This week’s New Yorker magazine pokes fun at smears directed at Barack Obama , but the Democratic candidate isn’t laughing.
The cover portrays Obama in Middle Eastern garb bumping fists with wife Michelle, who sports an Afro, a rifle and military garb. In the background, an American flag burns in the fireplace.
The left-leaning magazine’s cover neatly summarizes several smears that have surfaced this year: that Obama’s a “secret Muslim” who hates America, Michelle is a ’60s-style black militant.
And that fist bump, the modern version of the high five? It’s been described as a “terrorist fist jab” by a Fox News anchor, who later apologized.
The Obama campaign has taken aggressive measures to knock down these and other false rumors. It’s not amused with the magazine’s cover.
“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,” spokesman Bill Burton said in a prepared statement.
Republican John McCain agreed with his rival for the November election.
“I just saw a picture of it on television. I think it’s totally inappropriate and frankly I understand if Sen. Obama and his supporters would find it offensive,” McCain told reporters in Phoenix.
What do you think? Is the cover out of bounds, or do the Obama folks need to lighten up?
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The magazine cover pokes fun at those who would stereotype the Obamas so crudely. It is a reasonable attempt to shame the 10% polled who believe Barack Obama to be Muslim, and those who would claim he is anti-American.
The correct Obama response was given by John Stewart of the Daily Show. To paraphrase:
It’s a cartoon! If I was an anti-American jihadist, I would be offended by cartoons, but as a Christian American, I am not offended, and the cartoonists have the right to print what they wish.
There has been lots written about how it is hard to tell jokes about Obama, because there is no obvious hook, like womanizing for Bill Clinton and age for John McCain, but I think all this rejecting and renouncing that Obama does might be reaching a level of self-parody.
- Posted by David Rasmussen[...] the New Yorker magazine tried to satirize some of the myths about Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack [...]
- Posted by Satire alert — New JibJab video out! | Ertx.com - Updated Every 20 MinutesPlease see my visual suggestion for the New Yorker. The cover only lacks context:
http://heatherleila3.blogspot.com/2008/0 7/what-they-should-have-done.html
- Posted by HeatherI’ll have to go with David Vance — “It’s a damn cartoon!!” Let it go and let’s try - at least - to fix America….
Mary
- Posted by MaryI can understand the Obama camp reason for the politically weighed response, but all you people who comment about never buying a New Yorker again because the magazine is secretly racist or something need to relax a little.
- Posted by BradWhen was the last time a Presidential Candidate did a “FIST BUMP” ON TV like they actually did ??
Michelle actually sat down with Farrakhan and agreed with him soapboxing about the Whitey’s.
We don’t need more of Obama.
- Posted by HarryIt’s a damn cartoon. Lighten up. We’ve gone way too far with the “politically correctness” stuff. Let the press have the freedom that our Constitution and Amendments provide and promise.
- Posted by David A VanceToo many people in the US simply do not understand satire — its intent or purpose. Instead of showing what Obama is NOT — why not really come up with something that shows what he is FOR in a satirical/humorous way?
Mary
- Posted by Maryhey guys, It’s a CARTOON. Not only that, it’s a NEW YORKER CARTOON, of course its not meant to be taken seriously, it was printed to illustrate the falsehoods and myths that the media and GOP have concocted, if you take it seriously, than I am to assume that “sarcasm” and “satire” have never been in your vocab.
- Posted by NickThe New Yorker cartoon is offensive. It’s the modern day equivalent of portraying African Americans in cotton field clothes. Frankly, it just looks like an updated racial stereotype. If the Obama’s weren’t African Americans, there is no way they would be drawn like that.
I read a quote where the New Yorker editor claimed they were just trying to lampoon how Obama’s right wing critics were portraying him. If the editor really believes that, then he is stupider about the media and the American public than someone who doesn’t work in the media. The vast majority of people will see the picture, get no context, and just associate Obama and his wife as a radicals.
If they want to joke about the candidates, pick something with less racial overtones, and something that those of us who read the New Yorker would actually find funny.
- Posted by Sam GoldbergRE: 3:45pm …”how could such evil be allowed to exist in America?” I think that would be the 1st Amendment to the Constitution, have you heard of it? I was texting with friends today wondering if I was the only Liberal who “got it”. Not the only it seems, but one of a few. Kind of sad.
- Posted by JPI think it’s a riot. The only reason his supporters are so upset is the ring of truth this cartoon suggests, I am a little surprised they didn’t add Barack’s Racist ties to this cartoon. I give the New Yorker much credit for having the backbone to do this. Did the Obama supporters think he was going to cake walk to the POTUS?
- Posted by WaltHis closet has way too many skeletons.This is only the beginning.
Tim Russert, where art thou? Please send forth the rainbow and HEAL
- Posted by McKaythe MEDIA industry. It truly has lost its way!
Obama has a lot of nerve with his finger pointing. He is about as dependible as the weather - and is on the far left - accusing all of us of this and that but not taking on any responsibility himself.
Shame on him
- Posted by leeIt’s simply racist. If David Remnick doesn’t get it; he’s simply another Don Imus… more “nappy heads” for
them to mock. If David Remnick doesn’t get he’s offended muslims, christians, afro americans, and millions of others with their ‘intellectual’ bullying; New Yorker Board of Directors simply needs to follow the example of the Board of Directors at CBS… that is unless they
also are all afraid someone other than one who looks like them lives in their White House..
The first test of satire is it has to be humorous. This
wasn’t funny in the least except to racists.
Where’s the cartoon of Bush, Cheney, Rove, Rumsfeld sitting around a poker table all wearing their western
outfits, waving their 6 shooters and taunting the ‘insurgents’ to bring it on. 4000 Americans have died
as Bush called for the insurgents to bring it to them.
Thousands more troops have been wounded, neglected and left on the floor at Walter Reed Hospital to fend for themselves while they were less than 8 miles away from the offices of those folks who sent them into combat without proper care and equipment, Bush, his cabinet and
McCain himself who claims to be a friend of the military.
Friends don’t send friends into harm’s way in combat and then leave them to fend for themselves.
Let’s see if the New Yorker satirizes that.
- Posted by RonInteresting… I doubt that the editors allowed this cover to hurt Obama on purpose. You can argue that it will hurt him I suppose and I think it was a mistake to publish it. However, you have to wonder if this raises a big enough stink that it actually helps him by way of drawing attention to the lies.
- Posted by KellyIf nothing else, the New Yorker cover has spurred us to talk about the media-generated perceptions of the Obamas. It has also opened the door to question of “what do voters really consider when choosing a political candidate?”
By the time this “tempest in a teapot” has boiled over, no one will be able take the “terrorist” label seriously. Or so I would hope.
- Posted by MikaleJust another example of the racist sublimation of the “average American” who does not understand satire and believes whatever the media suggests. A sad day for journalism. Shame on the New Yorker!!!!
- Posted by HaroldSATIRE OR REALITY?
The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream
is the second book written by US Senator Barack Obama. It was the number three bestseller on The New York Times nonfiction list as of October 2006. The book represents Obama’s personal manifesto for his 2008 campaign for the presidency.
A quote for your review.
“I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.”
James H. Cone
Aspects of Cone’s theology and words have been the subject of controversy in the political context of the 2008 Presidential campaign, as Barack Obama’s pastor Jeremiah Wright noted that he had been inspired by Cone’s theology. Some scholars of black theology have noted that the controversial quotes do not necessarily represent black theology as it is currently practiced or the views of people like Wright who practice it. Cone has responded to the controversy by noting that he was generally writing about white churches that did nothing to oppose slavery and segregation and not about white people as individuals.
- Posted by JR MartHoover Institute fellow Stanley Kurtz, in a political commentary in National Review, wrote that “Cone defines it as “complete emancipation of black people from white oppression by whatever means black people deem necessary.” For Cone, the deeply racist structure of American society leaves blacks with no alternative but radical transformation or social withdrawal. So-called Christianity, as commonly practiced in the United States, is actually the racist Antichrist. “Theologically,” Cone affirms, “Malcolm X was not far wrong when he called the white man ‘the devil.’” The false Christianity of the white-devil oppressor must be replaced by an authentic Christianity fully identified with the poor and oppressed.”