Yeah, its really stupid of Obama to denounce it.  One of the few likable things Michelle O has ever done is when she joked on The View about how "whitey" sounded like something George Jefferson would say.  Obama should have joked about this one too.  The fact is they're worried that the non-liberals are too DUMB to get the satire.  Another example of liberal condesention toward bitter hillbillies.  

Gurdjieff66 -- I hope that's a joke about people being too dumb to get the satire, because clearly some people are. In spite of endless coverage of the Rev. Wright scandal, only 57% of Americans believe Barack Obama is a Christian.

Go look at a the thread on Megan McArdle's Atlantic site -- the libertarians (a loony lot, granted) are already breaking down each element of the drawing to determine what's "true" about it. Michelle's afro? Well, she allegedly wrote a thesis about black power. Burning flag? Well, he met William Ayers, and he was photographed standing on the flag.

Obama's response was right. They said their piece about it and that was it. They're not demanding an apology or a retraction or howling and screaming. Obama gave a reporer a "no comment on that" and a campaign flack made one statment. If they'd said nothing at all, the TNR bleat would be "John Kerry 2.0."

This idea that FOX only picked up on this because of the Obama camp's statement is so naive as to be ludicrous.

I meant "reporter" and "statement," obviously. Thanks, Lagavulin.

This is just dumb. Nobody waits for word from a campaign spokesman to act like an idiot.

Sometimes it's necessary to drag something half in the light into the spotlight so you can let the disinfectant work. If it were inside the magazine and not the cover it wouldn't even have hit the eyes of anyone who might - as gurdjieff66 does on another thread - believe that there's a grain of truth to any of it. But it's on the cover, on "newsstands everywhere".

It was a large feature on Britian's Channel 4 news.  Ridiculous.

M Crowley, surely you know better.  This would have galloped around on its own (and in fact, is pretty much doing so)...

I'm with Linda.  You really think that the campaign's statement had anything to do with it showing up on the cable news shows?  Come on.  Those guys are so hungry for content, they jump all over anything that has the slightest whiff of controversy about it.  If the Obama campaign had shrugged the cover off, the cable news drones would still be ranting and raving about it--and remember anything visual such as this cartoon is gold on tv--only in that case everyone would be busily parsing the Obama campaign's limp-wristed response to this affront.

I'd be curious to know this: each time Obama's campaign takes umbrage at something, and each time a member of the press says how stupid it was for him to take umbrage, how much his campaign donations actually went up.

And anyhow, Drdan had a good point that it may not be so bad for Obama to fall afoul of the "liberal press."

"The fact is they're worried that the non-liberals are too DUMB to get the satire.  Another example of liberal condesention toward bitter hillbillies."

What roz said.  What if some people (liberal, conservative, whatever) are actually ignorant of the facts?  A sizable number of Americans believe Obama is a Muslim, and many of them are probably less likely to vote for him because of it.

It is not elitist to hold up these false rumors to the light of day and say that they're wrong.  It is not elitist to call someone on a falsehood they're repeating and to explain to them why they have the facts wrong.  Obama's faith is not a matter of personal opinion.  It's not an "I think he's a Christian, but you think he's a Muslim.  Let's agree to disagree" type of thing.  It is not elitist to tell someone they're ignorant of the facts when, in fact, they are.  It is not elitist to point out that most people who think Obama is a Muslim are less likely to vote for him because of it.

I think that segments of the American population really need to grow a spine and stop this self-victimization.  If you think Obama is a Muslim, you ARE ignorant of the facts.  I'm an Obama supporter and have donated to his campaign, but I'm fully aware that there are many reasonable arguments for voting against him.  If you think that meeting with foreign dictators is always wrong, if you think that getting out of Iraq as quickly as he wants to is irresponsible, if you think that his public resume is too thin, or you think that John McCain would better prosecute the War on Terror, then by all means vote for McCain.  I disagree with these arguments and I'd try to persuade you otherwise, but I know that your beef with Obama is based upon opinions of him and his policy, and based upon the direction you think he'd lead the country, which are entirely valid.  However, if you vote for McCain because you think Obama is a muslim then (aside from the religious bigotry) you are basing your vote on LIES.  Not opinions, but lies.  Not facts, but lies.  If you willfully ignore the overwhelming evidence that Obama is a Christian, then you are not only ignorant, which may not be your fault, but you are willfully ignorant.

Although I disagree with the criticism of the New Yorker, I also disagree with the criticism of Obama's spokesman.  In short, I find nothing offensive about the cover, but I think it was brilliant of Obama's people to pump up the volume.  

Consider the possibility that this raging discussion will force everyone to acknowledge repeatedly that Obama is a member of the Established Church of Christian America - a card-carrying, church-going Christian, not a Muslim.  That should put a dent in the 13% of America who haven't got the message yet - and maybe some of those folks will have less reason to go to the polls on Nov 4 and vote for McCain.  No need to save America from Islam - okay, I'll stay home.

I think this is brilliant.  Much better than having Obama repeatedly assert his non-Muslimness - which was beginning to irritate a lot of Muslims in Michigan.  

We'll have to wait and see, but I think this ends up helping the Obama campaign.

Neil

rozenon -- I simply find it impossible to believe that that many Americans really think he is a Muslim.  

I have no proof of this, but I think for many "Muslim" is a code-word for what they really want to say but can't:  BHO is an underqualified whitey-hating black man, elevated to Presidential nominee by guilty white elites, who has nothing in common with me and is trying to put one over on everybody.  

In any case, whether they think he is a Muslim, or a closet Stokely Carmichael, the way to address it by directly contradicting it, and also with humour.  Dave Chapelle or Chris Rock might be able to help with the details on this.

psantillana -- as I said, the grain of truth in the cartoon is in its portrayal of Michelle, not Barack.    

bigfish -- I'm voting for Obama, too.  Mainly to keep the neocons out of various federal office buildings.  

I was thinking of that line, "Who died and put you in charge?"...Then it dawned on me that George Carlin died and his last words must have been to The New Yorker.  Cool!

I was a subscriber for at least a couple decade and I think I dropped it around the time Tina Brown took over. I'm no snob (hell, I'm a Hoosier and I think I'd have to leave the state for that label to stick). No, I didn't mind Tina's adding color or photography. I suppose the people and events she thought were important struck be as shallow but then I don't watch E! or read gossip columns.

Anyway, I'm glad to see Carlin passed the funny bone the The New Yorker because it will be neat to have a print version of The Colbert Report.  Yeah, I know he wrote a book but he said it will be a one and done project and Stewart is probably already too jealous of his success to amend his contract for magazine duty.

I'm not naive (Hoosiers aren't snobs or hicks) and I realize it will take more than cartoons and a sarcastic cover if The New Yorker wishes to pick up where Carlin left off. The Barack's are easy targets and I'm waiting for them to nail New Yorky stuff, their Style and their fact checking.

Oh,this should be the last time the editor explains a cartoon. Screwing with the reader's mind doesn't require their cooperation. Follow though with content in the pages and hope it works.

So good luck to The New Yorker and I hope you do Carlin proud. But as he'd be the first to admit, dead guys don't complain.

What is needed is for the New Yorker to do an equally satirical cover on McCain.. TNR readers, especially those who ejoy the Obama cover, can help the cartoonist and editor design this one.  How about:

McCain hugging Bush in the foreground (except maybe the faces are exchanged on the bodies)....  In the background is Cindy dressed as a REALLY expensive call girl... with McCains first wife and kids (carefully labelled as such) crying in the background ..also his black daughter from South Carolina lookung on.... On the wall is a picture of McCain in a n Vietnamese hospital getting a chip implanted in his brain (a.k.a.  the Manchurian Candidate)..... McCain in one hand holds the 49th page of his (unreleased) medical report diagnosing Alzheimers and uncontrollable rage syndrome..A map of the Middle East and Europe on the wall labels countries or religious sects as he has identified them....

and...?????  y'all fill in the rest

Guaranteed to have every McCain supporter in stitches (from giggling??)

When did Michael Crowley become Monica Crowley? The latter made the exact same argument on FOX & Friends this morning (yeah, I watch it -- it's gets me going by making me furious). Ms. Crowley also suggested that because Obama had reacted so angrily about the New Yorker cover it could be a case of "methinks the lady doth protest too much" -- or as she said it, "what is so angry about?"

Basically, had Obama not been mad, the Right and the press would have questioned his patriotism for not wanting to distance himself from a caricature where he was burning an American flag and putting up a photo of Bin Laden. And because he did get mad about the New Yorker cover, the Right gets to re-raise the specter of Secret Muslimhood and wonder what he is *really* so mad about.

Thanks, New Yorker! Hope you got my cancellation e-mail.

Also, I that gurdjieff66 is on to something. "Muslim" has become a code word for people who hate Obama for race-based reasons but who are afraid to articulate those lies. Instead, they suggest that he is what has become an acceptable slur.

for a magazine that pounded John Kerry for adopting a "if you ignore it, it will go away" response, it seems very bizarre and inconsistent for all you tnr boys to now be saying, ignore it, it will go away.

The right wing media was all over this from the start, without any prompting from Obama's campaign. Sheesh, sometimes I think that political junkies go from day to day, changing their tune, forgetting previous advice, always trying to Monday morning quarterback crisis.

Perhaps the name "Scott Thomas" will jangle some of you steel nerved boys back to reality and the folly of ignoring stuff and hoping it will go away.

As for the New Yorker, as I mentioned yesterday, I cancelled my long standing subscription. There is somethiing very irritating about this whole episode which, for me, points to a disconnect that someone like me has always had with magazines like The New Yorker. I can't find the exact words for it but billyard did touch upon it: Most of the people who write for magazines like this are really irritating little twerps who think they're smarter, funnier, hipper, and edgier than average joes. I went to school with a lot of these guys and though we agreed on politics, culturally, I often found their grating sense of ironic superiority annoying and sometimes, funny. Take these boys out of their sheltered and blinkered environment, put their arrogance and grating sense of cultural superiority on the streets that I ran, and they would be hard pressed to find an f-----g gas station to call daddy for help. I guess what I am saying is that though I certainly admire the New Yorker's brains and high velocity sense of humor, deep down, I find a strong strain of cultural stupidity and an oblique connection to middle class reality. That the smart alecks at the New Yorker would think that readers would be bowled over by their brave ironic humor is truly laughable.

gbittner, I think the equivalent McCain cartoon would be a lot less detailed than you propose. I would propose drawing McCain in place of Slim Pickens on the H-bomb from the climax of "Dr. Strangelove," with the missile in some way representing George W. Bush.

Actually, gurdjieff66, one of the reasons I'm voting for Obama is to get Bush's cronies out of the federal regulatory agencies' break rooms.

Mick, you don't actually believe that the media would have passed on a chance to engage in other round of navel-gazing about race and Barack Obama, do you?  There's no chance that they would have passed on a juicy media semi-scandal even if the Obama campaign hadn't issued a curt four-line objection to the cover.

So you are blaming the Obama camp for the firestorm based on what?  Some imaginary alternate scenario of yours.  Is this what seriously passes for commentary in these circles.  Pretty damn stupid if you ask me.  

Bill Carter has an interesting piece in today's Times about the difficulties comedians are having

When you're right Crowley, you're right ... if not for the Obama camps statement yesterday's political press coverage would have left that cover to the side to focus on the news seeping out of Iraq and Afghanistan - O' wait ...

Contra Noam and Mike and Isaac , I think the Obama campaign pretty much had to respond to the New Yorker

Editorial question for TNR, why was the identifiable OBL portrait snipped from the side of the cartoon as posted for this entry?

Will all those who think that the New Yorker cover was harmless fun consider this:

What if the New Yorker ran a picture of Joe Lieberman, wearing a skullcap and prayer shawl, with a very hooked nose and dark beard, with an Israeli flag in one hand and a H-bomb in the other, and wads of money coming out of his pockets, socks and other clothing, speaking at an AIPAC convention, wearing a McCain button?

Great satire, eh?

I found myself agreeing with james Carville for about the first time ever.  He argued that the cover was obviously satire to anyone but an idiot.  Bill Bennett debated back, not unconvincingly, that it's not satire if nobody gets it.

I think the intended audience got it.  Obama's people pretended not to and took the dumbass politician's stance of umbrage and outrage, totally lacking in Obama's supposed nuance.

McCain diplomatically also feigned outrage.  Though, he's no dummy either.

Carville was the only commentator or politician from either side I saw defend the New Yorker.  Amazing.

Can't say I'm not enjoying the New Yorker's suffering, though.

Obama should have joked about it, but seriously, he had to respond somehow.

I can just imagine us talking in the summer of 2004, about how if Kerry had just ignored the swift boat stuff, it would have all been gone in a day, instead of lasting four whole days.

yawn

Well Channy, speaking as a lady - I like that he didn't laugh off or ignore something that included the wife, I dare sau that you don't have to beling to the Women for Obama NYC Chapter to appreciate that.  

I liked it, short and clear. It also shows that his priorities are right - I want to see that he is a man who loves his wife.  Like many things Obama, its both political calculation and the right thing to do.  

Wandrey, I don't disagree with that.  He could have said joke about me but leave my wife out of it.

Again, I would have been really impressed if Obama had not been so conventional and predictable in his response.  Remember, he's supposed to be the smarter, hipper young guy for a new era that transcends dumbed down politics.

I wanted him to say, I get the joke, I appreciate The New Yorker trying to stick up for my by lampooning my looney critics.  But, frankly, I don't think most people are going to interpret the joke as a joke.  And, sorry, but I don't appreciate my wife being included even though I get that  you were trying to defend her, too.

Instead, he acted as if he didn't understand what they were doing or trying to do.  So, in my book, he's dumbing down politics just like his predecessors.

I totally agree with that part Channy. Being an NPR, New Yorker reading, Upper West Sider, I keep feebly hoping the Hipster ("I'd have to see the man dance before I could say if he was a brother" - Obama in a debate re Bill C.) or The Professor - The Speech - will make another apperance, but I know my demoghraphic has been taken care of enough, thank you.  I respect that and totally accept it (unlike my horror show bretheren on the far left, ugh).

Obama knows that.

Read that Lizza article Channy, it was amazing.  Obama really is a steely eyed lizard, which is a great relief to me.  I may be a social worker on the upper west, but I was also raised by a former military man/engineer in Southern California in the 70's.  I only go so liberal.

I like him even more now (although you might want to scream).

I didn't get the satire. Actually, I didn't get the cartoon at all until I read that the woman was supposed to be Michelle. I thought maybe she was meant to be Angela Davis, but then wondered what was funny, or coherent, about that? Anyway it was certainly tasteless and offensive, and I would add crude, but at last it couldn't be anything but racist. What assholes people can be when they think they are being funny - or "satirical."

It's not nice for a white liberal to say another white liberal is racist. Especially when it's so.

"Again, I would have been really impressed if Obama had not been so conventional and predictable in his response.  Remember, he's supposed to be the smarter, hipper young guy for a new era that transcends dumbed down politics."

Oh knock it off, Chan, if Obama had acted "the smarter, hipper young guy for a new era" etc., you would be crowing what a transparent elitist he is. So, now that he doesn't do elitist, he's a hypocrite. Man, you're one smart dude. Quite a trick to have your head so far up your ass you can see so clearly.

tomeg, I interpret a comment as elitist when it is made to people with pretensions about their own status and condescends to people in less rarified demographics.  Referring, of course, to the notorious "clinging to their guns ad bibles" riff.

I do not equate intelligence and perception with elitism.  And, if Obama had demonstrated same in this instance, I would have been impressed.

As I said in another thread, I actually agreed for one of the very few times with James Carville on this issue.  He was the only talking head who had no problem stating he got the joke, and knowing The New Yorker, knew exactly what they intended.

That is not to say that somebody less familiar with that pub and its sensibilities is an idiot.  But, I think a lot of people who claimed outrage-- on both sides-- were feigning same.

I'll check out the article, Wandrey.  I'm not surprised there is a lizard to be discovered.  I never said I thought Obama was anything less than shrewd.

I've held off commenting on this because I remain rather ambivalent.  I like Barry Blitt's art work, the sketch accomplished what good political art should in my opinion, it provoked reactions, varying interpretations, and vigorous debate.  So many people have weighed in with different perspectives, the way I see it, almost none of them are necessarily wrong.  I think this piece of political art tells us something about ourselves through our reactions to it.  

I also like it because it pushes the boundaries, and I'm a boundary pusher, or so they tells me.   I was just banned from the Kos affiliated Mothertalkers blog , first blog I've ever been banned from, without actually trying.  Some of those Kossacks have got it in for me.  Hard truths are not something they are prepared to hear apparently, but it's my attitude that bothers them most, I get that a lot.  

I understand the Obama campaign's reaction, but I have to wonder if Barack and Michelle didn't laugh when they saw it.  It's more than over-the-top, it's outrageously subversive in its inception.  In a very real sense Barack Obama is the insurgent candidate, he is attempting to remake American politics on some fundamental level.  And it's obvious many people on both sides of the aisle aren't too comfortable with the idea of change and the unfamiliar. It's been a long time since anyone's broken new political ground in this country, an unfortunate reality that has led us into stagnation and regression.  It seems fitting that these changes come at the beginning of this new century and at the end of the abject failure of the GOP and their contrived conservative revolution.  This caricature pushes buttons on the monied right, buttons they don't like having pushed.

Just imagine if George W. Bush had actually been a competent President, a Republican president who prevented 9/11, then taken us to war in Iraq anyway, achieved total victory and transformed Baghdad into a favorite American discount getaway tourist mecca like Mexico, and we had 70 cent a gallon gasoline.  In that unlikely scenario I imagine Hillary would be the Democratic nominee right now, and she would be looking at a landslide loss to that abusive racist southern Republican George Allen in the general election.  So let me just take this opportunity to thank corporate America for installing their hand-picked utterly incompetent puppet lackey in the White House, and awakening the sleeping giant that is the American electorate. I promise you are going to regret it boys.

 The minimal danger of this image is that it gives the Republicans exactly what they want, a portrait of Islamic fundamentalism triumphing over America, and the Democrats responsible for that triumph.  The image is already on every conservative site around the net, being used to instill fear in the faithful, a last desperate attempt to consolidate what's left of their rapidly shrinking base. So I'd say there is some real political cost to the Obama campaign just for having that image out there.  And it's not the campaign's reactions to the image which is the problem, as some would assert, it's the image itself on the cover of a common newsstand magazine, which was bound to create this controversy.  

I suspect the magazine's editorial board decided to make it the cover for entirely self-serving reasons, but then again you have to think that a lot of discussion went on about the larger ramifications.  It seems the more sophisticated as well as the monetary arguments won out, deciding that Obama's campaign was strong enough to take the hit, and I would have to agree with that assessment. Doubtless The New Yorker has had plenty of extra copies printed up to meet the demand

But fair is fair, I think The New Yorker should have Blitt create a cover depicting John McCain in a North Vietnamese prison cell spilling his guts, giving the Commies every military secret we had, and agreeing to become the Manchurian candidate, who once in office abolishes the Republic and seizes America for the Reds. Of course it wouldn't have the same impact, given that Vietnam, Communism and John McCain are all ancient history relatively speaking, but still.

They could do a whole series, how about Hillary Clinton as a dominatrix in the Oval Office clad in black leather, whips and chains, her stiletto heels digging into bill's back as he looks on drooling while she gets head from her beautiful personal assistant.  At the same time Mistress Hillary is on the phone calling for the round up and eradication of everyone who voted against her. Two can play at this game Billy boy, *cackle cackle*.  :-)

OK, Chan (and others here gathered), I can imagine getting off on the subtleties of the intended humor, and yeah, after a second (and third and fourth) look at the cover I sort of got the joke, but it was twice too clever for its own or anybody else's good. I think Blitt could have done a better job of reaching a wider audience than just the inside New Yorker sophisticates, with an similarly adroit wit.

On the other hand maybe I'm just sour because my own sense of humor is more wacky (or blunt and sarcastic, alas, what can I say)  though I think no less sophisticated. I'd like to join in on the fun but I didn't think the cartoon was particularly funny on its face. I must still not get it.

Oh well, by the end of the week this will all seem so yesterday's warmed over.

tomeg, it's progress when people find some common ground.  But, there is a problem in your sugggestion that Blitt "cpould have done a better job of reaching a wider audience than just the inside New Yorker sophisticates..."

By definition, every magazine (and political blogsite) is self-selecting.  It establishes a certain identity, style, and sensibility.  And the audience that identifies with and responds to same, goes to that magazine.

It happens that The New Yorker sadly has some big financial problems.  Partly because their sensibility may not be as widespread as formerly.  But, maybe because The New Yorker changed.  By going way to obviously and openly Lefty.  Which doesn't bother me.  I read it, even when it annoys  me, because it expresses itself well.

"It happens that The New Yorker sadly has some big financial problems"

Is this true? I mean, beyond the usual chronic unprofitably of every single quality opinion journal? My information was that Remnick has actually been able to buck the trend, and that the New Yorker, for the first time in memory, is actually turning a profit of somewhere around a million a year.

Look at the number of ad pages: they seem to be closer to Vanity Fair in that regard than to Nation or TNR.

TNR started off the week by trouncing The Atlantic at softball and settling in for a Sunday read of Ryan