guest1234567

So, did anybody here actually not get the picture the very first time you either saw it or were told of its existence?

Does anybody think that this issue is suddently going to appear on newstands next to Double Wide Trailer Weekly?

The thing about humor is that some jokes just aren't as funny as the joke teller thinks they are. In this case I think the regular New Yorker readers got the joke, and someone who didn't is just adding fuel to a fire so that they don't look stupid.

The artist name was Barry Blitt and he has made many covers that were satirical. Did you complain about these?

MarkMiller

The second one from the top is my favorite. LOL!

HarperLee

O.K., my blood is boiling.

I just received an email from a college-educated, moderate Republican
"friend" forwarding the bogus Maureen Dowd column.
PolitiFact | Bogus Dowd column spreads quickly

This goddamned New Yorker cover will be emailed to tens of
thousands of feebs who will have no idea it is satire.

I give up!

__________________
Oliver Stone on George W. Bush: "the banality of evil"

http://www.nationalpriorities.org/costofwar_home

guest1234567

HarperLee

I think we all get that. The point is that the right wing slime machine, not to mention the white supremacist element, loves to misrepresent
anti-Obama propaganda from liberal sources, i.e., the bogus Dowd column that is being promulgated by mainstream Republicans.

The New Yorker magazine has a circulation of
1.1 million. I am sure that all 1.1 million of those
subscribers will "get" the cover. I would bet
a lot of money that the cover will go out in emails
to far more than 1.1 million voters, presented in
such a way that that receivers will be convinced
that even the liberal media questions the background and agendas of Barack and Michelle
Obama.

__________________
Oliver Stone on George W. Bush: "the banality of evil"

http://www.nationalpriorities.org/costofwar_home

ibex

[quote=guest1234567;222477]So, did anybody here actually not get the picture the very first time you either saw it or were told of its existence?

Does anybody think that this issue is suddently going to appear on newstands next to Double Wide Trailer Weekly?

The thing about humor is that some jokes just aren't as funny as the joke teller thinks they are. In this case I think the regular New Yorker readers got the joke, and someone who didn't is just adding fuel to a fire so that they don't look stupid.

The artist name was Barry Blitt and he has made many covers that were satirical. Did you complain about these?


Michael Shaw: Reading The Pictures: The "What" Of What's Wrong With Barack Osama TNY Cover This guy explains it so much better than I could. I suggest you read this.

MarkMiller

I doubt you are really giving up. When Harperlee get's pissed she does not quit.....this is not the end is it. Hell no, why should these stupid tactics get you so upset when you know they have little substance if any at all and don't get far these days with the efforts of the campaign (and this site) to bring to light what is false and what is real? I know it is frustrating...I've been there, but you knew the real fight would come after Obama won the primaries. Hell the convention is still over a month away.

Yeah....Harperlee is discouraged right now.....but it is not in her history to just give up.

MarkMiller

I thought he over analized the whole thing. The article is drawing to much attention to a simple cartoon. The attention will cause many other controversies. It is not worth all the attention. It really isn't.

EvilMonkey

Yep, Obama wasn't too pleased and who could blame him?

HarperLee

Quoting from the Michael Shaw piece Ibex linked:

Some of that rationale includes: a.) Otherwise topflight, liberal-minded illustrator forgets that parody involves the employment of imagery to convey something opposite its literal meaning, b.) Otherwise mistake-averse magazine becomes caught in blind spot after big city liberals get bitter and "cling to rhetorical guns" to express feelings of being jilted by overly centrist nominee, and c). Right wing mouthpieces who have so-far avoided turning into complete bottom feeders have just been handed enough cover for at least a week. )

What you're probably not going to see much of elsewhere, on the other hand, is the actual "what" of what's wrong here. Here's my list:

1. Set in an Oval Office the revolutionaries have cleared of the desk (because revolutionaries don't do desks, so much as lairs), the self congratulations -- especially at this early, pre-convention stage of the campaign -- ascribes a massive sense of entitlement to the Obamas.

2. Minus the eye contact of the actual fist bump in St. Paul (and adding the arched eyebrows), Angela Davis Obama's expression is transformed from "I love you" to "You're SUCH an evil genius, baby ... and no one ever caught on!"

3. Besides Barack's pursed lips -- which have turned into code in the MSM for this arrogant (read: "uppity") black man -- the most damning element in this illustration, by far, is Obama's eye. The furtiveness lends the perfect Machiavellian effect, and the fact it's directed our way suggests we should really know better what this guy is up to.

4. Of course, the gun, the ammo clip, the cammo pants and the crossed legs (like crossed fingers) suggest what an angry, war-like creature Michelle is.

5. It's not just that Old Glory is on fire ("thank Allah I can finally toss that damn pin!"), the crumpled flag at floor level is reminiscent of the flag good old Bill Ayers was stepping on.

In my "ObamaPhobia" presentation at Netroots Nation next Saturday, I aim to show how various campaign images in the traditional media echo more extreme right-wing hate imagery -- conveying Obama as a man with a covert, anti-American agenda, or a deliberate and calculated mastermind, or a closet Muslim and Islamic Manchurian candidate. In hitting the trifecta here, many will argue this illustration is simply a satiric representation of the sophomoric attacks being tossed at Obama from far right field.

If that's all there was to it, though, than why do I sense Rove is chortling tonight?

The reason -- besides the fact that the New Yorker demographic is a pretty narrow one -- is that visually-based racial, religious and character-based framing does carry cognitive weight across a spectrum of higher- and lower-level reasoning, and, more than anything, it gains strength and veracity through repetition.

So, forget about "don't think of an elephant." Try not thinking about the guy's name in the turban-thing without not thinking about his brother's name in the portrait behind him.

__________________
Oliver Stone on George W. Bush: "the banality of evil"

http://www.nationalpriorities.org/costofwar_home