Satire Or Tasteless?
Barack Obama says the New Yorker’s cover is tasteless; the magazine says it’s satire.
“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,” said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton. “But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree.”
In a statement Monday, the magazine said the cover “ombines a number of fantastical images about the Obamas and shows them for the obvious distortions they are,” the Associated Press reported.
“The burning flag, the nationalist-radical and Islamic outfits, the fist-bump, the portrait on the wall? All of them echo one attack or another. Satire is part of what we do, and it is meant to bring things out into the open, to hold up a mirror to prejudice, the hateful, and the absurd. And that’s the spirit of this cover,” the New Yorker statement said.
Republican John McCain’s campaign spokesman, Tucker Bonds, told the AP that the cover was “tasteless and offensive.â€
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What the jerks at the new yorker don’t get is that
obama detractors will now be able to say “see even
the liberals in new york think he is a muslim”..
which even john mccain thinks is off the charts
“The New Yorker” is barely a shell of what it once was. The people and writers I knew years ago at TNY were giants. These days, they are filled with second and third-rate talent, and obviously have also become stupid, because they are primarily left-wing supporters and, ironically have stumbled beaucoup with their latest cover.
When did Rupert Murdock buy The New Yorker publication? Or did it just disintegrate on it own ?
This Obama illustration is not art! It is offensive. Pure upper crust 1920’s racist Americana.
I guess the New Yorker is living a rarified bubble that still thinks that Jim Crow is alive and well. Do-Dah. Do—dah.
The New Yorker was once a great American Institution but sad to say nothing in America these days is worth much including the taste in cutting edge wit that The New Yorker used to represent.
I guess the staff of the New Yorker had one too many Martini’s making this Vulgar editorial decision.
We all make mistakes.
The ‘not so important anymore’ NYer has published a despicable so-called cartoon depicting BARAK OBAMA and his wife MICHELLE as MUSLIM TERRORISTS. It is bad enough that no one ‘reads’ this SCHIESTRAG anymore – that the NYer has to resort to this ‘sensational cartoon’ to garner them readership or buzz!!! BAD ENOUGH THAT THE NYer STILL CONSIDERS JOHN ASSBURIED SOME KINDA’ POET – AND THIS CARTOON SALACIOUS ENOUGH FOR THEIR COVER!!! This will not ‘revive’ the now moribund publication – but perhaps JUST PERHAPS if they wheeled the ‘openly GAY’ raconteur and thinking/writing man’s TRUMAN CAPOTE – that is to say the middling writer and penetrator of EUROTRASH GORE VIDAL – they could finally both bid RIP to us all!!!
one more possibility..that the staff of the new yorker
intentionally portrayed obama that way to discourage
people from voting for him..because they agree with
the neocons..
No. They erroneously think they are on the cutting edge, especially with their covers. They are harpooning neocons and the right, as is their habit, especially with covers. They just over-thought their position this time. They like cover controversy and outrageousness, (it sells) but they don’t ever mean for it to be directed at the left.
The people that should be most offended are Republicans. A liberal publication is portraying Republicans as nasty and racist. I find that incredibly offensive. The New Yorker, a liberal (but usually thought to be principled) publication, wasn’t even smart about it and ended up going so overboard that it offended Obama. However, the real people that were smeared are Republicans.
New Yorker magazine, owes Republicans an apology first and foremost.
You got it, Ian. They outsmarted themselves this time. Republicans know TNY hates them. It is to chuckle at the backfire.
Many political cartoons have a nasty side to them. Now it is on all the television news channels. They make this headline news. There should be much better things to report on than a magazine cover.
The IDJIT NYer now hopes to ‘blame’ this scurrilous cartoon on REPUBLICANTS. YES the NYer now sates through its executives that this cartoon was a ‘satire’ to show how REPUBLICANTS feel about BARAK OBAMA aka ‘the new but not improved’ JOE ISUZU. Let’s see D^CKHEAD CLINTON dismissed OBAMA by saying that:”JESSE JACKSON won SOUTH CAROLINA in the primary too” or KERRY ex-prez of the ‘NEW SCHOOL’ speculated that:” OBAMA might still be doing drugs” or JOE’hair-plug’BIDEN stated that OBAMA:”...WAS WELL-SPOKEN, NEAT, CLEAN…” good DEMBHOLES all. Ha.
Ian: Glad you are back on this blog.
The New Yorker’s cover is reminiscent of those of the late National Lampoon during its 1970s heydays. That’s where this art belongs.
But: like The Guardian, once-respected print publications today realize that sensationalism sells. (viz, NY Post in the 1980s: “Terror From the Sky!” as an air conditioner drops onto 23rd Street, e.g.)
When they get attention, these pubs can sell more ad space, which is what pays their bills.
I wouldn’t call this week’s New Yorker cover repugnant, but, like many of my own occasional comments, it’s “over the top.”
Now: after viewing the cover, read the article within. It’s counterpoint to the cover art.
And don’t neglect The New Yorker over one controversial article: read the features by Peter Boyer, a sine qua non investigative reporter.
My biggest argument with The New Yorker: why it won’t review or publish anything about Young Frankensetin, the funniest show on Broadway.
Tim (the Reagan Republican)
Ian: Glad you are back on this blog.
The New Yorker’s cover is reminiscent of those of the late National Lampoon during its 1970s heydays. That’s where this art belongs.
But: like The Guardian, once-respected print publications today realize that sensationalism sells. (viz, NY Post in the 1980s: “Terror From the Sky!” as an air conditioner drops onto 23rd Street, e.g.)
When they get attention, these pubs can sell more ad space, which is what pays their bills.
I wouldn’t call this week’s New Yorker cover repugnant, but, like many of my own occasional comments, it’s “over the top.”
Now: after viewing the cover, read the article within. It’s counterpoint to the cover art.
And don’t neglect The New Yorker over one controversial article: read the features by Peter Boyer, a sine qua non investigative reporter.
My biggest argument with The New Yorker: why it won’t review or publish anything about Young Frankenstein, the funniest show on Broadway.
Tim (the Reagan Republican)