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 Obama Camp Denounces New Yorker CoverPosted on Jul 14, 2008
The latest New Yorker cover features a satirical cartoon of a Muslim Barack Obama fist-pumping his terrorist wife in front of a portrait of Osama bin Laden and a burning flag. The image was intended “to hold up a mirror to prejudice, the hateful, and the absurd,” says the magazine. When 10 percent or more of Americans still think Obama is a Muslim, there’s apparently no room for humor—tasteless, offensive or otherwise.
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Confronting the Terrorist Within
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Jump to Comments
By JMCSwan, July 15 at 12:33 pm #
Saggy, (July 15 at 4:04 am)
DundanIdaho, (July 15 at 7:01 am)
Jack, (July 15 at 8:10 am)
Interesting.
Perhaps, soft-pumping GAS Town & Country Dr. Klein Phoenix Church posts?
Indeed DuncanIdaho: a gigantic fucking problem. Bigger than anything else at this point. Any thoughts why the headline refers to the Obama campaign as a camp?
From Wikipedia:
Taylor and Nova are allowed to escape on horseback .. Soon after [Taylors] escape, in the final, iconic scene, Taylor discovers a damaged Statue of Liberty half-buried in the beach. He realizes that he has been on Earth all along, and that humanity must have destroyed its own civilization with war, thereby paving the way for the Planet of the Apes.
A Monkey Business, VIA GI-one-night R-liberty-R offer, perhaps?
Report thisBy thebeerdoctor, July 15 at 11:45 am #
Try this:
Report thishttp://www.abrahamlincolncartoons.info/index.php
By thebeerdoctor, July 15 at 11:30 am #
I do not think you would like it if Senator Obama was portrayed as a monkey man. But the true point is, the people who believe the lies about the candidate, will never look at The New Yorker anyway. The vast majority of people never look at the magazine, if they did, then the investigative journalism by Hersh and others would have more of an affect than just being political points of conversation. Outrage amongst the general population is greatly over rated.
Report thisBy cyrena, July 15 at 11:09 am #
“..No the real problem here is that Obama and supporters have swallowed the bait that being a Muslim is a smear...”
Beerdoc, I never knew that Abe Lincoln had been portrayed as an Ape. What’s wrong with being an Ape?
Meantime, I have to disagree with you on the above about swallowing bait that being a Muslim is a smear.
The real insult is far simpler than that. There is absolutely NOTHING with being called a Muslim, if that’s what one is. And, there are 1.3 billion Muslims in the world proud to be so.
There is very much an insult at being consistently referred to as something that one is NOT, especially after saying it over and over again. THAT’S the problem, and anybody would be annoyed.
Obama has never suggested that there was anything ‘wrong’ with being Muslim. In fact, when questioned, he’s specifically said (a few dozen times that I know of) that he respects Muslims and the Islamic faith, but that HE just doesn’t happen to be one.
I’d be pretty pissed off if someone insisted that I was something that I wasn’t as well. Most people would.
I always marvel at the complications that people associate with things. How unreasonable is it to simply be taken for what one claims to be?
Report thisBy thebeerdoctor, July 15 at 10:36 am #
All this over a stupid cartoon? Get a little historical perspective: the opposition portrayed Abe Lincoln as an ape. There have been quite a few crummy cartoons in the history of American politics. No the real problem here is that Obama and supporters have swallowed the bait that being a Muslim is a smear. Billionaire idiots like bin Laden represent Islam the way Eric Rudolph represents Christianity. This self-conscious perception business is a real loser. If you object to stupidity too long, the uninitiated will think there is something to be concerned about. You know “the lady doth protest too much”.
Report thisBy rage, July 15 at 9:11 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
“This is a crock. The New Yorker cover is a direct effort to destroy Obama. The Zionist overlords at the magazine hopefully justifiably fear that Obama might show some glimmer of compassion for the victims of US and Israeli aggression in the middle east. That is simply not allowable in US politics. Obama has kowtowed to AIPAC up to a 9 on the scale of 1-10, but McCain has hit 12. So, the knives are out.”
It’s not a crock when 12% of registered voters maintain that Obama is still a Muslim, and 20% maintain that he was schooled in a madrassa. This characture, as offensive and galling as it is, is satire predicated on the fears of our most ignorant people who will be VOTING. This is far from a crock.
I don’t excuse the New Yorker staff for attacking victims, which is pretty witless in satire. I think I have more than copiously documented my disgust with how the bought-n-bossed corporate media is kissing McCain’s ass, just to victimize Obama for being ahead of the old coot. Still, I maintain that the shameful idiocy depicted in the satire is no less offensive and appalling than this ridiculous characture itself. While victimizing the Obamas, the New Yorker is also pointing out and defining the most ignorant people among us, namely the idiots who are willfully ignorant enough to still think these rumors and lies are enough justification to vote for McCain against a scary black muslim man, no less after eight years of Dumya’s reign of terror. That, I reiterate, is compellingly way more telling about the current cultural and social status of the regressive and repressed United States of America in the 21st century than the multiple insults this New Yorker satire hurls at the Obamas are offensive.
Report thisBy Jack, July 15 at 8:10 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
RE: Anyone who has any doubts should look at the owners and board of directors of ALL the major TV networks
It’s not that complicated: “The Central Intelligence Agency owns everyone of any significance in the major media.” - William Colby - Director of the CIA (1973-76)
To think the Church Committee Hearings changed this in any way is the epitome of naive.
Colby’s “confession” came in the wake of his personal shame from being confronted by his daughter over Operation Phoenix - CIA’s Vietnam assassination program - prototype for Latin America’s Mano Blanco and Iraq’s current Salvador Solution - Colby’s mysterious boating accident death (officially labeled “possible heart attack") soon followed.
Report thisBy thebeerdoctor, July 15 at 7:41 am #
Putting all policy questions aside, the comments by rage on this link are accurate.
Report thisBy rage, July 15 at 6:03 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Granted, this characture is galling, tasteless, and very offensive. All that notwithstanding, the New Yorker Staff raises a very poignant point. Too many fearful xenophobes still think this characture bears out the certain reality they unjustifiably fear. All these gullible lobotomites still paying homage to Brillo and buddies on Faux Noise infotainment still hold those divisive and deceiving talking points about Obama to be the gospel truth. Whats more shameful than the offensiveness of this satirical characture is that its legitimately based on the unfounded fears of media-frightened, severely limited American citizens whom we entrust with the responsibility of electing the best Presidential candidate to our highest office. These are too easily misguieded sheep, who, for the past two Presidential election cycles, have been bamboozled into voting against their own best interests to elect a so-called conservative Christian, called and hand-picked by God Himself, with whom they’d all prefer to have a beer!
The enigma of this puzzling riddle is that the Obamas are actually everything these reactionary, sheltered, confused, frightened conservatives, who distrust and dispise them the most, all claim they want in a President and First Family. Obama is a great husband, a good father, a Christian, a hard worker, not an elitist, had nothing handed to him, is well educated, and was a fairly successful legislator before coming onto the national scene. Michelle is charming, a great mother, and wonderful wife, has interests beyond a co-presidency, and is brilliant. Their daughters are adorable and sweet. Yet, these Faux Noise devotees still suspect Obamas some Manchurian Islamo-fascist, just because his name, Barack Hussein Obama, is neither Christian nor Western European. Though his mom was white, his father was a black Muslim Kenyan. So, as far as theyre concerned, Obamas still very black, yet not black enough to qualify more than Bill Clinton to be the first black President. Worst, Obamas quite possibly a Muslim, trained in Indonesia by his Muslim stepfather in some America-hating madrassa just waiting to infiltrate America and enslave whites for slavery as early as the 20th of January 2009! He’s rumored to be a closet homosexual. And, then, there is that Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright, who obviously hates all white people, with all his Civil Rights twists of what Jesus said. As far as they can see past their talking-points blinders, that Obama feller just aint to be trusted!
The crazed madness found in this insulting characture is utterly preposturous and, more imporatantly, proven over and over again to be untrue. Yet, and most distrubing, there are still huge numbers of scared nuts out there who are demanding to vet the Obamas with greater scrutiny to keep proving there is nothing there that has not already been discovered ad nauseum. That, in and of itself, is pathetically way more telling about the current cultural and social status of the regressive and repressed United States of America in the 21st century than the multiple insults this New Yorker satire hurls at the Obamas are offensive.
Report thisBy Anthony England, July 15 at 5:57 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
As Ed Harges astutely observes, this is caricature once removed, i.e., “this is not a caricature of Obama - its a caricature of the misperceptions about Obama.”
I’m not particularly well informed about these matters, but the political cartoons I recall tend to be more visceral.
My question: Can anyone recall previous examples of successful political cartoons in this vein, i.e., caricature once removed? In the New Yorker? Elsewhere?
Report thisBy cyrena, July 15 at 5:02 am #
Jaded Prole writes..
“… It is also where Seymour Hersh publishes incisive exposes of neocon adventures in Iran and is generally progressive....”
~~~
Indeed, not just the excellent work of Seymour Hersch, but Jane Meyer and many others. They are two of whom I was referencing when I mentioned my own appreciation of the New Yorker.
That’s why I was very surprised at the cover. It’s tacky and distasteful, and was printed in poor judgment.
Any attempt to rationalize or otherwise defend it as too sophisticated for certain tastes or whatever the hell else, doesn’t change that it’s tacky, below the the normal standards of the New Yorker, and just get on with it. It doesn’t change or otherwise alter the content or the quality of the work by the contributing authors that we’ve both mentioned here, or the others. But the fact that those authors do contribute to this magazine, or that the New Yorker IS a generally excellent publication, doesn’t change that this is a bad and distasteful cover on this particular issue.
Why are people always trying to defend or otherwise rationalize something by way of something else? It IS WHAT IT IS!
Hopefully, this is not the beginning of some new habit. Life goes on.
Report thisBy Jaded Prole, July 15 at 3:47 am #
The New Yorker is an excellent magazine with a wry, sophisticated humor which some here are apparently not up to. It is also where Seymour Hersh publishes incisive exposes of neocon adventures in Iran and is generally progressive. Yes the cover is satire lambasting right-wing delusional paranoia.
Those of Saggy’s ilk make their own bigoted limitations obvious and certainly do not have the intelligence or level of literacy to enjoy such a magazine.
Without humor, life is that much bleaker.
Report thisBy jersey girl, July 15 at 3:25 am #
Duncan’s point is well taken. Here we are on the edge of a devastating depression, ready to go to war with Iran and perhaps start a planet ending nuclear holocaust and THIS is what everyone is upset about?
Jesus H Christ.Don’t you guys get it?....It’s to distract you from what’s REALLY happening in the world..just like they do for the sheeple with american idol. My god, I can’t believe you are falling for this shit.
Report thisBy Charles, July 15 at 12:52 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Poor attempt at satire. Maybe, if Obama was presently in office and people had an opinion or an image they wanted to mock, there would be no offense taken. This isn’t a mockery. The depiction preys on fears that some share and will see them validated because really, how many will read the article in its entirety, if at all? That number may be few compared to the number who now have a different idea or opinion because of the cover that can, and has been seen without seeing the actual magazine. This fear and idea about the Obamas has already interfered with his candidacy. If addressing the misconceptions was all they wanted to do, there are many ways to do it without adding to them.
Many are easy to state what others (Obama) should do when situations personal and professional in nature arise. This is easy to do from the outside looking in. I am quite certain that everyone has made all of the correct choices in matters personal and professional in nature ... right? It was also quite easy for others to give advice and tell you what they would have done after the fact… right? Also, if someone, anyone, even you are offended by something, what right does anyone have to say, “you shouldn’t be offended by this or that”? We might as well let others tell us when to be offended and that our feelings or emotions are wrong! Imagine that!!!
Report thisBy jack, July 15 at 12:17 am #
(Unregistered commenter)
Terrorists in the Oval Office?!? ...such a notion!
Does anyone recall the FOX “24” War Of Terror series season where the POTUS was actually articulating the wave of terror (poison gas that season), while taking orders from a rogue network, via hourly calls to his cell, and running enough moles to keep everyone guessing into the final reel?
No doubt you’ve heard this one: if WMD go off anywhere, don’t seek the event’s author in a cave in the Hindu Kush, but rather in the one beneath the Naval Observatory.
Report thisBy Maani, July 14 at 7:31 pm #
Cyrena:
“And I might have to check in with some of my favorite authors, to see if they would consider publishing elsewhere.”
Actually, what I’d like to see is a barrage of letters to the editor BY “THE NEW YORKER” WRITERS THEMSELVES expressing outrage.
The best comment I’ve seen so far is that what the NYer SHOULD have done is published this cover - but put the whole pic in a “speech balloon” coming out of McCain’s mouth! Now THAT would have made political sense.
My comment? Personally, if Obama was as smart as he pretends to be, he should have taken a look at the cover, smiled, said, “How silly!,” and moved on. By “denouncing” it, he only dignifies it, and perpetuates attention to it. He HAS to learn to stop bristling at every slight, either real or perceived. As troublesum rightly puts it:
“Politicians are so thin skinned these days. They probably never heard ‘If you cant stand the heat...’
Maybe if they were dealing with real issues they wouldnt even notice these things. Lincoln, for instance, was treated unmercifully by the press and cartoonists of his time. He joked about it.”
Peace.
Report thisBy Doc, July 14 at 6:34 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
This is not satire. This New Yorker cover is simply ugly prejudice dressed up as satire...and scandalously offensive. Of course, it was done by a conservative! Be fun, though to see what Bush and company would do in response to a cover with Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld as Nazi stormtroopers, with arm extended. That wouldn’t be satire either, but stone cold reality.
Report thisBy Ed Harges, July 14 at 6:24 pm #
The offended Obama devotees apparently can’t get their heads around the fact that this is not a caricature of Obama - it’s a caricature of the misperceptions about Obama held by stupid people who get all their information from AIPAC or from “Christians United for Israel”.
Report thisBy ApprxAm, July 14 at 4:31 pm #
They ain’t gonna make this easy for him.
Report thisWow, satire! Is it:
Specious or spurious?
By Robert, July 14 at 4:21 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
Enough excuses by the New Yorker. I don’t buy it! They crossed the line, no hiding behind the freedom of press. How about, Responsibility. Shameful.
Report thisBy PatrickHenry, July 14 at 4:04 pm #
Obama should be selling autographed copies for his campaign for $10,000 a pop.
Turn it around.
Report thisBy troublesum, July 14 at 3:51 pm #
Politicians are so thin skinned these days. They probably never heard “If you can’t stand the heat...”
Report thisMaybe if they were dealing with real issues they wouldn’t even notice these things. Lincoln, for instance, was treated unmercifully by the press and cartoonists of his time. He joked about it.
By culheath, July 14 at 3:49 pm #
The new left kids just don’t have a feel for irony or satire. They’re all in tizzie and hysterical about the damage the cover will do. They worry that the stupider Americans won’t get it. Judging by their own reactions, they’re right.
Report thisBy troublesum, July 14 at 3:02 pm #
Look at any poll - there’s always 10% who don’t know anything and don’t want to, so it isn’t surprising that 10% don’t know anything about the Obamas. Those people might take this seriously but anyone else will see it as ironic and satirical. Tempest in a teapot.
Report thisBy Louise, July 14 at 2:49 pm #
The New Yorker has always been a mag appealing to typical New Yorkers. Up-beat, aggressive and definitely in your face.
In New York City, lampoon is easily identified, and so are phonies. So I suspect when the editors decided to cover this issue with this lampoon it never occurred to them no-body would get it. Well actually a lot did. When I first saw it in the side-bar on another website, I looked for a second, thought of a few stupid people I know and forgot about it.
But Obama’s camp has a legitimate complaint, because as already noted, conservatives don’t have a very well developed sense of humor, so they’ll see this as some sort of validation of every evil thought they’ve ever had about Barack and Michelle. Especially given the typical target of all things “funny” in the conservative mind is the female gender. Notice Michelle is the “terrorist.”
Hmmm ... makes me wonder if maybe this lampoon was actually created by a conservative.
I guess it’s just hard to understand unless you’ve actually lived and worked there, but I seriously doubt any “honest” New Yorker will take offense to this. I mean you ought to hear them joke with each other about their various ethnicity’s. The uninitiated would cringe and run for cover!
The mistake the Editors made was not remembering life moves beyond New York City.
And yes, it definitely is tacky, lampoon usually is!
Report thisBy Blackspeare, July 14 at 2:11 pm #
Remember, the female of the species is always the more dangerous!
Report thisBy jersey girl, July 14 at 1:43 pm #
Tasteful or not, we still have freedom of the press. At least for today.
If I were Obama or an Obama supporter I’d worry more about what’s inside the magazine than what’s on the cover. He’s definitely a slick politician all about winning at any cost it seems. Even if that means trampling on others and forgetting old friends who helped him get to where he was going in favor of new ones who can take him higher.
Report thisBy Sang Ze, July 14 at 1:32 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
New Yorker hides behind its “sophisticated readers,” claiming they understand their bigoted cover as satire. Bull@)(&@)&! It’s nothing more than an endorsement of the bigoted crap that insists Obama is an anti-American Muslim. Since New Yorker editors claim they have such great intelligence and sophistication, they must have known perfectly well what they were doing. Calling it satire is a laugh and a half, an excuse for the bigotry which is obvious to the meanest intelligence. But I guess one can’t expect much more from anything that comes of the New York. That’s the kind of city it is.
Report thisBy Smudge Martens, July 14 at 1:30 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
Whats the right answer to question of whether a particular presidential candidate is Muslim?
My religion is private and will have no explicit effect on my policies.
Instead of wallowing so much (much more than George Bush) about how he has given his life to Jesus, Senator Obama should have simply taken the religious issue off-the-table. He is reaping what he has sowed and insulting the people of Islam by reacting to the question as if it were an insult.
Report thisBy cyrena, July 14 at 1:24 pm #
“...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 thats the spirit of this cover, the New Yorker statement said.”
Well hell, if that’s what they were trying to do, they could have saved the time and expense by simply snatching any one of several comments right here at truthdig. There’s TONS of prejudice, hateful and absurd stuff running round these pages. The same ones who post in are delighting in this cover. Which just goes to show how sick they all are. They aren’t reveling in the satire of it, they’re reveling in the predictable damage it will cause.
The New Yorker apparently gives this sick society far too much credit for being able to recognize such nuance, because there’s no way for anyone to consider this as anything BUT offensive. Or...this was itself intentional. That’s just as good a guess as anything else.
How often does the New Yorker put this kind of cartoonist stuff on their covers? I’ve never seen anything like this, and I’ve been reading it a long time.
Very tacky. I’m surprised. I think the New Yorker needs to leave the satire to Andy Borowitz. And I might have to check in with some of my favorite authors, to see if they would consider publishing elsewhere.
Surely there are more than enough quality publications out there these days, that the New Yorker can go by the wayside just as easily as any other entity who makes such mistakes. People need to start THINKING about what the hell they’re doing these days. This regime seems to have jacked things up even more than a lot of people comprehend.
I guess if we can somehow standby while a bunch of thugs continues to slaughter millions of innocent human beings, and destroy another society right here, all in the same operation, pretty much anything goes.
So, is the whole damn thing ‘inverted’ now? Does this mean everything is now the rabbit hole of the Mad Hatter’s domain?
Report thisBy Kevin Ward, July 14 at 1:21 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)
I canceled my subscription when the editorial of the magazine seemed somehow to conflict with its advertising content. There was a limited if sincere complaint about the tragedy of global warming penned by the editor only offset dramatically by a full page color prompt by Exxon.
The New Yorker lost me then after twenty years as a subscriber. Obviously they still have not become any more sophisticated or up to date with their foggy notions of what is really right.
No amount of excellent reportage by their writers can salvage their reputation of wallowing in their own pompous slime: their dismal connection to the corporatocracy and their struggle to remain relevant in hard copy.
They are now as esteemed as the Post.
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