoon news," said Bennett. "With every new story, there were statements to be made and support to be rallied." He recalled doing dozens of media interviews during his yearlong tenure as president, and sometimes spending three hours a night at home writing e-mails relating to AAEC and cartooning issues.

The AAEC's June convention absorbed a lot of Bennett's time, too, though he emphasized that much of the work surrounding the Denver meeting was done by aforementioned co-hosts Stein and Keefe.

But Bennett, 48, emphasized that his busy year as president was worth it: "It's not a job I aspired to take. But when I was asked, I was glad to oblige the AAEC. Fortunately, I was able to pay back just a little bit what the AAEC has given me over the years."

The eight-year Monitor veteran -- who's married to cartoonist/painter Cindy Procious -- has been an AAEC member since 1981.

Bennett is relieved that he'll soon get back to "obsessing just about my cartoons." But he has mixed feelings about suddenly having time to start the long-delayed task of stripping the wallpaper from his living room. "Being AAEC president is the best excuse for getting out of chores," he laughed.

As immediate past president, Bennett will remain on the AAEC board after Rob Rogers takes over -- but obviously have less responsibilities. "It's Rob's baby now," he added. "Let him change the diapers!"