Most of the news about print journalism is a little depressing -- circulation is down, money is tight, etc, etc.

So it gives us immense pleasure when we can share a little positive news.

Evidently, there's something called the "Best of the West" Contest for print journalism, an award given yearly by First Amendment Funding Inc. in a variety of categories.

While we can't claim to ever have heard of it before today, we certainly believe that the judges have excellent taste.

The Chron's Don Asmussen has won the cartooning award for this year. Yay! BOTW's site describes Asmussen's cartoons as "fresh and funny with a great sense of the absurd," and we couldn't agree more. He's one of the real bright spots over at our city's paper of record (and he draws a great caricature of Tim Goodman too).

The Chron also made the winners list with a second-place award for its coverage of the Kim Family tragedy; the BOTW folks specifically cited Peter Fimrite's tight writing and Jason Van Derbeken's story of a heroic helicopter pilot as contributing factors.

So, congrats again to the Chronicle writers and Mr. Asmussen!