In a strictly tongue-in-cheek jab at their sister publication at Conde Nast, the editors of Vanity Fair have satirized the controversial New Yorker magazine cover depicting Barack and Michelle Obama. It will only appear on their website, but you have to admit it’s funny.
The Vanity Fair cover similarly reflects stories that have swirled around McCain and his wife Cindy, seen here cradling vials of pills while the Senator leans on a walker. The American flag isn’t burning in the fireplace; instead it’s the U.S. Constitution. In place of a portrait of Osama bin Laden, a likeness of President Bush hangs on the wall.
The blogosphere and mainstream media were all abuzz today over the controversial cover on the latest issue of The New Yorker. Illustrator Barry Blitt has done a number of provocative covers for the magazine, but his latest shows Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama in the Oval Office, adorned in Muslim attire, a photo of Ossama Bin Laden on the wall and a burning American flag in the fire place, giving a “terrorist fist bump” to wife Michelle, herself decked out like a ’60s-era Black militant.
The picture has drawn stiff criticism from the Obama camp and even condemnation from Republican presidential hopeful John McCain, but the magazine is defending its decision, saying it is just another example of the type of satire Blitt is famous for.
The picture is satire, designed to draw attention to many of the ridiculous rumors that have swirled around Obama since he announced his candidacy. No one with any intelligence would take it seriously. But America is full of people lacking in basic intelligence or the ability to discern the truth from concocted lies and deliberate distortions. Many are just gullible enough to believe every single one of these and other rumors. And they vote.
The New Yorker article does go into great detail about the calculated rise of Barack Obama.
While that controversy brews, another flew in under the radar. This past weekend, syndicated television commentator John McLaughlin of The McLaughlin Group, asserted that Obama “fits the stereotype blacks once labeled as an Oreo — a black on the outside, a white on the inside.”
The watchdog group, Media Matters, wants McLaughlin to publicly apologize and has created a campaign to raise public awareness.
Finally, David Simon, executive producer of the critically acclaimed television series The Wire may be off on his next great adventure. Simon, who already produces the HBO miniseries Generation Kill, set during the Iraq War, has just gotten the greenlight from that network to produce a pilot about life in post-Katrina New Orleans. “Treme,” named after the New Orleans neighborhood where many musicians live, will film its first episode sometime later this year. The show promises to take a critical look at life in the city itself and if it gets picked up, production could start in 2009. Former “Wire” star and New Orleans native Wendell Pierce is one of the first names attached to the project.
That is the big question now that she has bowed out of the race for the Democratic Party nomination for President. Some commentators are weighing in on the real motivations behind her supporters’ lack of party unity and the ramifications for Democrats this November.
Tim Wise, a White man who calls Whites to task on their racism, pulls no punches in his open letter to Hillary supporters, Your Whiteness is Showing.
Meanwhile some key female Clinton backers are also calling for people to think before jumping on the McCain bandwagon. They point out that a vote for McCain is a vote against women’s issues.
A chorus of voices is growing calling for New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to bow out of her race for the Democratic Party nomination for president.
Mathematically, even with the remaining primaries, she will most likely not win enough delegates to supplant the frontrunner, Illinois Senator Barack Obama, and would have to rely on votes from superdelegates to put her over the top, a highly controversial move that would over-ride the will of the people and surely split the party.
This past week, Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, a superdelegate himself who has already swung his support behind Obama, publicly called on Clinton to withdraw so that the party can come together before the general election. GOP nominee John McCain is already taking aim at Obama as he builds momentum and raises funds.
The big question is whether Clinton will heed anyone’s advice. Along the campaign trail, both she and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, seemed to suggest they’d be in for the duration. A group of Clinton-supporting big donors are even threatening to stop supporting Democrats in Congress because Nancy Pelosi said that the people, not the superdelegates, should decide the Presidential nomination, prompting MoveOn.org to circulate this petition.
Clinton’s all or nothing strategy is raising the ire of ordinary citizens, bloggers and political pundits, some of whom suggested she should have dropped out even before the Texas and Ohio primaries. But for her to get the message she’s going to have to hear from even more people.
Now is the time for all good Democrats to come the aid of their party. Write to Hillary. Tell her that for the good of the party, she needs to concede defeat now, tell her supporters to get behind Obama’s campaign and unite to win the White House in November.
Anything short of that only helps the Republicans, increases the chances for four more years of Bush-like incompetence and mismanagement of the country, and speaking as one of her constituents, decreases her chances of ever getting full support again should she want to run for re-election as the Senator from the State of New York.
