I just looked on Google News -- there were 1302 news articles returned by the words "Obama" and "cover." Satire is dead, pessimists say. Perhaps the people who are freaked out about this satirical illustration -- which is entitled "The Politics of Fear," get it?? -- believe that.
It's classic coastal elitism. Not the cover itself, but the belief that people will see this cover and say "See?! This proves my point exactly! Obama really is an Islammer!" Thinking that you are smart enough to understand a joke while the hoi polloi won't, and that this could be horribly damaging -- that's the elitist belief. And the New Yorker -- the epitome of what the ignorant flyover folk are supposed to fear -- has done a good thing in giving a full-frontal dismissal of it.
Courtesy Huffington Post: The artist, Barry Blitt, defends his work. And so does the New Yorker editor.
You want a real "Satire is Dead" headline? It was on Salon today:
My God! An insult to dolphins!
technorati: New Yorker, Obama cover
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