Poor Barry Blitt.
His cover for the latest issue of The New Yorker which he calls "The Politics of Fear" is meant to be a satire of the ridiculous right wing rumor mill on Obama. Or as the NY-er puts it "[The cover] satirizes the use of scare tactics and misinformation in the Presidential election to derail Barack Obama's campaign."
Personally I think its funny. On the other hand, I can also see it as perfect fodder for the same abusive groups it is supposed to satirize. Its not like the Obama critics are discrete or tasteful about their bashings and this drawing could easily serve their ends. After all, it contains a graphic symbol of nearly every rumor about Obama they have so far put forward.
Yet it would be stupid to let the politics of fear have an influence on the "The Politics of Fear" wouldn't it?
Its also possible that the controversial uproar over the whole thing will serve as a focal point for dismissing once and for all the false information of the rumors.
The left is all in a tizzy about the whole thing:
The Bad Frame: Why Are the New Yorker, Salon and Other Liberal Media Doing the Right's Dirty Work?
Me thinks the lady doth protest too much.
The comments over there on this cover are just over the top in terms of being politically correct and evangelical in their tenor. Its like there's no sense of humor at all, just dour overly-sensitive and defensive rantings. There were a few rational comments such as the one below which I found particularly cogent:
Posted by: Pirate1 on Jul 14, 2008 10:27 AM
This is so obviously depicting the absurdity of the right's daily depiction of the Obamas... to imbue it with all this power to undo the candidacy of Obama is absurd and imfantile. It simply gives image to what these radio hate peddlers and mind muckers and crackers already believe, it's not giving them ideas.
I will vote for the man because he's not McCain or another Bush, not because I agree with much of his stated views of late. (I was for Kucinich) There is just a feeling, likely wishful on my part I'll admit, that somehow Obama would be more likely to listen to the people than McCain. His apparent notion that Afganistan is somehow the "good" war, that we should get out of Iraq and focus there is as mad an idea as any that has come down the pike from either party.
If the average American had any understanding of what a terrorist cell is and how they operate, then attacking any country to "end terrorism" would be seen as the tragically absurd notion that it is. All this does is drive fear in the home population so the corporate/government powers that be can have free reign to use military force to change regimes they don't like in the name of fighting terror. A couple of decades ago the term was communism or as Cap Weinberger would say fifty times in each press conference, the "Soviet Threat".
Power structures like our military have evolved in preparation for nation against nation warfare.
They go in and smash nations that had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks because that's all that they know how to do, all the tools they have are for doing that. The notion of terrorist cells is totally misunderstood. They render massive militaries like our own obsolete. There is no top down command center involved to defeat, no leader you can kill and "win". No infrastructure to destroy to cripple their production. These are people who have lost everything through corporate and military brutality who collectively vow to deliver some kind of payback. Most never get the chance but occasionally one succeeds and in this case, buildings symbolic to millions worldwide of capitalist oppression and disregard of local custom and religion fell down... with tragic loss of lives. All the people in that cell are now dead. We don't realize in our busy day to day lives how many more people in far away countries die every week from the excesses of corporate greed and that American sense of entitlement to whatever it might need.
But it's far easier to follow the leader or let the pundits be substitute for any real thought on our part. Our spectator sport mentality kicks in and we're out there to WIN! b'gawd... We need to learn to respect people, treat them fairly, not pay their government leaders and provide them the maens to oppress their populations so they do work US workers would get $30 and hour for 1 or 2 dollars a day. No, that would involve a bit toomuch self examination. Having to say we fucked up and are sorry. It's more important to be top dog. Number one. Until that changes, there will always be people from somewhere looking for payback.
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