^^ Yeah, that's another of my favorite strips and he's guilty of it, too.
I don't see what difference it makes if a strip is ghostwritten or reassigned when somebody leaves or dies. That's happened a million times. Dan Barry was just as good, possibly better, than Mac Raboy on Flash Gordon-- and worked with other writers, such as Harry Harrison, during his tenure. BC, another of my all-time favorite strips, went downhill rapidly once Johnny Hart went bananas; and from what I've seen, it's in pretty decent shape now. I'm not going to go into a long digression about which of the older strips are good and which aren't-- there's a range of quality just like with contemporary strips-- but there's a meanspiritedness to the satire (and also among the readership) that turns me off.
I suppose it's the result of the shrinking space available to Comics these days, which I also deplore. The young guys resent the use of resources by the olders guys so they want to euthanize them. It's understandable that they want the chance to be successful themselves, but it's still no excuse.
