Dispatch cancels profane cartoon

The Dispatch has canceled Wiley Miller’s Non Sequitur comic strip, daily and Sunday, because of foul language the author used in an attack on President Donald Trump in a comic strip published on Sunday.

It appears from a post on Miller’s Twitter account on Sunday about the strip that it was no accident: “Some of my sharp-eyed readers have spotted a little Easter egg from Leonardo Bearvinci. Can you find it?”

In a statement issued Monday, Miller indicated otherwise and said that “it was NOT intended for public consumption, and I meant to white it out before submitting it, but forgot to.” He did not apologize.

Editors at The Dispatch did not see the words scribbled in fine print before the strip was published. That will not happen again.

We must be able to trust that the people who provide content to The Dispatch will uphold the high standards we have set for this newspaper. That includes those who draw the comics.

Wiley Miller has lost our trust. Therefore, we will not publish his work going forward.

Dispatch Sunday comics are printed a week in advance, so Non Sequitur will appear for the last time on Feb. 17. We have reviewed that strip closely, and it does not contain foul language.

Andrews Mcmeel, which syndicates Non Sequitur, issued a statement Monday

saying, “We are sorry we missed the language in our editing process. If we had discovered it, we would not have distributed the cartoon without it being removed. We apologize to Non Sequitur’s clients and readers for our oversight.”

In Miller’s statement, issued through Andrews Mcmeel, he said that he had drawn the comic about eight weeks ago and had forgotten the “scribbling that has now caught fire” until sharpeyed readers pointed it out on Sunday.

“I now remember that I was particularly aggravated that day about something the president had done or said, and so I lashed out in a rather sophomoric manner as instant therapy . ... Had I intended to make a statement to be understood by the readers, I would have done so in a more subtle, sophisticated manner.”

Miller said Saturday will mark the 27th anniversary of Non Sequitur, “and in all that time, I have never done anything like this, nor do I intend to do so in the future.”