Basil inspired the character of Louie in the strip, and also helped create the common theme within the strip of the dogs, Louie and Raymond, loving steak and hamburgers from the pirates’ grill, says Dunham.

“If I never had Basil, I never would have had Louie. I should have been feeding Basil steak every night. He got his share, but he gave a lot in my life and gave a lot to the strip, and I really miss him,” Dunham said.

The Denver Broncos have long been my favorite topic to draw about (25 years now at the Rocky Mountain News) and I’m always looking for fun ways to cartoon the season as it unfolds.

So this year, I’m jumping head first into the pool of animation with online cartoon webisodes of The Broncs Zoo. It’ll be about all things Broncos related and kind of like Saturday morning cartoons except without the cereal commercials. It will be regular feature on rockymountainnews.com right next to my daily sports cartoons.

Fort Wayne, Indiana’s Journal Gazette will add “The Brilliant Mind of Edison Lee” and “Bound and Gagged” to their daily comics pages.

Starting next Sunday, TV Week is becoming The Guide to TV and the Internet, with fresher TV listings, more channel listings and more color. And tucked inside The Guide will be your favorite color comics in an easier-to-scan tabloid format. Plus you’ll get our experts’ and readers’ advice about the best sites on the internet, including those on chicagotribune.com and elsewhere.

Here are the details:

In our more up-to-date listings grids, you’ll find nine new cable channels, plus color coding that will instantly guide you to movies, sports, news/talk, and our Best Bets.

In Comics, which will be a pullout section inside The Guide, Chicago’s best comics and puzzles – now including the popular TV jumble – will be easier to hold ad share among the entire family.

Each week in our guide to the internet, we will cut through the jungle of millions of sites to the best ones as determined by Tribune experts and readers like you. Each week, we’ll offer different topics for time-saving surfing.

Look for it next Sunday in the same spot you’ve been finding TV Week.

I’ll post a link to the blog when he sends it to me. I’m not sure if he’s talking about this one.

UPDATE: Just received an email from Patrick. His job was spared. Congratulations Patrick!!!

What does Zell know about journalism? No more than any other billionaire real estate mogul. But that hasn’t stopped him from telling off journalists at some of the country’s best newspapers — the Chicago Tribune, Newsday, the Hartford Courant, the Baltimore Sun and, finest of all, the Los Angeles Times. Zell has told these new employees of his that they are practitioners of an arrogant kind of journalism that doesn’t give readers what they want and fails to make increasing company profits a key objective of news gathering.

As I detailed in my cartoon, Zell has delivered his message on a grand tour of his properties, dropping F-bombs all along the way. Worse than his crude language, though, is his vision of the future of journalism. Apparently, foreign coverage and reporting from Washington, D.C., will be discounted. Stories that seek to protect the public interest by tackling tough, important subjects will be frowned upon, unless they can somehow be shown to enhance the bottom line.

In an accompanying cartoon, Dave depicts and quotes Zell as he toured various newspapers throughout his chain telling reporters that readers don’t like foreign news “it’s just something journalists like to do” and he’s willing to allow ads for strip clubs to run in the L.A. Times because, “it’s un-American not to like to (bleep)!”

As to the cartoon and column’s reaction, Dave Astor contacted Tribune Media Syndicate VP for News and Features John Twohey who said that the cartoon was provocative but would not place his relationship with TMS in danger. Horsey, who had been out of the office doing election coverage and didn’t know how the cartoon was being received by Zell or his readers.

» The Washington Post, regarded as one of the best run newspapers in recent years, has announced that it will offer “an undetermined number” buy-outs to its staffers. The buy-outs are aimed at older staffers nearing retirement, union and management employees.

» The Tribune Company has announced that it will cut 400-500 jobs from its chain of newspapers that include the Chicago Tribune and LA Times.

» The Albuquerque Tribune will shutdown this Friday after failing to find a buyer. Its parent company, E.W. Scripps Co. has also shutdown its Cincinnati Post and Kentucky Post papers in December of last year. The editor blames the loss of revenue as advertisers shift advertising from newspapers to the internet. It was a small paper with a daily circulation of about 10,000.

But this batch of news is not all gloom and doom.

» The Salt Lake Tribune has launched a small, free afternoon tabloid that is dispersed to commuters heading home. The tabloid has only 12-16 pages and runs four comics: Chuckle Bros, Diesel Sweeties, Girls and Sports and On A Claire Day.

The list contains:

“10. Laid-off journalists sign over their unemployment checks to help a poor executive out.

“9. Tribune readers send him a quarter every day for each feature they look for in the paper but can’t find because of one of his layoffs.

“8. All remaining Tribune staffers forward any journalism prize money over to him since they couldn’t have done it without him.

“7. Auction off Tribune Tower on eBay and give him the proceeds.

“6. Lease out vacant office space at other Tribune papers to generate monthly cash flow for Mr. FitzSimons.

“5. Corrupt politicians benefiting from fewer investigative journalists create a foundation for him.

“4. Overworked journalists taking on the extra load in the wake of layoffs squeeze in just a little more time to have a bake sale in his honor.

“3. Cartoonists hold a benefit auction of original art in his honor for all that he’s done to ensure the survival of editorial cartooning in America.

“2. Get a Hollywood studio to buy the movie rights for his heroic life story of public service.

“1. Remaining staffers at Tribune papers sell a kidney to go the extra mile for Fitz