A geriatric John McCain in a wheelchair! Get it? Now THAT’S funny! But, what about those thousands of Nimrod-in-Chief Hitler caricatures? Funny as hell they were. Why, some of the Photoshopped mash-ups of Lil’ Napoleon dressed as a terrorist rival the New Yorker’s noteworthy effort. And don’t even get me started on the Cindy McCain and Laura Bush robot jokes - it’s comic gold I tell ya’, comic gold!
It’s also time for a slap up side the head.
Dueling Typewriters and Pens
The much-excoriated New Yorker cover is no more over the top than a thousand other satirical cartoons produced by the left and right. Satire, especially political satire, always goes for the gut. By its nature, it’s a knife fight of dueling typewriters and cartoonists’ pens. It’s often over the top and vicious and it’s supposed to be. If it wasn’t, it would be a wonkish, stuffy policy discussion - boring as hell and not nearly as stress-relieving as a good belly laugh.
Hogswallop! If Obama is such a weak candidate a satirical cartoon will topple him, we’ve all got much bigger worries.
Satire’s a Good Thing
Many of the righteously indignant claim the cover only enforces the misperceptions and outright lies of the anti-Obaminator crowd. It probably does, but given the New Yorker’s position as one of the ring leaders in the right’s liberal media elite, I’m guessing not many Bushies or McCainiacs will pick up a copy to nod with satisfaction that the media finally got it right and has come over to the dark side. Therein lies the satire. The cover’s not a satire because it confirms anti-Obama views. It’s a satire because it lampoons the addle-brained, fear-mongering anti-Obamans.
Satire’s a good thing. It allows us to laugh when, by all rights, we should be crying. Righteous indignation has it’s place too. We should be righteously pissed at the things going on in our country and a good rant is a way to make that point strongly. And if you’re handy with a cartoonist’s pen or a keyboard, satire is a particularly delicious way to do it. I satirize my political opponents often and when I do there are plenty of pats on the back for administering a good, old-fashioned, ass-kicking screed against the dark forces of the right - comments that come from some of the same people now seeing satire in a different light.
This satire also reveals another dark truth. By wasting energy on a satire with the weight of a politicized Dilbert cartoon, the righteously indignant crowd puts themselves exactly where those being lampooned want them - firmly among the hypocritical for laughing at right-bashing satire while carping about vicious pens turned on their own main man.
Your attitudes only help those who want to see us fail and want to harm us. Why do you hate America and want the terrorists to win?
Bookgasm - It seems a bit of overkill to me, but some people really like to hide that porn where no one - and I mean no one (except a bookseller) - can find it. (NSFW)
