Wonkette
Why does Barack Obama hate the nation’s hard-working comedians, satirists and cartoonists? That’s the important question teevee-industry reporter Bill Carter is asking today, in a New York Times piece complaining that nobody can make fun of Hopey because of hope, change, and racial transcendence. Yet the rednecks and racists are free to peck out their ALL CAPS emails and blog comments about how Barack Hussein Osama and his wife Angela Davis the Black Terrorist will turn America into some unimaginable place where black people aren’t slaves.
As the whole dumb New Yorker flap proves, the liberal media has to be super careful when dealing with Barack, lest His earnest minions go crazy like they did when Charles Gibson and George Stephanopoulos implied at that one Hillary/Obama debate that black people can’t swim and are always on welfare.
Beyond the fear of exploring the backwoods trailer-trash 12 percent’s racist paranoia about Obama, there’s the problem of Obama himself:
“The thing is, he’s not buffoonish in any way,” said Mike Barry, who started writing political jokes for Johnny Carson’s monologues in the waning days of the Johnson administration and has lambasted every presidential candidate since, most recently for Letterman. “He’s not a comical figure,” Barry said.
When Stewart on “The Daily Show” recently tried to joke about Obama changing his position on campaign financing, for instance, he met with such obvious resistance from the audience, he said, “You know, you’re allowed to laugh at him.” Stewart said in a telephone interview on Monday, “People have a tendency to react as far as their ideology allows them.”
The only thing truly laughable about Barack Obama, so far, has been the reaction from America’s lower classes of openly racist idiots. And as the New Yorker cover proved, the line between satirizing that crowd and seemingly supporting their weird view is very thin and very hard to find.
It is, in fact, like the famous vaginal “G spot” — it’s never in the same place, and you never know how it’s going to react.
Yes but they are tards for putting it on THE COVER of all places. I mean, Jeebus. We should joke about him all the time, forever, but not when Our Nation of Disenfranchised Whiteys (TM) is waiting in the wings for some fresh Barry to consume.
Much like good jokes that offend no one, the G spot is a myth.
Laughter is a devilish whim which deforms the lineaments of the face and makes men look like monkeys. !
Oh for Chrissake. At least 99 percent of New Yorker readers will vote for Obama. They get the joke. So the magazine is getting crucified for not worrying about the retards who have never even read an issue of the magazine and are going to take it wrong?
At what point can we just say, let the stoopid people be stoopid if they want, but why do they have to control everything?
Barack needs to do a bit in blackface.
No one is disputing that it’s a satire. It’s just a bad fuckin’ joke.
Grand Ayatollah Q2ani hereby issues a Fatwah calling for the beheading of all journalistic non-Hopey-believers. All Wonkettophites are directed to obtain head removing devices (as you are all elitest, please look in your garage…hanging on the wall…behind your Audis…for a pair of hedge trimmers). Take your hedge trimmers to the nearest newspaper, then locate and behead any cartoonists you may find. Do not wear your burhkas during your mission…no need to draw unwanted attention to yourself.
The cartoon would have been funnier if it included a prayer rug and quoran.
There’s nothing funny about not being able to find the G spot.
I’d like to see how many people complaining that the Obamabots just don’t get how gut-bustingly funny / high-brow incisive this dumb New Yorker cartoon cover is are the same people who screamed how stupid it was for MoveOn.org to place the “General Don’t Betray-Us” ad.
If you are one of these people doing both, please STFU and leave the public sphere immediately & permanently.
If anyone is having trouble locating their G-spot I can help you look for it. I’m not a very good speller, but I’m a dependable G-spot finder.
It’s a stupid brouhaha. As such, I’m just paraphrasing what I wrote yesterday. The whole thing would have gone unnoticed since bitters don’t read the elitist New Yorker, but now people that didn’t know the magazine existed are using it to justify their crazy xenophobia. I hope this doesn’t mean the end of jokes/irony/sarcasm/fun just because bitters and wingnuts don’t understand it.
At the same time, I don’t care for the cartoon. And yes, Shorts, they should have put it inside the magazine. If they’re going to devote a cover to an image that captures an unfounded fear held by a handful of crazies, then I want to see a cover of WALNUTS! blowing up Iran while calling his wife a c— drinking the blood of newborns and downing a bottle of Viagra.
Jack Shafer at Slate said we were required to laugh along with the New Yorker cover, so I’m going with that.
Uncle Al: I agree. However, 40% of Americans apparently believe that Barry graduated from a madrassa and 13% think he’s a practicing Muslim, so this is a topic that the New Yorker might want to leave alone. I actually thought the cover was pretty funny, as it is obviously making fun of the idiots who think Barry’s a terrorist. Sadly, there seems to be more of them than there are people who’ll get the joke, though.
Sheesh…I hope those crazy xenophobics don’t come to Wontette.com. Their heads would explode, and blood would begin spurting from their empty eyeball sockets.
Remember those aliens from Star Trek? The half-black/half-white ones?
Nothing, those were just cool.
the cartoon would have been a bit funnier if they’d included the face of a shocked GOP supporter or some other visual clue.
Just like the G spot, you just need one person to point it out and then it’s easy to find.
NoWireHangers: WALNUTS! blowing up Iran while calling his wife a c— drinking the blood of newborns and downing a bottle of Viagra.
Now that’s art.
Joey Ratz: 40%? That number is suspect. I challenge it. Source?
If the NYer editors had any satirical balls, they would have had Barry and Mich doing a jig with the Prophet. Are they going to let the Danes out satire us… what kind of ‘mericans run that magazine?
That cover would have been a lot funnier if the New Yorker had depicted John and Cindy McCain on it instead…especially if they gave Cindy a kick-ass, militant afro.
Or maybe they’re doing that for next week’s issue. Then all this consternation would be totally worth it!
jagorev: Boo.
The cartoon would have been funnier if it had Obama sucking Osama’s cock.
Um..do we really want another buffoon in the White House?
Q2: I saw it on Hardball yesterday. I think they cited Newsweek as their source, but I could be wrong about that.
The cover would have been funnier if it had included a G-spot.
to paraphrase seinfeld: “I’m not offended as a liberal, i’m offended as a comedian.”
It’s just really shitily done. just… shitily.
the ReThugs cannot figure how to get to Obama
they’ve got nothing but lies
the troubling part is that it seems about 40% of the population is perfectly comfortable with lies
the willful ignorance is something I just cannot understand
shortsshortsshorts: I dunno, we here at the Wonkette make sophisticated use of this so-called ’satire’ all the time to poke fun of our beloved Hopey and other assorted figures in the pubic eye. Erm, “public”. I’ll allow the New Yorker the same privilege - as long as the bitters never find out.
NoWireHangers: …but that’s not satire.
Don’t worry about it fooling teh morans. Even if the cover did influence a few hard-working, grade 8 educated, white people, the New Yorker would never have run this cover if the good people at Diebold hadn’t assured them that the Dems will prevail in November because it’s “their turn”.
Anyway, it may look like bad satire now, but believe me, it’ll seem funnier in 6 years when Obama begins his second term amid a prosperous economy, abundant renewable energy, peace on earth, and a cure for AIDS.
There’s no issue with satire. The issue is with the New Yorker attempting to flay its limp member with its poorly done satire. The New Yorker is over.
That said, the Obama campaign is having a hard time taking a joke, but it’s more because the media has more or less forced him to suck in every and any ounce of nuance, wit, negritude, and humor to appeal to old white people who aren’t going to vote for him anyway.
Joey Ratz: Yeah, if the New Yorker is smart, next week they’ll have something similar about McCain, with him drooling in his wheelchair as he presses the button to nuke Iran.
Uncle Al: Done.. and not funny either…
Someone (on Race for the White House, I think) said last night that the cover would have actually been funny if you panned out a bit and showed Limbaugh or somebody like him painting the image.
That being said, does this article imply that if Obama would just do one good pratfall then we’d all be better off?
sezme: Problem is, while the readership of Wonkette is probably equivalent intellectually to that of the New Yorker (except pervier,) when crazy people come after us for outlandish things we say, we just make assfucking jokes about them until they go away, and say even more ridiculous, untrue things afterward. You know, in good fun. I’m not sure TNY has that option. But hey, maybe their next cover can be Jeff Gordon driving a beer truck into Cindy McCain’s cunt, TRUCKNUTZ a’flappin, with a big confederate flag draped around his shoulders, ready to go to a lynching.
Or something.
The New Yorker Cover: Proof positive that Tony the Tiger is alive and well and gainfully employed as an Editor.
Uncle Al: …while buggering a Senate page. Hey - he is a Republican.
I, for one, remain outraged at this picture. Michelle’s head should be covered. Inshallah.
Whaddya mean, Barry isn’t a comical figure? Have you ever seen him bowl?
You know, every time I see that cover, all I think is that Michelle is very hot, in a Pam Grier sort of way.
Uncle Al: They need to have McCain in a wheel chair at a flower show run by Vietnamese generals with an old Tandy Computer behind him, trying to call for an air strike on Iran, and behind him Cyndi is boarding her private plane (Hey, it is the only way to get anywhere you proles), on her way to pick up some drugs.
Walter Sobchak: I’m sorry but I vehemently disagree with you. Wonkette is America’s Finest source for news, ever.
EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER EVER
I mean shit, I trust the Overlords on Wonkette much more than my local GAY GAY GAY news overlords.
Walter Sobchak: Now THAT’s a cover we can believe in!
Complain all ya like about USA, but it’s good thing that there’s a nation where the newspapers wring their hands about how one candidate isn’t being ridiculed enough.
Are there any radio/TV comedians doing good Obama impressions, by the way? I haven’t heard of any over here. I saw this one clip on an SNL guy a few months ago and his attempt stank.
Sorry no jokes in this comment, but then it’s a Barry blog.
And talking of G-spots and the New Yorker cover. I just couldn’t put a finger on it at first, because it took a lot of explaining on the part of the magazine to explain it was satire. Otherwise, being the dumb citizen that I am, I believe if it was on a cover it’s gotta be the truth.
But thank god, Obama, like a G-spot, is a moving target. So fire away hard-working America.
shortsshortsshorts: I may have had some fucked up semantics up there, but I certainly agree with you 100%. Did I imply otherwise? I LIKE jokes about assfucking, and the fact that we can rely on our esteemed editors for them along with our politics. You know, especially when they’re one in the same. Here’s to ENDLESS CUMMER ‘08!
This is true. I found my G spot on the B train going to the C side.
Also, ever since those dynamic dickwads Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson decided black people weren’t allowed to be made fun of last year (nappy headed ho’s, anyone?), there has been an extra sensitivity applied to anything that attempts to lampoon said black people.
This cover would have been piquant & timely had Mrs. O. also been holding a bottle of Mad Dag 20/20 in her left hand and a Barry a bucket of the Colonel’s crispiest in his right. And maybe a pair of pit bulls should have been shown in the corner tearing each other’s nuts off as the children clapped and clapped while a Secret Service swept up the smashed crack vials from the prayer rug. THAT would have been satire!
BTW: Mr. Cartoonist, I find it truly offensive that you put a roll of toilet paper on Obama’s head. What’s that all about, dude? Are saying that only elitists use the Charmin’? You might be right, but …
Hey, I just found my G-spot! It’s on the bottom of my scrotum!
pattycake: Was it a D-light?
Q2:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/145737/page/2
This is the Newsweek page that references the in-house poll on this. It’s actually 39%, but Joey Ratz has a Papal Icon, which imbues him with infallibility, so I’d accept 40%. Otherwise your soul is in jeopardy.
I think I’m with Joey Ratz on this, if the misinformed voter block weren’t such a huge demographic, it’d be funnier.
NotMyRealName: Yeah, there was a blooper real where they were supposed to be chasing each other, but one got turned around and they ran right into each other.
Conversely, I had a girlfriend in high school who was just like John McCain as an object of ridicule: you couldn’t miss her G-spot if you wanted to. We’d be down in the rec-room a few minutes, and she’d start moaning and casting about like an epileptic. Thus it is with WALNUTS! Just let him open his mouth and he says something idiotic.
since they don’t generally sell the new yorker at beer stores or walmarts, none of the racisty yokels would have probably ever seen this cover if such a huge deal hadn’t been made of it.
I tried to leave a comment but am going through gen mod fat secret animal bits withdrawal and my 17 children need their insulin shots so maybe later.
That New Yorker cartoon would have been greatly improved by working in the face of Prophet Muhammad.
scotterl: Do’h, you got there first. Apologies.
bonanzaj: blerg. see post on bitters boycott of Mcdonalds because
its horrible for them and their enormous familiesRonald loves gays.policonoclast: Combover: The cover would have been funnier if it had been on the inside.
Is Obama about to have yet another Sister Souljah moment? Jesus fucking Christ. Him and his dweeb Kool Aid drinkers need to go fuck themselves.
If you want further proof of how thin the satire line is for the trailer trash 12%, go to a Randy Newman concert anywhere in the south and listen to them gleefully sing along with, “We’re rednecks, we’re rednecks. We don’t know our ass from a hole in the ground” as if they think it’s some sort of anthem.
Jesus!
I go out of town for one week and avoid the T.V. and when I come back, people are suddenly caring about the New Yorker?
What the fuck?
Sorry, America, I’ll stay right here at my keyboard through early November just to make sure everything stays normal.
Anyone else think that Obama could have capitalized on the NYer episode or at least handled it better? Either brush it off or acknowledge that it is a satire of those propogating the muslim/terrorist chatter… . His reaction shows me he has no sense of humor or a sense of humor that is long dead. As for all the possible thousands of additions the cartoonist could have made to show his intent more clearly, wouldn’t that have killed the cartoon? In addition to the media beating this to death, I think Obama deserves blame for handling this in a whiney fashion.
evolutionista: Yeah, but the Internet System of Tubes runs through all walks of life. Same reason we know about Rush Limbaugh’s adventures though I’ve never been able to listen to more than five minutes at time.
People claim there’s no angle to make fun of Obama from, because he’s too Jesus-y, but that right there is the perfect angle. Bush was a moron, Gore was wooden, Kerry was a douchebag, McCain is a crazy old man, and Obama is held in Messiah-like esteem and comes off that way in his speeches occasionally. Make fun of that. Problem solved.
Here we go, the proposed McCain cover: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/horsey/viewbydate.asp?ID=1792
sezme: It won’t be so funny in eight years WHEN WE’RE ALL SPEAKING DIRTY, ARAB, GIBBERISH AND THE GOVERNMENT TOOK OUR GUNS AND MARXICISED THE WHOLE REPUBLIC YOU DIRTY, STINKING, COMMIE LIBERAL FASCISTS WITH YOUR UNIVERSAL HEALTH-A-WHATSIT. I KNOW HE GRADUATED FROM A MADRASSASSASSSAA CUZ I WAS IN VIETNAM MAN YOU WEREN’T EVEN THERE MAN YOU WEREN’T EVEN THERE. GO EAT SOME BIG MACS YOU SCARY GAYS!!!!!!
ahh….I feel better.
pepperpug: Obama deserves blame for handling this in a whiney fashion.
Silly pug. Didn’t you get Sen. Foghorn Gramm’s memo? We’re a nation of whiners…Barry’s just playing to the crowd.
user-of-owls:
Good one, I wasn’t thinking…
Sigh. This is the state of media in modern culture. Someone still have to explain basic literary principles to a national literary magazine. You see, New Yorker, “caricature” - in political drawings - is often used to depict the essence of a person. So when you draw potent imagery that reinforces a stereotype that so forcefully smears the essence of his character, and you can’t then just simply call it “satire” to make it so. That would be akin to Keith Olbermann doing an entire show with a Bill O’Reilly script and then end the broadcast, assuming everyone would know it was “satire” because it was happening on his show. No, we would all just be confused, annoyed and mostly think he was delusional.
Similarly, nothing in the cartoon says that this is considered by the artist to be an unfair portrayal, that these images stem from a deep-seated racism or that these fears are bred from a unwholesome paranoia – basically nothing that urges us to take them at anything other than face value.
That is the exact opposite of satire.
snig: too true, but at least the oldies like johm mccain would never have seen it.
Invisible Buttsecks?
No doubt, people who actually read The New Yorker will understand their satire.
The trouble is that this cover has been spread all over the internet, to be seen by people so humor-deficient that they will be unable to appreciate that it is not representational art. You know, the same people who buy all those Elvis on Black Velvet paintings.
Also, in this post-PC era, even some lefties are no longer able to recognize satire, which causes internecine warfare in the comments columns of all too many blogs (not the super-satirerated Wonkette) when someone employs that literary device. And for those confused souls, the cartoon has the added cachet of being on The New Yorker’s cover.
Face it: the further left, the more humor challenged. NOTHING is funny. Not even clubbing baby harp seals.
(yes, godddamnit, I’m kidding)
I once got kicked out of a place way way off-strip in Vegas called the G-Spot, it was also hard to find.
Here’s why the Obama campaign reacted without a sense of humor:
Comment from Newsweek article on the NYer cover:
“Wow how un-PC of the New Yorker. The point is not whether the cover was meant as satire or not, it is absolutely the truth. The cartoon cover picture portrays the Obamas accurately. However often they try to disassociate themselves from their pasts, this cartoon shows their past. Barack Obama is the first person of Muslim heritage who is a presidential candidate in the United States. He is the first candidate to be seen in pictures in Muslim dress. Right?? This is a fact. Michelle Obama’s history is one of revolutionary writings, association with and belief in the philosophy of the radical “Weathermen” and their ilk.. She is ashamed of her country so far. No matter how much they try to disassociate themselves from their past history, it is still their history. Bill Ayers is their friend, neighbor and supporter. The revolutionary, un-American flag stomping radicals have worked themselves into the elite ranks of academe and now into the highest levels of our American government. The American public needs to know not only who but also what they are voting for so three cheers for the New Yorker’s un-PC cover!!!”
Um..ha-ha?
Wee Mousie says: The trouble is that this cover has been spread all over the internet, to be seen by people so humor-deficient that they will be unable to appreciate that it is not representational art…
True enough. However, wasn’t Obama’s reaction a major factor in the cover being spread as it has? But for his comments, would we be discussing this at all?
It would have been funny if it was good satire, but as others have pointed out, it’s not good satire at all. Besides that, I think I am more offended by TNY’s staff doing the “Gee, golly, whiz” routine about how they didn’t think it would get this type of reaction.
How should Barack have handled it? Who knows. It has become clear to me that no matter what he does, it will not be enough, or too much for some. But just as TNY has the right to publish what it wants on its cover, he has the right to call them out if he thinks its counterproductive. That’s the American way.
As far as Barack isn’t funny complaints, I disagree. I just think that it is going to require more creativity than writers have had to deal with, given that Bush has literally written their material for them these past eight years.
>> Kimmel said, “His ears should be the focus of the jokes.”
Wow, that Kimmel guy is too edgy and searing for me. How can you watch that man?
If I were Michelle’s hairdresser, I’d be uber pissed.
lawchic says at 6:09 pm, July 15th, 2008 - How should Barack have handled it? Who knows. It has become clear to me that no matter what he does, it will not be enough, or too much for some…
I’d say that to the Republicans, no matter what any Democrat does (not just Obama) is not enough or too much.
As far as handling it, sometimes simple is best. Say nothing. Blow it off and it probably won’t get picked up as a story.
I went back and forth about this. First I thought–eh. Obama is worried the rednecks won’t get that it’s purported satire. But New Yorkers all wear the Magic Monocle of Eustace Tilly and understand that this is sophisticated satire. Except that there’s just as many black-haters in New York as there are in the rest of our republic…and so on and on.
Obama has a sense of humor and makes me laugh. I LOL’d at his response to Phil Gramm’s diagnosis of “Mental Recession” for instance: “America already has a Dr. Phil.”
I still think we need to get back to the Really Important Issue re the New Yorker:
KILL TINA BROWN! DEATH! DEATHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!
If the bitters don’t understand THIS New Yorker cartoon, just wait ’till they get to the one with the dog sitting at the computer wearing a bowler hat. What the #&@!*^ does that one mean!?!
Lionel Hutz Esq.: That’s all wrong. McCain should be dumping his first wife out of a wheel chair and offering it to Cindy, who is dressed up like JonBenet Ramsey (a little ballerina cowgirl, not rolled in a carpet with jizz).
I DONT KNOWIN WHAT YOU MAKE FUN OF MY CALCUCOMPUTA ONLY TYPES IN ALL CAPPS. MY DANG COMPUTER BE TRYIN TO PLAY A JOKSTER ON ME. I DON’T BE SHOUTIN ALL DE TIME. YOU HAVE NICE WWW INTERNET SITE PORTAL HOMEPAGE AND READIN YOU IS LIKE SITTIN ON POURCH WIT MY PAL JONNIE RAY
pepperpug: True enough. However, wasn’t Obama’s reaction a major factor in the cover being spread as it has? But for his comments, would we be discussing this at all?
Obama’s original comment when first told about(or shown) the cover on Sunday, was, “I have no response to that.”
CNN and several blogs (Huffington Post, Eschaton, Crooks and Liars) had a mention of it on Monday, (Crooks and Liars had a copy of the cover).
Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton, who originally claimed the cover was ‘tasteless’ did so sometime late Monday afternoon.
I doubt that so close a timeline should be necessary. Taking into consideration the minutia which already has been blown into a full-scale donnybrook, one look should be enough to inform the most sanguine observer that this was going to become an issue.
Oh fucking Christ on a crutch. I can’t believe commenters at Wonkette give a shit about this. It’s the fucking New Yorker already: not exactly a magazine available at the Poughkeepsie Wal-Mart check-out. Shit, just look at today’s Boston Herald editorial “cartoon” if you want any proof that the average moran doesn’t even know that the New Yorker is a weekly magazine.
http://bostonherald.com/news/opinion/holbert/
The more I listen to people (including David Remnick) explain the ‘humor’ in the cover, the more I think no one has any fucking idea why they ran that cover. People mention the Danish cartoons, but that was completely different–that editor knew he hated Muslims and was trying to piss them off. David Remnick doesn’t know what he thinks. But the rest of us now do.
Some material for Jimmy Kimmel:
His ears are so big. He made his own waxwork dummy for Madame Tussuad’s. Ear wax. Geddit? LOL!
His ears are so big. He went to the zoo the other day, he made the elephants feel inadequate! LOL!
His ears are so big. He’s got terrific hearing. No really. They say he can hear someone getting an erection from the far side of the room! LOL!
Yeah. Thank you, my name is Jimmy Kimmel, I’m here all week . . .
slavojzizek: The whole thing affects The New Yorker far more than it affects Obama’s campaign. Given that people have been doing that send-up for so long, on places like Wonkette, it’s not like The New Yorker’s take was fresh. It’s only interesting because it was the self-styled urbane, discerning New Yorker magazine, is all.
Neilist: Uhmmm, yeaaah, kill Tina Brown… but she left the NYer ten years ago. That being said right after her book on Bill and Hills comes out, I’m sure you’ll be able to rally an angry mob.
slavojzizek: yeeeeeeeeeeeeeawn.
Did DailyKos tell you that, or did you come up with all by your little self?
Am I the only one who finds Barry hilarious? The guy is, whatever his other qualities, a self-important super-ambitious self-obsessed condescending Pied Piper. One doesn’t have to be a buffoon to be innately mockable!
AxmxZ: “The guy is, whatever his other qualities, a self-important super-ambitious self-obsessed condescending Pied Piper.
And he’s different from other politicians how? Welcome to America, now please take a number and your snark will be listened to in the order in which it was received.