If Clinton were the nominee,
Wed Jul 16, 2008 at 04:20:11 PM PDT
What would we have seen on the cover of The New Yorker?
Would Remnick, who I generally respect, have dared to run and defend the satire of a cover cartoon that depicted Senator Clinton wearing the uniform of an SS storm trooper, Eva Braun wig and standing in a hallway holding a burning bra in one hand and a leash reminiscent of Lyndie Englund in the other with a nude, except for a top hat, Uncle Sam on the floor at the end of the leash? With one high heeled boot firmly planted on a Bible. Add a poster on the wall with a picture of Bill Clinton sporting a Hitler mustache. Wouldn’t such an image be entirely consistent with the messaging of the rightwing about the Clintons? As completely false and incendiary as the image of the Obamas on the latest issue of The New Yorker? As filled with irony?
While I can imagine such a disgusting and provocative illustration, as analogous to that of the Obamas as one could get, I truly can’t visualize it on the cover of The New Yorker. Nor can I envision a similarly ironic image for McCain, Bush or Cheney. One absent a scintilla of truth and places any of those public figures in a position of violating cherished American iconography.
The problem with The New Yorker cover is that it’s so meta, so cool, that it fails to communicate a truth. It doesn’t inherently reference the intended target if its wit, the rightwing media: television, radio, print or internet. Much less does it poke a stick in the eye of it. It can be lifted with no modification and disseminated by the the intended target to advance their propaganda about Obama. Propaganda given greater currency because it first appeared on the cover of a liberal magazine. Not unlike what the Bush gang did with the propaganda that they managed to get placed in front page stories of the New York Times.
Is it irony when those who don’t "get it," can use it to support their prejudices or ignorance? Irony when those who don’t "get it," don’t get that they don’t "get it?" Most Americans don’t "get" New Yorker cartoons but they know enough and don’t hesitate to acknowledge that they don’t. It’s also doubtful that The New Yorker readers have had much, if any, contact with the most virulent anti-Obama, anti-Democratic Party, anti-liberal, rhetoric and imagery blipping around the internet. So, exactly how were they supposed to perceive the intended target of that cartoon? Have not instead seen an repetition of ugly racial, anti-Muslim, anti-American stereotypes? Conflated into one illustration that on its face, blatantly mocked the Democratic Presidential nominee.
The comedic stylings of George Carlin and Lenny Bruce were often raw and tasteless but never not funny if one "got it." Even if one didn’t appreciate the humor. I was appalled by a much e-mailed illustration of a few months ago that depicted the Clintons standing in front of a large white house with a lawn jockey, but I "got it." Had The New Yorker cover included a logo such as "National Review Exclusive," it still wouldn’t have been funny but at least it would have been defensible. As it is, so arch, hip and cool, the illustration couldn’t tickle the funny bones of almost anyone that isn’t consciously or unconsciously a racist. But even there it failed to confront, hold a mirror up to, those who smiled, giggled or laughed.
Perhaps The New Yorker needs that mirror. As it still exhibits the smugness of the guests at a NYC cocktail party immortalized by Lenny Bruce decades ago. So hip and cool that one of the guests was a black man. The others all clucking their tongues about the racism in the south where a black man was the help and not a guest. Exhibiting how comfortable they were with the black man in their company by stating that they weren’t racists. As long as their sisters didn’t marry one.
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