The New Yorker's Offensive Obama Cover
By John Amato Sunday Jul 13, 2008 1:00pm 
Nice going New Yorker. We have a very large number of people who actually believe all the smears that have floated around about Obama during this election season. So what does The New Yorker decide to do? Put them all together in a cover, as a satire, to sell copies for a very serious article. I think that the cover will only be used to further enhance those fallacies. How would the right react with a NYer graphic of McCain screaming at his first wife while she signs the divorce papers---one arm is behind his back---he's handing Cindy a box of chocolate candies as she kicks over a bag full of cash that's marked Beer money while a Keating jet is parked outside the window. Well those are mostly true...
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The New Yorker cover could have worked if had made more clear who it was satirizing (Fox news, the Republican party, Rush Limbaugh, whatever), or by being clever enough to provide the actual funny. As it is it's just a reflection of the Right's view of Obama, but there's nothing clever or funny about it. The cartoon could run as is on the cover of the National Review, also meaning to be "funny" but with a different target.
All of this doesn't make the New Yorker public enemy #1, just makes them idiots of the week....and the Doughy Pantload says:
- What I find interesting about the New Yorker cover is that it's almost exactly the sort of cover you could expect to find on the front of National Review.
Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton:
"The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create. But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree."
Artist Barry Blitt defends the cover, saying that "It seemed to me that depicting the concept would show it as the fear-mongering ridiculousness that it is."
Kurtz's Reliable Sources touched on the graphic for a few minutes.
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Too clever by half.
Funny toon.
Hey, I say let's put the spotlight on all the absurd hate-mongering that right-wing talk radio and the like thrive on! That's exactly what The New Yorker is doing here! No better way to pull the troglodytes out of their caves and into the sun! (Apologies to genuine troglodytes!) (Disclaimer: I am a long-time New Yorker subscriber!)
Nice going, New Yorker. If you would get your noses out of NYC, you would realize that, unfortunately, most of the country BELIEVE this is what the Obamas are really like. Nice going confirming their stereotype. Idiots.
I'm a longtime New Yorker subscriber and an Obama supporter. I think the cover is great satire, very much in keeping with other work by the same artist. I can see how it might come off to people who aren't regular readers of the magazine, though.
Fight bad satire with good humor. Push back against the New Yorker by entering a cartoon caption contest here.
"All of this doesn’t make the New Yorker public enemy #1, just makes them idiots of the week…."
make that useful idiots of the week.
i'd cancel my subscription if i had one.
*
Rule #1 - DON'T FEED THE BEAST
If you're going to fight pornography, don't put it on the cover. If you're going to fight 'violence' don't show a gratuitiously violent image. If you're going to fight racial intolerance - don't create images to support it.
DON'T. FEED. THE. BEAST.
Idiots.
I'm a little worried about the liberals who think this is great satire; they are surely the kind of people who mearly tolerate the rest of the unclever world.
Beyond that, I have my doubts about the New Yorker actually believing this would be largely taken as satire. Could they really be that elitist?
As soon as I saw this artist's other works, I recognized what it was exactly. It is indeed a spoof of the distorted conservative lies about Obama. I don't see this as a problem at all.
Perhaps the artist could have placed a title under it claiming "Through a Right Winger's Eyes" or something.. but this counter productive whining from Obama on the piece is just silly.
Fortunately the Conservatives can't take advantage of this liberal overreaction because to do so would mean they actually support the fact that the lies that made up this picture are shared by the subhuman, anti-intelligent conservatives in America.
Rusty Steelers = Packers Shackleford @ 5:
Those people who are not regular readers are probably most of the country, unfortunately. I saw this on CNN first thing this morning and figured the idiots at Faux were probably wetting themselves in anticipation of the hour-long investigative report they'll do on this to keep the story (and cover) in the eyes of those impressionable fools even longer.
.
TERRORIST FIST BUMP!"
Repeating the propaganda until it sinks in.
The image supplied by the
SUNNew Yorker informs me that:~ Obama is a terrorist
~ Obama is Muslim
~ Michelle is in on it
FOXPRAVDA should give ED Hill a raise... NO?
.
Freedom of the press. OK. NO PROBLEM.
But fair is fair. How about a cover showing McCain "servicing" Bush?
They could even put quotation marks around the whole thing in case some people don't get it.
I just heard the guy who wrote the article talking on NPR, and as he was describing the cover I could feel the blood draining from my face. All I could say was, "You dumb motherfuckers."
Hey New Yorker: this might sound like really clever satire in your Manhattan mahogany paneled editorial room, but just wait until it's being sold on a t-shirt outside the Republican convention.
You dumb motherfuckers.
Cindy would not want chocolates! John better be handing her a box chock full of percocet. That was her drug of choice to abuse I believe.
Ok.....The New Yorker is not trying to smear Obama, The New Yorker is doing what it does best, poke fun at the idiocy of the Media. The New Yorker is trying to point out how ridiculous the media is, and is in a way trying to make fun of the way the media portrays Obama. I know many of the people on here are going to try and say that the New Yorker is "racist" but come on!! I think this is a funny cover, and it's just out there to show how stupid the media is.
Obama "As seen through Rush-tinted glasses!"
The cover douses flames with gasoline. Who could have predicted the mud-slinging against Obama would be as bad from the left as it is from the right?
From Limbaugh, O'rilley, Ann Coulter it would be declared racist. From the New Yorker it is considered satire? Oh wait, since they went on TV to announce its satire it's all better?
I am not buying it New Yorker. I am not buying it.
Give me a break people.... it's so clearly satirical that to get upset about it is absurd. A cover that pokes fun at lies and distortions about Obama shouldn't be drawing this much outrage from left wing blogs etc.
Yes, I am an Obama supporter. Yes, I find the cover funny. No, its NOT worth getting upset over.
Good lord... its just one faux outrage after another. Politics in this country so often becomes inane, stupid "controversies" over misunderstandings and misinterpretations. I for one, am sick of it.
To get across the point that New Yorker was apparently trying to make, that image of the Obamas would need to be the picture on a TV set with a 'Fox News' logo in the corner. With a very fat couple watching the TV in the foreground and a copy of NYPost (also a Murdoch propaganda outlet) with a 3 inch headline saying 'Obama! Secret Muslim!!!' lying on the floor...
But without that context it hands ammo to the conservative media.
this, like all the other questionable 'journalistic' endeavors will do nothing but help obama in the long run.
even the painfully dumb are seeing through this kind of slander.
Is this cover more likely to dispel or enhance the myths?
What do you expect from a magazine run by closet Zionists? For them it's win-win. Irony noting liberals will buy more issues & hillbillies will support their pro-Israel hidden agenda.
It's satire. I don't see what the big deal is. If the cover is enough to sink Obama, then he was the wrong candidate to nominate. Get over it.
Unforgivable race and fear carding to white people(to, of course sell their magazine) who dislike and or are afraid of black folks and Muslims holding public office. Hate and fear PROFITEERING at it's worst....case closed.
Oddly enough, no, it wont. Which, I think, is an ironic statement about our collective intelligence as Americans - we're more apt to accept the exaggeration as fact when finding the humor would take any effort.
What's more ironic is that the editors of a publication with the legacy of the New Yorker would think for a moment that 8th grade intellects their journalists are expected to dumb down their writing for WOULD find the humor before believing the exaggeration.
If the Obamas were in anyway similar to the cartoon on the new yorker cover they would get my support. Of course i'm a militant leftist revolutionary so nobody wants my support. Y'all just move along, nothing to see here...
Let's make lemonade out of this lemon:
1) Push New Joker (sic.) to give us a McCain follow up.
2) Keep pushing the absurdity of this, to try to reach those who want to believe it, and embarass them with facts ie. use the spotlight.
3) Point out that: "This is what it has come down to."
4) Warn against the subtile prejudice that will continue to come out...not necessarily by the New Joker, but across the board.
Man, if you guys think the New Yorker is a tool of the conservative media, you need to read it sometime. Sy Hersh, anyone?
Shine a light, people!! This is just shining a light on the absurdity that is Faux News, O'Reilly, Limbaugh, Coulter, Murdoch....etc., etc., etc.!
count me in the camp of you people need to get over it. it's satire. it's funny. it's smart. and, yes, it might actually require people to think in order to get it. too bad that's so hard for most people in the US, but that shouldn't stop them from trying anyway. just another example of the anti-intellectualization of our culture.
Back in the old days, New Yorker covers used to be completely unrelated to the content inside the magazine. The fact that they are now using cover art to promote content inside is another sign of that magazine's dumbing-down and sad decline.
Let's get on with real issues please. The New Yorker is not the enemy. One "cover malfunction" is not going to derail Obama's campaign. I think all the hoo-ha over this cover is nonsense, personally, and yes I am a subscriber. The New Yorker has been an important leader in publishing the details of the Bush Administration's crimes. They were also the first place many people read the name Barack Obama back when he was running for Senator in May 2004 and before his keynote address at the Democratic convention.
ocinemod @ 13:
Remember Paul Krassner's cartoon "One Nation Under God" ??
If not I'll let you imagine it and I'm certain you get it right!
Too clever by half is 100% right - New Yorker needs to get a grip of itself.
Sorry Xoites, hit the wrong button. You gotta do what your conscience dictates.
mudshark @ 358:
Yes, i can not vote for him. I can not vote for McCain either. Once again i have been given no options.
xiotes@361
Well I certainly do know how you're feeling. Give it some time x. we need you .
The artist who painted this satirical cartoon is a Canadian. Have a look at some of his previous work in the New Yorker. Bush is treated harshly but no one noticed THAT one.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/13/barry-blitt-addresses-his_n_112...
xoites defends Constitution @ 354:
Riggsveda @ 342:
So you're going to vote for McCain. That is some shameful shit.
Your link-round-up on this cover should include Dr. Shaw's analysis over at BagNews.
The BagNews link:
http://bagnewsnotes.typepad.com/bagnews/2008/07/the-politics-of.html
As joe cantwell Says:
All of this doesn’t make the New Yorker public enemy #1, just makes them idiots of the week….”
As I view the pic of Obama. In his islamacic headress and Michelle in her revelutionary, qeu Guivera, clothing, I have to ask. Who set them up?
Someone did.
Troubled Texan
How many people remember the most famous New Yorker cover of the past few decades (a New Yorker's view of the world, 1976, Saul Steinberg)? I know many people in the NYC area who proudly hang framed versions of that. As recently as last year when I asked various people about it, the NYC-area people said (in general) that they loved it because it ridiculed what the rest of the country thought about NYC. When I asked people far away from NYC about it, the general response was that it was funny because it was true-- in other words, they really believed that New Yorkers felt that way.
I think this cover will also go down in history. The people who get it will find it very funny since they understand that it is what a lot of corners of the country think about Obama, so it really is a satirical dig at the same know-nothings who keep insisting that Obama must be Muslim, etc. The people who don't get it will think either that it is true or that it is massively offensive. For anyone writing in, please keep your comments in some permanent form. And see if you agree in 30 years.
Publishing is a funny business. I'm willing to believe there are a few moronic little Muffies at the New Yorker who thought it would be "fun" to be in publishing and believe this article is amusing -- and that's pretty much their level of depth. But assuming they really would like to hire college graduates and do make that a policy, I find it hard to believe the majority of content staff at a magazine like the New Yorker have never heard of McLuhan, Chomsky or postmodernism. Clearly a high percentage of the people at the New Yorker must have understood that this cover was damaging.
"If your satire does not offend...you have failed as a satirist" _Confucius (551-479 BC)
Please try talking for yourself, and not for white people in America or black comedians.
Nicky @ 352:
Lighten up, John. I know you feel passionate about Obama, but you will never convince 100% of the people to feel the way you do. Satire of any public official is necessary at all times.
If anyone still gives a shit:
http://www.caglepost.com/
xoites defends Constitution @ 274:
Yep. So either Obama is an idiot or he's playing for poll points.
Hmmmm? I wonder which it is?
Johnny2BadObamaCaved @ 374:
The report I heard was that when Obama was asked about the cartoon he shrugged and said he had no comment. This makes me wonder if he even knew about it at the time he was asked.
pinkobait @ 373:
Thanks for the great link. Cagle provides excellent analysis, although I disagree about the thought bubble. I think in this case the cartoon is so obviously satire, and it is so obvious to anybody who has been paying attention that this is that case, that a thought bubble would be redundant, and in fact, less clever. Besides, Republicans don't read the New Yorker, nor do people who aren't otherwise widely read, intelligent, and astute. "Consider the audience." Perhaps those who are most offended aren't in the target audience for this particular work?
He could avoid all this stuff by just calling himself Barry O'Bama.
Then again, the Republicans would probably start calling him an Irish terrorist.
The longer this goes on the more suspicious I become of Obama. I mean really, why would such a smart person want to be president of such a dumb country?
The New Yorker shines a bright light on all those Obama rumours. Rumour mongers are like cockroaches, they run and hide when the light's turned on. Keep the lights on until the election.
BaScOmBe hearts Lara Logan @ 74:
i have to agree, mostly... i also understand how this is also a kick in the gut... unfortunate timing...
i "get it", most will too... even thought it was humorous... but it could feed that fire - wouldn't take much anyway...
but, wouldn't it be a hoot if barack and michelle were to dress up like this on halloween?!?!!!
now, THAT would take some “Muchos huevos grandes”!
How the UK media reported it: Channel 4 News 14 July 2008
Johnny2BadObamaCaved @ 374:
Neither, actually. We get your point that you don't like Obama because he isn't ideologically pure enough for you, which you make over and over again. Sorry to tell you this but the world wasn't created exactly to your specification. Why don't you just quit your belly aching and do something redemptive for a change?
Wit and satire are so overrated! I personally find it boring.
Barbara in BC @ 379:
Unless the BC stands for Bloom Country, I'll assume you, like the New Yorker artist who did the cover cartoon, are Canadian or you type as badly as me and are from our nation's capitol or Jesse Helms homeland.
I'm from Texas. We got us some big sumbitchin cockaroaches down here. Many have been elected to high office. What you are referring to are too big and gnarly to be cockaroaches. With your Cockaroches, it ain't what they eat and carry off, its what they mess up and leave behind. Kind of like trolls. Nope. Not cocaroaches. Thems weasels, ma'am. And not the mechanical kind the GREAT Ron Popoeil used to sell. You cannot scatter 'em with light. You gots to trap 'em. Liberal weasels eat their own. Right wing types like to eat dark meat. When they smell it its lights out whether your lights are on or not.
Remember, don't feed trolls. Trap weasels. And please everybody, do not quote me at #352. The monitor aleady said it was too long the first time. Insult me by number. It saves bandwidth. That said old Ruffled, or Fuddled at # 352, I would never presume to speak for white folks. The only Black comedian I know is my son and he speaks for hissef.
Now, probably some 12 or 24 hours since I first heard a report on NPR on it, and started reading internet postings, I hear the first report that actually informs the listener that the magazine entitles the cover "The Politics of Fear." That was on BBC World Service!!
I wish more people would pay attention to details like that. But then again, as a New Yorker subscriber, I'm accustomed to checking the title of the cover pages on the table of contents each week!
JM @ 385:
Now there I go twitching my itchy weasel hunting finger again wasting bandwidth without loading up.
Old JM @ 385 doesn't get it. IT AINT THE ART ITS THE MEDIA.
Want proof? Two acronyms and a confession. BBC. NPR. Subscribes to the New Yorker and always reads the Table of Contents down to the cover art title every gdanged time.
Folks down here in Texas don't know what a Table of Contents is. The only magazines they read is on the cover when they're waiting in the Doctors office or the Tire store.
Weasels cain't read.
Shoot, I know it will come as a shock to you JM, many think a web site is what old Dick Cheney needed when he was a duck hunting down here at that place where they release critters without wings so you can shoot em easier when you are drunk.
The people whose votes will decide this election don't read the NY'er, listen to NPR, or BBC. They watch CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, and FOX. And folks serving at that alphabet soup of news outlets don't give out titles to art work. They just keep reminding folks that Barak feller is Black and fairly controversial for some unknown reason.
To anyone who thinks this cover is ok and just a joke I'd like to relay the "comments" CNN had on about it early this morning, comment number 1 was a woman claiming it was offensive because Michelle Obama is pro gun-control so portraying her with a gun on her back is clearly offensive (strike 1 for wingnut fear of Obama taking their guns), comment number 2 was a man saying that everyone knows Obama has a Muslim ancestry so his taking offense at the cover was ridiculous, that was it, CNN probably claim it was balanced coverage but anyone but a moron can see that it was two strikes for the wingnuts, it's hard to believe those tools at the New Yorker could not see how this would play directly into McCain's hands, either they've got an agenda we don't know about or else they're really a pack of elitist wankers, either way they're a pack of shites!!
If the cover portrayed a Jewish leader with a huge nose hoarding money in the Whitehouse with a huge Israeli flag on his wall as he wipes his arse (or blows his nose) on the stars and stripes would everyone who is now saying we should laugh it off tell us the same thing? Come on be honest now.
glennser
PMD @ 19:
Hear hear. The left should be combatting this type of hypersensitivity, not falling into it headlong. The NYker is not responsible for whether the herd is capable of understanding satire and as several have already pointed out, those who don't understand it don't read the NYker. It is disappointing that C&L throws its hat in with those utterly humorless liberals absolutely petrified of giving offense and whose satire goes further and bites harder than their own. Push this humorlessness far enough and, PRESTO, the left-liberal utopia might as well be Pleasantville.
this whole issue is why the 1st amendment comes first.
kudos to the forefathers.
i expect to see record sales of this particular issue of The New Yorker. good for them.
Well, it sure is going to affect my vote. I'm a retarded Democrat who thinks it's funny.
O.k. is anyone else here old enough to notice the uncanny simularity between Michelle O. and Angela Davis?
Is having a black candidate running for office that touchy a subject that satire is no longer allowed or would it have been fine if it had been something satirizing John McCain? Is Obama so totally untouchable that nothing can be said or done about him without an outrage brewing? I think it is a great cover since I can't say I have seen Michelle Obama with an AK47 or whatever lately.......My goodness, if this is such a touchy area then maybe you are not all as enlightened having a black man running for President as you think you are. Anyone running for that office is fair game for criticism, humor, sarcasm, satire, etc. Get used to it because Obama is not going to be protected from everything forever. And if he feels or his supporters feel that free speech is now no longer acceptable, then maybe he is running for the wrong office.
Both Obamas look adorable in the cartoon. I'm from Canada but I wish I could vote for him!
Nicky @ 387:
I hear you Nicky! Another confession, I've lived in Texas the past 25 years, so I understand exactly what you're saying!!
I suppose it just may be the truth that we get the politicians we deserve, I mean, how may people voted for Dubya in '04...after it was already apparent to anybody paying attention that his administration what driving the whole country to such tragedies as we have continued to endure and will endure the aftershocks of long after he and his ilk have long been banished from the seats of power!! Oops, there I go again with my optimistic belief that people in this country actually do pay attention!!!
Well, the discussion is going on now! Anybody claiming Obama is some sort of secret Muslim or revolutionary can only do so in the bright light of this current dialog! So let's just watch and see what sort of person we elect come November.
And Paulahaha, I have no doubt the big 'fro Michelle sports on the cover was a very deliberate choice on the artist's part...another obvious reference most Americans, I would hope, would be able to read!!
I'm voting for Obama. But I didn't shut off my brain cells or my sense of humor. It's funny! It's satire! Obama should have laughed and moved on instead of reacting like he has a corncob up his ass. Jesus, liberals used to have the market on wiseass, irreverent humor. What has happened to the left?
Faux approves of this message......seriously.
The New Yorker puts itself ahead of the interests of the country and democracy. The cover has succeeded in doing what it was meant to do -- getting attention for a dying, shriveled prune of a magazine. That's all these editors cared about. F-you New Yorker. I've bought my last edition of your rag.
no issue here...... pretty simple......
IF THEY ADMIT THEY ARE WRONG..... print an apology
IF THEY SAY IT WAS A FUNNY......... print the McCain Version too
..............i like a good joke as well as the next guy...........so ON WITH THE HUMOR
As a fellow cartoonist, you can't please all the people all the time. Good drawing. "F" 'em if they can't take a joke.
Zenrage @ 10:
Satire, satire, satire...Where has all the good natured, humor gone today and what
is this World coming to(at least in the US of A) when a cover like this is taken out
of context(satire) and attacked? Only rational answer I can come up with is that
"there is just toooooo much bitterness/hate/anger on both sides of the aisle".
What a nation of whiners you people are.
I knew HuffPo and C&L would have their collective panties in a bunch, but Atrios, I never expected to be this big a pearl-clutcher.
No worries. I doubt the people who still believe the fallacies about Obama read The New Yorker.
Agent_M @ 18:
Manufactured outrage from a manufactured controversy? I think you've bought it, you just don't get it. The punchline here is you, not the New Yorker, and from what I've seen in the media today they're pretty much owning the entire U.S.
Also I'm buying it and framing it.
One might consider such cover art to be "partisan" by political standards. It does not have any humor associated with it that I can see. The NRA might like it due to the assault weapon. Who else would find it amusing? My biggest question is, why would anyone use such a drawing as a cover?
Does the person making that decision have an agenda?
Volum Hussein Christ @ 41:
You're whining.
doctormidnight @ 43:
Sadly, many, many, many reich-wingers will be doing the same thing and will take this "parody" quite seriously.
I dunno guys. This is the first time I've really disagreed with (most of) my fellow liberals on this one. I honestly think that the image on the cover was pretty overt satire and did well to make the right wing smears look outlandish and stupid. But you all have a point. If the populace can believe that Gore actually said he invented the internets, Kerry didn't deserve his medals, and Saddam was behind 9/11, then maybe I do overestimate the intelligence of the public.
And I hope the Obama campaign realizes that, and is too smart to say "We don't like the cover because people won't get that its satire," instead going with "We don't like the cover because it's offensive."
At least I hope that's the case. If they're legitimately offended, then I'm a little disappointed. Remember, it's us who say that it's the conservatives who have no sense of humor, who are unable to understand nuance.
Just my $0.02
Jerry @ 355:
"Think of how fucking dumb the average American is. And then remember that half the country is even dumber!!!" --George Carlin
The cartoon mocks the RIGHT WINGERS, not Obama. How stupid does one have to be not to see that? And if you are that stupid, you should not be allowed to vote.
Paulahaha @ 391:
My god, yes and that was the artists' intention!!! Mocking the right's perception of her as an angry black radical.
glennser @ 387:
It is making fun of the right, not Obama. How thick-skulled can you get?
bornagainpagan @ 396:
Yes, indeed. I'm amazed that this angst-filled thread has gone on for almost 400 posts. Jeez, people. Get a life. It's a CARTOON.
The emotions and controversy it has stirred up proves its success as satire and exposes fears and complexes about politics and stereotyping that badly need to be exposed.
This controversy brings out the anarchist in me. Now that so many people are falling over themselves to condemn this CARTOON (a witty, satirical one, at that), I'd like to see a stand-up comic do Obama in blackface. Wearing an Osama getup, while eating watermelon and drinking malt liquor. Making bombs with Michelle. Just to be a shit-disturber. Bad taste, I know, but I think it would be hilarious.
Bush has destroyed the American economy and killed 1 in 40 Iraqis in the process - who is the really dangerous one in the White House? All those people evicted from their homes thanks to subprime mortgages are not cursing Obama!
Obama supporters have gone a long way on the fake outrage. Please, don't be humorless too. This cartoon is your friend. It's riduculing the stupid things your enemies say. If Obama's campaign loses its sense of context, or irony, of humor, it's in big trouble. Look, McCrummy just said that Obama will trade "defeat in Iraq for the election." That's the attack that's happening. Don't lose the ball in the sun. The New Yorker is your friend.
I just saw a satire on Obama's religion. It was priceless. Had him converting from closet Muslim to Buddhism. That said, for our Candian friends, and other who keeping fixating on the cartoon and not the campaign:
IT IS NOT THE ART IT IS THE MEDIA.
The broadcast media picked this satire up, forced the issue with the campaign, and are now running it as an endless loop. It is being done with the effect of avoiding coverage of the things you think will favor Obama.
Don't fool yourself about the intelligence of the Amereicn electorate. 95% of the people who see this art will not see it on the cover of the New Yorker. They will see it in an e-mail with text that reads "The liberal New Yorker, which supports Obama, is looking forward to the change he will hopes for." They not only won't get the joke, it won't be presented to them as one.
To those who says "have liberal lost their sense of humor? I say, I did not know so many liberals had lost their sense.
It's satire. Get over it Obama. With all the real problems in the world, Obama has the gall to get outraged by a satiric magazine cover! Hey Obama, you know what upsets me? The fact that you couldn't even bother to vote on the climate-change bill. If the election were held two weeks ago, I would have voted for Obama and not voted in any of the races on the rest of the ballot (the Pennsylvania Democratic Party being so thoroughly corrupt and all). If the election were held right now, I wouldn't even bother to walk to the polling station. Perhaps Obama will win my vote back. He certainly has enough charisma to do so, but he won't if he continues to run a campaign that is degenerating into a textbook example of the worst aspects of American politics 101.
Was this Really Necessary? Laughing Anyone?
This week’s cover of the New Yorker is so ill conceived, so poorly constructed and so singularly un-satirical that it makes me wonder why the liberals in America don’t just let the Republicans do all the voting and stuff and be done with it. Really. It would be less painful to watch.
Such a stupid cartoon clearly trying to be something funnier and cleverer and, I don’t know, more useful than it actually turned out to be. Context anyone? Humor? Actual satire? Um, not so much. This must be one very insular and rather clueless editorial board to think that this cartoon wouldn’t backfire in a big way. Not to mention perpetuating the Republican agenda of keeping the ill-informed in blissful ignorance.
On Saturday Night Live last May, Amy Poehler as 'Hillary Clinton' says, “I’m a sore loser, I played the race card but Obama didn't, my supporters and I are racist and I have no ethical standards”.
http://ransomthink.blogspot.com/2008/05/amy-poehler-as-hillary-clinton-o...
This satirical presentation was a LOT LESS "cartoony" than the cover of the New Yorker. Many, many more potential voters saw that SNL opening skit than will ever see all the New Yorker covers this entire year. There was no sense of irony or comic reversal about anything they have 'Hillary Clinton" saying about herself and her supporters. There was no comparable skit later in the show depicting Barack Obama as, for instance, clueless about the economy or reminding us that his campaign actually played the race card throughout the last 18 months.
As far as I could tell, no pundits on any political talk show cited that satirical routine on Clinton and made a case that SNL crossed a line or was feeding the beast of her enemies and opponents. And no one from the Clinton Campaign condemned SNL for it.
Obama and his handlers are hopeless cry-babies.
ghostrider @ 24:
Sure, you can call it a test of his worth, but It's really more about the passive-aggressive nature of perpetuating these stereotypes...again...now in the New Yorker. I'm really kind of flustered.
I don't care WHO the guy is. I get tired of seeing blacks and browns constantly get smeared negatively, no matter what the context it is. Kind of hard to "get over it" when this crap is perpetuated in the media ad infinitum...whether there is an election going on or not. Since 911 and Iraq, I have never seen so many people scared of brown people in my life.... Or have you been paying attention?
I'm sure those brown goat herders finally released from Gitmo will just "get over it".
What is going on? It's a magazine cover! A picture! A very memorable picture I guess. What would the reaction have been had the daughters been tugging at a pant leg? There's much going on like the economy being shredded daily, the war spreading in Afghanistan, the energy crisis. We don't need to make mountains, we already got em.
As November rolls around and gets closer and closer to reality, the rich white corporate bigots, come out in force. You have to realize they would not have anything to talk about if this brother was not in the race, just kicking the crap out of their selected choice. No matter what distracting made up polling data they sell us this week, it is so clear that McCain has little or NO support at all.
All we need to be doing right now and signing up democratic poll workers, all over the country to watch these bastards and we are home free. I go to my two hour training class this week and if many of you can't do it yourself, send your kids down to do the job. They can make a cool $125.00 or more for the one day of work.
There is no question about it folks, these people are simply besides themselves with anger that this young brilliant brother will in fact become this nations most prestigious and honorable individual, this country has ever known, so don't think they will not do any and everything they can think of to block what they know is going to be a land slide, if we do not get in the faces of these people in charge of our voting process.
They are so stupid, they don't even realize that the more they pull the kind of crap, they pull in their cheap tawdry efforts to demonize and distract, American people from the real issues that need to be addressed. The more likely the people are going to get behind Senator Obama. If for no other reason, then he is simply not one of them.
I venture to guess, they are still comatose, of the idea that pretty much 80% of American people despise those that bring us this kind of junk everyday. They come up with a different demented disgusting racists rants every week to distract us, just to have something other then anything close to the truth to discuss. Why in the world would the old sick bastards that own operate and control all our media, pay Shaun, Rush and O'Riley the kind of money they do?
And the people who actually waste time listening to these perverts, continue to be misguided, mislead and uninformed, which adds to the problems in this country,
Makes no difference how many of us suffer with the loss of jobs, health Care, our homes. Not even the continued death and destruction of our young people to which few if none of them worry about, take place. They simply do not give a dame.
We are just pissing, moaning and winning in their eye's and it seems the darker complexion of the people in pain, the more gleeful they become as the entire world watches these clowns, depict our country in this circus style manor.
This stinks but so do the Republicans.
Certainly John Amato does not speak for all C&L fans. But he's a smart Yankee fan. He should know that it's satire. And if he really didn't get it, then this country is more stupid and doomed than I thought.
It's not just satire, it is BRILLIANT satire.
Compare John Amato's reaction to the one at Sadly, No!
Satire need not have a punchliine.
It can in fact be very grim.
However repeating the accusations and adding nothing to them a myna bird could do.
When Jonathan Swift wrote A Modest Proposal he wasn't repeating anyone's contention that the Irish should eat their own.
This cover challendges the New Yorker's patina of sophistication
Especially when they repeat the rash limpballs--ann colter justification, "It was only a joke."
Challenges.
I vote good satire. The more it gets dragged around the better for Obama.
BlueEgpytian @ 405:
For people who complain that we're too stupid to get the satire, read the quoted text and REALLY think about it. This is RACISM through and through, and calling it satire is doublespeak.
Over at another blog, there's a post complaining that liberals who are upset about the cartoon don't care about artistic liscense and want to cater to the knuckledraggers.
My response is that some of us don't want to cater to the knuckledraggers, we just know they is armed and object to our side passing them the ammunition.
To all the people who were offended by this cartoon: are those of us who changed our screen names to So-and-so "Hussein" So-and-so just as guilty?
Rusty Steelers = Packers Shackleford @ 414:
Hussein in the Membrane?
I'm loving this cartoon more and more because it's made something clear to me: we have to take back the left from the humorless, perpetually offended, self-righteous, puffed-up school marms that rule the blogosphere these days. More satire, not less. More laughter -- mocking, self-mocking, it's all good. More wit, less whining.
Annoyed Canuck @ 399:
To be fair, there are four hundred posts because two hundred of them (this is a rough estimation) are arguing that there's not a damn thing wrong with the cover.
James Carville is full of crap.
CNN should just drop his contract (with the American viewer) and let him slither off at long last into his concrete coffin with Mary Matalin.
"So happy together" ... lol
Annoyed Canuck @ 399:
Yes, indeed. I'm amazed that this angst-filled thread has gone on for almost 400 posts. Jeez, people. Get a life...
Haven't you heard?
Life magazine is out of print.
hello @ 420:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfuRz1w_8ss
I should explain that Carville forever lost what little respect I ever had left for him in his segment on Anderson Cooper last night, for his defense of that indefensible magazine cover.
ysbaddaden @ 422:
Thank you, ys.
Feeling much better now :D
The cartoon is excellent. Whiner libs need to lighten up. It's okay for them to attack in every sort of manner, but when the're given a little in return, it's over the top. Any student of American history knows that this cartoon is nothing compared some of the ones we've seen throughout our history of elections. Stop whining. Come out of your dream world, and embrace reality.
Speaking of American history, this cover will be in the archives to remind people in the future of how some people were nervous about President Obama when he was running for president. Imagine! And that other New Yorker cover by Barry Blitt showing Bush and crew failing to react to Hurricane Katrina will document who was the worst president of all time.
The Daily Show recently showed Obama wearing an unfortunate "road flare vest" as an example of photos taken out of context. It was funny. The New Yorker cover is funny. It's satire. Irony. Anyone who is offended doesn't get out much. It's a rather brilliant skewering of right-wing stupidity.
And I thought only right-wingers lacked a sense of humor.
Kudos, New Yorker.
Hey,I think there should be equal time for a satirical cover of John and Cindy McCain-WHY NOT? Especially now that they are rollin' out the Budweiser beer barrels full of cash!!!!!!!!!!That oughtta inspire some primo buffoonery-and personally, they are both practically caricatures(McCains) to begin with. How about a contest here at C and L to come up with a cartoon cover of the McCains,hmmmh????
Chill out and check the alternative:
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/horsey/viewbydate.asp?id=1792
ha...i mean, quit your bellyaching..."imagine how the right would react"...so, now we're supposed to think about what the "right" would do and DO THE SAME??!?!?! absurd...why don't we all start fighting to ban abortions...
good job new yorker....
Next: a graphic of McCain being tortured? THe cover was beyond offensive. I dont subscribe, thank God, and will try to never touch one again.
Rollo Tomassi @ 26:
Are all you people clueless? Yes, the New Yorker is elitist, and not afraid to be. They don't dumb down their writing for the morons on the right and, apparently, the left who would take this as real. Moreover, if the whiners (and here I think the term is appropriate) like the people posting here didn't make a fuss about it, none of the racist idiots who would take it seriously would have noticed it; to expand on what someone earlier said, not only are they highly unlikely to be regular readers of the New Yorker, they're unlikely to be regular readers at all.
I get the satire. And I'm sure the Republicans would have no problem with an analogous cover of McCain guzzling Anhauser-Bush and watching war porn with Phil Gramm, because of course they're sufficiently sophisticated to recognize parody. Right?
Dr. Hussein Matt @ 46:
Oh noes!!! We better get in our jammies and climb into bed with mom, 'fore the scaawy sccaawy retards on the right get mean at us!
Where's my bwanky?!!!?
The people that are stupid enough to believe these covers are the same people that believe Mad Magazine covers and they ain't gonna be bright enough to vote for Obama anyway.
Volum Hussein Christ @ 50:
You're whining. Congrats
Dr. Hussein Matt @ 46:
So true. Just another good example of that old saying.."Let the ignorance/stupidity shine through."
I was a bit horrified at first - Obama's Muslim garb; the "terrorist fist-bump"; Michelle's "angry" 'fro, camo pants & assault rifle ..
But by the time I got to the American flag burning in the fireplace I had to start laughing.
And then I saw the picture of Osama bin Laden on the wall smiling warm approval at Obama & Michelle and I had to congratulate the New Yorker cartoonist for capturing ALL THE IDIOCY OF THE RIGHT WING TOOLS in a single picture.
(well .. maybe not ALL .. the capacity for idiocy being endless ..)
Yes - it's tasteless. It was meant to be.
I think the discussion it provokes is good.
And I'm sure O'Racist will be outraged this evening and will be calling the New Yorker a vile Nazi magazine. I'll even help him out with the script
O'Racist: All kinds of vile stuff. And I said that these tactics that are being used in this magazine, The New Yorker, are the same exact tactics that the Nazis used in the late '20s and early '30s to demonize certain groups of people, so it would become easier for them, the Nazis, when they took power, to hurt those people.
First you have to demonize; first you have to create the hatred. Then you can take action. Now the hatred is by right against left. That's what's going on there.
I encourage everyone [Deleted. Over the top-Sitemonitor] to the New Yorker as a response to this outrage.
The world has gone vanilla and Swift spins in his grave.
Dr. Hussein Matt @ 46:
I sure hope so - it will make for a never-ending orgasm of humor. And what better way to identify the idiots from the not-so-idiotic? Simply ask "oh hey what's that?" If the response is "that's in the dictionary next to 'satire' and also 'large scale ownage,'" you can probably gather that person is relatively intelligent.
If, however, the response is more akin to "The New Yorker sure was brave to print this cover that accurately depicts that negro," look for the nearest exit.
“It seemed to me that depicting the concept would show it as the fear-mongering ridiculousness that it is.”
Yes, but you would have to be living in a country where the population is not primarily composed of idiots with no sense of humor who do not understand what satire is. And as a member of the press, for you not to realize that your audience won't "get it", you BECOME THE PROBLEM you are satirizing.
Get it?
Good thing Mohamed was not in there, there'd be a riot.
Dave G @ 47:
Spot on!!
doctormidnight @ 43:
That's an excellent idea, and I just ordered mine.
They actually sell their covers online. Large format, matted and framed too. They're actually quite gorgeous and ship fast.
http://www.thenewyorkerstore.com/product_details.asp?mscssid=UPN3WFV0EK5...
As usual, Generation Obama is more interested in the cover than the story.
Too much fun listening to the podcast of the "inspiring" speeches...Too much work actually reading his policy positions.
Sad.
The New Yorker needs to give equal time to McCain. Some on the far right have long thought McCain had it easy in the Hanoi Hilton so I think satirical support for their point of view is in order here. I'm looking forward to the New Yorker cover that has a dreamy looking McCain laying in bed smoking. In the satirical cover we see a prostitute just leaving the room through one door while a bunch of his "captors" are entering the room through another door with a poker deck, poker chips, pizza and enough booze to get them through a long night of card playing. A signed picture of Ho Chi Minh over McCain's bed might add a nice touch.
MountainMan23 @ 54:
Another one!! Spot on!!
Johnny2BadObamaCaved @ 62:
Hillary lost, thank God....get over it.
Lighten up, for heaven's sakes. It's satire.
I find it very funny that the knee-jerk reaction of those on the left to things like this is nearly always, "What would the right say if...." Well, heck, we know what the right would say about anything, whether it is satirical, critical, or a completely true revelation of a skeleton in someone's closet, with photos, videos, and a signed confession. So who cares what they say? I don't, and I don't find this any more offensive than I would if the Obamas were depicted this way in a Saturday Night Live sketch. The surest way of showing the absurdity of bald-faced lies is to depict them as if they were the truth, which is what is going on with this "offensive" cover. If folks here on C&L and elsewhere on the left want to act like the right by turning this into a firestorm, then so be it. But it seems rather silly to me.
Its no big deal - John McLaughlin called Obama an "Oreo" on his show yesterday...
Yeah, we've really come a long way baby!
It would have worked if Barry Blitt had put the Obamas in balloon-imagery of a Bible-spouting preacher at a podium. It would have worked very well.
Funny like SNL/Mad -- edgy
I can't wait for the McCain Tail-Hook Beer Bash cover...
I think the Obama camp needs to grow a thicker skin. First Bernie Mac gets lambasted for a joke that every Catskills comic has used since 1951, and now everyone's offended by a satirical magazine cover. I'm an unabashed liberal, but I hate political correctness, especially when it seeks to criticize speech meant to poke fun at the Republican spin machine.
the new yorker is a high context magazine being looked at in a zero context light.
as a regular reader, i'm quite frustrated by the hyberbole and hysteria now surrounding the most recent cover. i feel it tantamount to the left attacking stephen colbert for his work on the colbert report without bothering to watch the show.
the now controversial cover was titled "the politics of fear." is it not a sad irony that we now fear the illustration itself? i think we have better things to worry about.
You all are making me embarrassed to be a liberal - it's no wonder we keep getting our butts kicked and it's no wonder we have the same cowardly reactions by those who represent our views in Congress. It's f**king satire and I don't care if the right misuses it later on or not. Sh*t, they'll come up with their own anti-Obama tripe regardless what the left hands them. you want hide in a corner and refrain from speaking or doing anything lest it provides fodder for the right - go ahead and hide ya sissy.
And for those of you who don't read the NYer, you should be. Sy Hirsch's reporting on the Iraq war and the run-up to the war exposed more lies spread by this admin than any other sources I'd come across at time - lies now confirmed by the recent gov't reports.
Great point.
fucking idiots. if i had a subscription to that piece of shit magazine, i'd cancel it immediately.
Hey New Yorker: this might sound like really clever satire in your Manhattan mahogany paneled editorial room, but just wait until it's being sold on a t-shirt outside the Republican convention.
You dumb motherfuckers.
Chuck Norris @ 42:
I'm sure your intellectually superior mind will continue to read the New Yorker as you go to the polls to vote for McGeezer in November. Let me "generalize" with you "Chuck Norris"....you sound like a guy with a three inch dick who tells the ladies at the 900 numbers that you're six inches.
I'm with the magazine on this one. Obama should pull a raygun and laugh it off. Taking yourself too seriously is a dangerous thing in this campaign.
Kerry lost points because he was completely humorless.
Obama would do well to grow a thicker skin and a sense of humor.
In my view, this is an opportunity for the Obamas in a very long campaign to take a breather from the serious bullshitting that is the campaign and to sit back and have a good laugh at themselves and for the people who try to misuse the lies in the picture to be disarmed.
The real fear here is the "low-information voters", a pejorative euphemism for appalachia and the southern belt if there ever was one. If you refer to the people that will never vote for Obama, they are unreachable anyway, so this is a completely wasted opportunity to enjoy some campaign humor.
If I were Obama, I would have some people 'leak' that I laughed my ass off before straightening up and becoming outraged based on the advice of a campaign aide.
It's political satire, or at least tries to be.
It's a pity the article doesn't discuss/debunk the 'Closet Muslim' and 'Terrorist Fist-Jab' nonsense.
And it's an even greater pity that the media co-dependents out there probably won't discuss/debunk it either, but focus on the Obama campaign's response of 'tasteless and offensive' ... oh, wait, look! It's pictures of Kyle & Vivienne! Ooooooh!
Jim @ 70:
Both sides are "outraged" at every little thing because that way they don't have to bore us with any pesky boring details...like the war, the economy or healthcare.
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