The Maverick Tribe

I go back and forth on the New Yorker cover.  I can appreciate it as satire - this is the type of humor employed by Jon Stewart all the time.  And it's important to remember that satire doesn't necessarily have to be "funny" to be successful.  The New Yorker's style is more wry and clever than "ha-ha" funny. 

That said, the meaning - even understood as satire - is still rather crude.  If I were the Obamas - or anyone black for that matter - I imagine that I would find the cartoon - ironic or not - distasteful.  Many did.  Perhaps if they took out the afro'd Michelle and associated racial imagery it would be better.

What I do know is that I'm tired of both campaigns ritualistically taking offense at every off-color joke, insult, or otherwise crass commentary that comes down the pike.  Barack Obama could be privately offended by the cover but refrain from getting bogged down with it in his public communications.  I would have preferred his campaign to have put out a statement to the effect of "Senator Obama has a lot more pressing issues on his mind than an unflattering magazine cover."  I thought that in supporting Obama I was getting a candidate who was thoroughly annoyed and bored with the usual petty tactics - using umbrage as a political tool is one of these tactics.  Lately both the Obama and McCain campaigns (but more Obama's) seem to have been directed from that old mothballed playbook.