Imagery is everything...

It has been used for ages because we have eyes - and perception is a high percentage of what the brain assimilates as fact. Have not photographs and drawings been used to push a message for generations? And the Obama campaign knows this - anyone remember the backlash over a certain seal that wasn't even close to being as ridiculously conceived as the New Yorker cover? Or how other images and drawings have been used to discredit or label an issue or people?










Images truly speak without saying a word... for example ---








WE may get the point easily about what the magazine is saying with the tasteless image below, but when you put something on the cover, that is so ridiculous as that drawing is - it's certainly going to draw the ire of many, who may not appreciate how it may be deemed as racist, or anti-Muslim, etc. The Obama campaign was right in saying many people would find it offensive and they do, too. It won't be a long term topic, but it's still something that should not be done in the future.

Why not a breathtakingly positive and inspiring cover that shows the best part of humanity or the Obama campaign, instead of a mock-up of all the WORST things in absurd email forwards said about him & Michelle, just for the sake of being shocking?

Hmmmm....you mean like the one that is the cover photo for the New Yorker website and the actual article in the magazine?

to figure out what it was all about, I saw that lovely photo and thought huh? Then I saw the posts on DU including the image. What a difference!

is mind numbing.

They ALWAYS put a line-drawn cartoon on the cover.

I read political magazines, I get the attempt at satire - it SUCKED! I said why not do something DIFFERENT for once. They sure did something different - they put up one of their shittiest covers ever that one could imagine. I want you to go up to Obama and tell him how hilarious you found the cover... Tell him you could smell the flag burning it was so funny! I'm sure he'll appreciate it.

To be effective, it needs to have someone who's a BELIEVER of those false rumors about Obama, ON the cover imagining the image of the Obamas. And my name isn't Jesus.

I've been a subscriber to the New Yorker for many years. Many covers have been satirical but not all, not "always."

After all, it's what the magazine DOES! Who doen't know THIS?! It's such a major part of American discourse, spoken of at every dinner table! "Hon, have you seen the latest satirical cover of the 'New Yorker'? Pass the salt."

EVERY Bush/Cheney one is after they became sitting officials, always fair game to satirists (not that Obama isn't; just adding some history to you post).

http://www.coverbrowser.com/covers/new-yorker/70

Edited: There was another one with Obama, in bed with HRC.

it mocks the attacks on a candidate.

And they've certainly had many covers disparaging of Bush and Cheney.

I wonder if Michelle sees it your way.

what is the point of this type of very dark drawing on the cover then?

the smears aren't spoken out loud. Let's just stick our fingers in our ears LALALA .

You don't fight smears by pretending they aren't happening.

That's scary thinking. "Whether the artist had a point or not is irrelevant."

That's a pretty scary reaction.

when I saw the pics of him windsurfing! The Pubs tried to do it to Barack with the pics of him on the bike with the shlmet and shorts, but it didn't work this time! The one that doomed McNuts is the one of him hugging Shrub!

Thanks for posting this.

K&R

I see last night that Jonathan Alter has spoken about images over words, saying -

The Power of Images

The New Yorker cover only reinforces the silly Obama rumors.
Jul 14, 2008 | Updated: 6:52 p.m. ET Jul 14, 2008

When Harold Ross founded The New Yorker in 1925, he told potential investors that it was not edited for "the little old lady from Dubuque."

This is still true, as the flap over the latest cover suggests. Publishing an illustration of Barack Obama dressed as a Muslim fist-bumping his wife Michelle (with a semi-automatic over her shoulder) may have been meant as a parody of the dopey Internet rumor-mongering that has dogged the campaign for close to two years.

But it is indisputably harmful to the Obama campaign, which is why, though Obama himself wouldn't comment, his spokesman called the cartoon "tasteless and offensive."