New Yorker Cover pisses off Obama camp

[manifold]

WASHINGTON (AP) — Barack Obama's campaign says a satirical New Yorker magazine cover showing the Democratic presidential candidate dressed as a Muslim and his wife as a terrorist is "tasteless and offensive."

The Associated Press: Magazine's 'satirical' cover stirs controversy

 

[manifold]

Apparently McCain has condemned the cover as offensive too.

This is just the latest example of ancillary support for my thesis that we are becoming a nation of pansies. I blame the feminists.

 

[Ravi]

For the cover or for the fact that you're a pansy?

 

[midcan5]

I wrote them this morning. When a major magazine engages in what is stereotyping terrorism and through association paints an American citizen and presidential candidate with that image every citizen should speak loudly against this nonsense. It perpetuates false information and demonstrates the stupidity that passes for news in MSM today.

 

[editec]

Ironically, they published it as an ironic statement about the nonsense the right wing loonie squads are mass mailing all over the internet.

I don't who the editor was that approved it, but I'm betting he's on somebody's carpet for this gaffe.

 

[Ravi]

The reaction from Obama's camp makes him look weak. Didn't he actually once pose for a picture in a turban and a skirt?

 

[Steerpike]

Ironically, they published it as an ironic statement about the nonsense the right wing loonie squads are mass mailing all over the internet.

Yeah, people missed that entirely. The publication was supposed to make the right-wingers look foolish. New Yorker is hardly a conservative mag.

 

[editec]

Yeah, people missed that entirely. The publication was supposed to make the right-wingers look foolish. New Yorker is hardly a conservative mag.

One would have to have read the New Yorker occassionally.

I'm guessing few people hereabouts are big New Yorker readers.

 

[Steerpike]

One would have to have read the New Yorker occassionally.

I'm guessing few people hereabouts are big New Yorker readers.

But you'd think the people making the big fuss over the cover would likely know a bit about the New Yorker and what they were saying with it...

 

[Abelian Sea]

That's rich. I'll have to find a copy.

Way to tweak everyone's noses at once, NYer.

 

[random3434]

Yeah, people missed that entirely. The publication was supposed to make the right-wingers look foolish. New Yorker is hardly a conservative mag.

Right, but a lot of the right wingers won't "get it"-they'll say..."See?"

 

[Gem]

If Obama is planning on being president - he probably should get used to being the subject of a satirical cartoon or two...I mean, its been known to happen - the caricature of a president showing up in a political cartoon....

I'm surprised by the number of people here who are slamming this cover. What happened to freedom of speech, of expression? Anyone with half a brain understood immediately that the New Yorker was wrapping up all of the idiotic fears some people have about Barak and Michelle Obama in one image in order to ridicule it and show how ridiculous they are.

As far as some right wingers going, "See!" As one person here suggested...well - I would forward that anyone who would say that was obviously never going to vote for Barak Obama in the first place and therefore Barak has lost nothing by him feeling that way. (Not to mention that anyone that monumentally stupid probably doesn't spend a lot of time reading the New Yorker...)

The cover is a help not a hinderance to Barak Obama. Now, whenever anyone brings up anything about his character, his wife's character, questions their beliefs, etc. He will be able to point to the cover and say, "You're doing the same thing this cover does...spreading fear rather than dealing with my message."

Obama's team knows this...they've been doing this for months now. When McCain condemns a liberal magazine for a satirical piece he comes across looking either too stupid to realize it...or too weak to come out and call it like it is.

But, as an intelligent person, to be "offended" by a satirical piece making fun of bigotry and political smear - and to then label it actual bigotry and political smear - as so many are trying to do....well, if it wasn't so sad, it would by hysterically ironic.

 

[Steerpike]

Right, but a lot of the right wingers won't "get it"-they'll say..."See?"

Yeah, so we limit satire and parody to the most obvious lower common denominator because otherwise some people might not get it? I don't think so.

 

[Steerpike]

If Obama is planning on being president - he probably should get used to being the subject of a satirical cartoon or two...I mean, its been known to happen - the caricature of a president showing up in a political cartoon....

I'm surprised by the number of people here who are slamming this cover. What happened to freedom of speech, of expression? Anyone with half a brain understood immediately that the New Yorker was wrapping up all of the idiotic fears some people have about Barak and Michelle Obama in one image in order to ridicule it and show how ridiculous they are.

As far as some right wingers going, "See!" As one person here suggested...well - I would forward that anyone who would say that was obviously never going to vote for Barak Obama in the first place and therefore Barak has lost nothing by him feeling that way. (Not to mention that anyone that monumentally stupid probably doesn't spend a lot of time reading the New Yorker...)

The cover is a help not a hinderance to Barak Obama. Now, whenever anyone brings up anything about his character, his wife's character, questions their beliefs, etc. He will be able to point to the cover and say, "You're doing the same thing this cover does...spreading fear rather than dealing with my message."

Obama's team knows this...they've been doing this for months now. When McCain condemns a liberal magazine for a satirical piece he comes across looking either too stupid to realize it...or too weak to come out and call it like it is.

But, as an intelligent person, to be "offended" by a satirical piece making fun of bigotry and political smear - and to then label it actual bigotry and political smear - as so many are trying to do....well, if it wasn't so sad, it would by hysterically ironic.

 

[Anguille]

The Associated Press: Magazine's 'satirical' cover stirs controversy

Obama is a bore.

 

[AllieBaba]

Right, but a lot of the right wingers won't "get it"-they'll say..."See?"

Spare me. Right wingers aren't as stupid as the lefties, who have a cow over McCain's joke about encouraging Iranians to smoke.

Ah yes, the New Yorker. That bastion of taste and dead on journalism.

 

[manifold]

Ah yes, the New Yorker. That bastion of taste and dead on journalism.

Not to mention I once heard they plagiarized a Ziggy comic.

 

[AllieBaba]

I find them insufferable and pretentious, myself.

But I've also read some really fantastic stuff. Literature, not journalism. Or rather, somewhere in between.

 

[random3434]

Yeah, so we limit satire and parody to the most obvious lower common denominator because otherwise some people might not get it? I don't think so.

Uh, you just described every reality show that America eats up nightly.

What does that say for the 'lower common denominator' of people?


Which was kinda my point of the people who will take this out of context. Tasteless? Yes. Satire? Yes. Did it prove a point? Jury is still out with the American public.

 

[random3434]

From AOL News:


Does Burton have a point? Sure. This image will no doubt become an e-mail-forwarded classic. To his enemies, the cover will represent not a joke, but the ultimate "I told you so!" Essentially, then, the argument against the cover is that it's too subtle for stupid people to understand. Thus, The New Yorker should lower its intellectual standards so that the basest among us (including those that the cartoon is lampooning) don't get the wrong idea.

To my mind, however, the cover art helps Obama more than it hurts him because A) it is funny, and B) it confronts the outlandish perceptions that many have Americans have of Obama head on. The image won't convert anybody into thinking Obama is a terrorist, it simply exposes the prejudices that already exist. Besides, it's good practice for when the real life Obamas take over residence in the White House. After all, an American president is perhaps the single most popular subject for cartoonists in the world.