Maynard Institute archives

Obama Shrugs Off Cartoon

by richard0763

STEPHFF/The Nation

Candidate Calls Insult to Muslim Americans Overlooked

Sen. Barack Obama said on Tuesday that the New Yorker magazine cover depicting him and his wife as a Muslim and a terrorist, respectively, insulted Muslim Americans. And as the debate continued over what constitutes effective satire and what is merely offensive, the Nation magazine fired back at the New Yorker with a cartoon disparaging its controversial cover.

Referring to e-mailed rumors about his religion, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee said on CNN’s "Larry King Live" on Tuesday:

"One last point I want to — I do want to make about these e-mails, though. And I think this has an impact on this New Yorker cover.

"You know, this is actually an insult against Muslim Americans, something that we don’t spend a lot of time talking about. And sometimes I’ve been derelict in pointing that out.

"You know, there are wonderful Muslim Americans all across the country who are doing wonderful things. And for this to be used as sort of an insult, or to raise suspicions about me, I think is unfortunate. And it’s not what America’s all about."

Obama, a Christian, blamed himself for not being forceful enough in challenging some of the rumors about him, including that he is Muslim.

"Well, I know it was The New Yorker’s attempt at satire," he said. "I don’t think they were entirely successful with it. But you know what? It’s a cartoon, Larry, and that’s why we’ve got the First Amendment. I think the American people are probably spending a little more time worrying about what’s happening with the banking system and the housing market, and what’s happening in Iraq and Afghanistan, than a cartoon.

"So I haven’t spent a lot of time thinking about it."

The progressive magazine The Nation, meanwhile, unveiled a cartoon prepared for its Aug. 4 issue showing Obama tossing the New Yorker in the fireplace as he knocks down Eustace Tilley, the New Yorker’s fictional, monocled, foppish icon.

"While I understand why many object to this cartoon — and to images which they believe reinforce stereotypes (and there are many at The Nation who found the New Yorker cartoon offensive), I believe satire — even if it flops or offends — has a place in our culture and politics," Katrina vanden Heuvel, the Nation’s editor and publisher, wrote in presenting views on the controversy from some of her publication’s cartoonists.

"I have to say this, that the readers of The Nation are not the same readers of, say, Us magazine," wrote Steve Brodner. "To accept the premise of [drawing for a] ‘mass audience,’ I would have to make my work understandable to people who know next to nothing about the daily changing political landscape. Then you become like ‘Saturday Night Live’ at its worst: thinking it can, for example, satirize Jack Abramoff by making a lewd joke out of his name (‘I don’t even know Abram!’), leaving the viewer comfortable in not knowing anything about the issue. No, we are speaking to our readers, whom we feel very much in a kind of wonderful conversation with."

Brodner’s position was shared by some editorial writers and like-minded pundits, who agreed that the American public’s ability to understand satire was being underestimated. But to others, the issue was not the readers of the New Yorker or the Nation. And former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, a Republican presidential candidate in the 2008 primary season, was one of them.

"A whole lot of people who don’t bother to do anything other than just look at the image." Huckabee said on Fox News Channel’s "Hannity & Colmes." "Believe me, I’ve been a candidate, I’m telling you that there are a whole lot of people that don’t get beyond the surface."

The New Yorker’s satirical intent, Huckabee said, is "clear to people who keep up to politics, but if you’re walking down the corridor of an airport, you just happen to look over the bookstore, you’re just going to see that image, and, frankly, I don’t know that the average person who doesn’t know the New Yorker, who doesn’t read the article, is going to get that it’s satire." Obama is "worried about that guy that doesn’t know a whole lot about Obama except some of these images that have been going out on the Internet, and if he walks by and sees that magazine cover, he might just say, ‘See, I told you.’"

Daryl Cagle, who collects editorial cartoons on his "Professional Cartoonists Index" Web site, displayed alternative cartoons from six cartoonists — Justin Bilicki, Tab, Stephff, Simanca, Lalo Alcaraz and RJ Matson — that the artists thought would have improved the New Yorker’s cover idea. And Cagle, a cartoonist himself, offered his own view:

"Cartoonists have a great advantage over journalists in that we can draw whatever we want," he said. "We can put words into the mouths of politicians that the politicians never said. Cartoons can be outrageous in their exaggeration; we draw things that never happened, and never could happen — but we have a contract with the readers who understand that we’re drawing crazy things that convey our own views. The New Yorker’s Obama cover fails to keep that contract with readers. Cartoonists don’t exaggerate anything just because we have the freedom to do so; we exaggerate to communicate in a way that our readers understand.

"There is no frame of reference in The New Yorker’s cover to put the scene into perspective. Following the rules of political cartoons, I could fix it. I would have Obama think in a thought balloon, ‘I must be in the nightmare of some conservative.’ With that, the scene is shown to be in the mind of someone the cartoonist disagrees with and we have defined the target of the cartoon as crazy conservatives with their crazy dreams.

"Since readers expect cartoonists to convey some truth as we see it, depicting someone else’s point of view in a cartoon has to be shown to be someone else’s point of view, otherwise it is reasonable for readers to see the cartoon as somehow being the cartoonist’s point of view, no matter how absurd the cartoon is. That is where The New Yorker’s cover cartoon fails."

In the Washington Post, Philip Kennicott said the problem might be the nature of the print medium.

"On ‘Saturday Night Live,’ a sketch in which Michelle Obama tossed the flag in the fireplace and Barack Obama took off the pinstripes to reveal a flowing white robe would be seen as outrageous — and funny. Print cartoonists, unfortunately, find themselves working in an oxygen-free environment that is increasingly akin to the atmosphere of academia, or PBS. Cable television makes print seem like something ancient and sacred, a rule-bound sanctum fraught with the ever-present risk of sacrilege. Print is becoming a strange land where the solitary reader might easily go astray."

Revealed: The Jackson Comment That Fox Didn’t Use

Steve Kelley/New Orleans Times-Picayune

Ever since Fox News aired Jesse Jackson’s infamous off-camera excoriation of Barack Obama last Thursday, some have speculated about the words uttered on the rest of the tape — the part that Fox News Channel host Bill O’Reilly said was "trash talk that had nothing to do with policy."

A Fox News spokeswoman confirmed to Journal-isms on Wednesday that a transcript shows Jackson saying, "Barack . . . he’s talking down to black people . . . telling n-s how to behave."

In 2006, Jackson called for a complete ban on the epithet, a.k.a. "term of endearment," after comedian Michael Richards used it against a black man in a widely publicized incident at a Los Angeles comedy club. Richards went on Jackson’s radio show, among other places, to apologize.

While Fox said Jackson did use the the n-word, the network said Jackson did not direct it toward Obama, as has been published in the blogosphere and reported on the radio.

The TVNewser Web site, which first reported the newly public comment, said Wednesday it had been sent a transcript of what Jackson said on July 6, as he prepared for an interview on "Fox & Friends Weekend."

Previously, viewers knew only that Jackson accused Obama of "talking down to black people" after the presidential candidate’s recent statements on faith-based initiatives and the responsibilities of miscreant black fathers.

Cathy Hughes, founder and chairwoman of Radio One, wrote Fox News Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes on Tuesday about the rumors that the "n-word" was directed at Obama, saying, "It is being said that Fox News Channel has a tape containing Reverend Jackson’s alleged statements where he calls Senator Obama a [‘f——] half-breed [n—-‘]" and asking whether Fox News Channel host Bill O’Reilly planned to air the tape that night, as she had heard.

Ailes wrote back on Tuesday, "I can categorically deny that Fox News Channel is in possession of a tape containing the alleged statement you mention supposedly made by Reverend Jackson. That is simply not true. So it is easy to assure you that Bill O’Reilly will not be airing a segment regarding that statement tonight or any other night. I’ve known Reverend Jackson a long time and though we disagree on many things, I personally don’t believe those internet rumors about a tape. I think anyone discussing this further is being unfair to Mr. Jackson."

David Tabacoff, an executive producer of "the O’Reilly Factor," also shot down the rumor, which was published on the blogs Hybrid Nation, the Daily Kos, which quoted New York radio hosts, and elsewhere.

"Tabacoff tells TVNewser that in the un-aired portions of the tape, Jackson never used the words ‘half breed n—–‘ and never called Obama the ‘n’ word either," TV Newser’s Chris Ariens reported on Tuesday.

The speculation arose after O’Reilly airing of the tape Thursday night showing Jackson whispering in crude language, over what he thought was a dead microphone, that he wanted to castrate Obama over his recent statements.

O’Reilly added then, "We didn’t run some trash talk that had nothing to do with policy. As most people know, the ‘Factor’ has been tough on Jesse Jackson, holding him accountable for what he does in the public arena, and even investigating his finances. But we are not out to hurt the man in personal ways."

Rangel Moves Campaign Office After N.Y. Times Story

Charles Rangel "Representative Charles B. Rangel has decided to move his campaign office out of one of four rent-stabilized apartments he leases in Harlem, his spokesman said on Monday," Raymond Hernandez and David Kocieniewski reported Tuesday in the New York Times.

"Mr. Rangel has faced intense scrutiny since The New York Times reported last week that a developer had allowed him to lease rent-stabilized apartments in the Lenox Terrace luxury apartment complex at a time when some tenants are being evicted from such apartments around the city.

"One of the units — a one-bedroom apartment that he paid for with money from his re-election fund and from a political action committee — had been used as a campaign office, despite city and state guidelines that require rent-stabilized apartments to be used solely as a primary residence. Because that apartment is rent-stabilized, Mr. Rangel paid $630 per month, while similar market-rate units in the building rent for $1,700 a month and higher.

"In a fiery news conference on Friday, Mr. Rangel said he saw nothing improper with having three rent-stabilized apartments — all adjacent on the 16th floor — for his family’s residence, but said he would review the propriety of using the fourth apartment as an office."

Another Exodus Begins in L.A. Times Newsroom

The Los Angeles Times has begun implementing its plans to cut 250 positions across the company, including 150 positions in editorial, in another effort to bring expenses into line with declining revenue. The newspaper was reportedly circulating a list in the newsroom of about 100 people leaving the newspaper, including people taking a buyout and those being laid off.

Among the journalists of color on the list, Craig Matsuda, senior editor/development, and Eric Stephens, a sportswriter who covers the Anaheim Ducks of the National Hockey League, confirmed to Journal-isms they are leaving. In Variety, Cynthia Littleton said arts editor Lisa Fong was on the list, but Fong told Journal-isms that report is in error.

Separately, Kevin Roderick reported on his LAObserved site that investigative reporter Chuck Philips told him he was taking the buyout. Philips is the "investigative reporter and Pulitzer winner whose March story linking rapper Sean Combs to an attack on Tupac Shakur was fully retracted by the Los Angeles Times after some of the key backup material was traced to a hoaxer," Roderick wrote. "Philips told me today that he asked to be given a buyout and will be leaving the paper. Philips and Michael Hiltzik won the 1999 Pulitzer in beat reporting for an investigative series on the entertainment industry."

According to a bio, Matsuda also has worked as an assignment editor on the foreign desk, on the editorial pages and in the View section. He held several editing positions at the Denver Post, including Sunday metropolitan editor. He has worked as an editor or reporter for the Miami Herald, Time magazine, the Houston Chronicle, Detroit Free Press and Chicago Tribune.

He told Journal-isms by e-mail, "i’d like to: pay my bills; be a good person, especially to my family and great friends; do good in the world; keep up, in some way, the quest for things we all prized as journalists — truth, fairness, justice, honor, humanity, equality, liberty . . . if it all sounds corny, it is — just as it was when i started in this zany craft 35 years ago. if it made sense to my naive, youthful mind, why does it seem so cloudy, distant after all these years of tryin? the struggle must need to continue…."

Stephens, 39, has been at the Times for nine years, "and it was definitely a layoff," he told Journal-isms by e-mail.

"I’d like to continue writing, preferably for a website although much of my heart still resides with newspapers. I enjoyed covering hockey a lot the last three years but I’m certainly open to covering other sports as I have done that for most of my career. . . . Supposed I could have taken a buyout the last time it was offered but there was also a time when I thought at some point they would stop or slow down.

"Fact is there will be more cuts in this industry. But I will land on my feet and I have high hopes for the future."

Muscle Man Cover Guy Is CNN’s D.C. Assignment Editor

Branden Ray's colleagues at CNN in Washington call him 'the Black Hulk' or 'Captain America.' That guy with the bulging physique staring from the cover of Muscular Development magazine is the assignment editor for the CNN Washington Bureau.

Branden Ray, 27, is preparing for the National Physique Committee’s 2008 championships. He was already the 2007 NPC Junior Nationals light-heavyweight champion. On Wednesday, he made the New York Post’s Page Six gossip column.

"I work for CNN in Washington, DC. I’ve been there since 2002 after I graduated from college" at the University of Maryland-College Park, Ray said in a December interview in the magazine. "I’m an assignment editor. I’m the youngest guy in my position. Basically, I’m responsible for all the logistics of the news stories. I field the breaking stories, assign producers and crews. Every now and then, I’m a field producer, so I work on Capitol Hill, the White House and the State Department with the Pentagon. I’m pretty much involved in all aspects. I plan the events we’ll shoot the next day.

". . . They have so many nicknames for me. I’m the Black Hulk . . . Captain America. When the refrigerator is stuffed full, they know it’s mostly my meals. They laugh at the things I eat. And these are reporters you see on the air. I’m talking White House correspondents. They’ll ask, ‘How’s the competition going? Are you eating clean?’ Wolf Blitzer tells me that I’m getting too big every time he sees me."

A Brooklyn, N.Y., native who said he maintained a 3.8 GPA all through his academic career, Ray continued, "Once I got into my sophomore year, my goal was to get into journalism. I focused intently on it. I had an internship with C-SPAN and worked for the National Geographic channel. Funny enough, while taking all these academic courses, I had to have an elective. Basketball and swimming were full and the only thing left was bodybuilding. I wasn’t into it, because I was still playing ball at Gold’s [Gym] at the time. But I took it. I was the strongest guy in the class. By the end of the semester, my physique really changed. That’s when I became gung-ho."

Wallace Blasts MSNBC; Rove’s Fox Role Questioned

"Continuing Fox News’ war of words with MSNBC, ‘Fox News Sunday’ anchor Chris Wallace accused its rival of being ‘in the tank’ for Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama, while further pressing the news channel’s case that the mainstream press exhibits a liberal bias. "I think MSNBC’s coverage went so far over the line that it lost all credibility," Wallace told reporters Monday at the Television Critics Association press tour, Daniel Frankel reported Monday for Variety.

Although the session at the critics’ summer gathering in Beverly Hills, Calif., "was far from contentious, Fox did receive several questions regarding the propriety and terms of former Bush administration official Karl Rove’s role as a Fox commentator given the ongoing dispute with Congress — he ignored a committee’s subpoena — and his unofficial relationships with advisors to John McCain’s campaign," the Variety story continued.

"It’s been humbling to work with Karl," Wallace said, according to Alex Strachan of Canwest News Service. "I like to think that I and my colleagues at Fox are pretty sophisticated about TV. But to go through a primary night next to Karl Rove, you realize how utterly superficial and inadequate your analysis of politics is. With Karl, it’s a master class. He drills down into the numbers, into state politics, into strategy in ways that none of us, most reporters I know, including myself, ever dreamt of. It really is a fascinating and humbling experience."

"Rove was less forthcoming about decisions made while he was in the White House," Strachan reported.

Fired Detroit Anchorwoman Says She’s Innocent

"Calling the allegations that prompted her departure from Fox 2 Detroit ‘scandalous’ and the dismantling of her career ‘malicious,’ former anchorwoman Fanchon Stinger is breaking her silence about her media company’s role in placing ads in connection with a City Hall sludge contract under federal investigation," Leonard N. Fleming wrote Tuesday in the Detroit News.

"’At the conclusion of the federal investigation it will be apparent that the scandalous allegations pertaining to my personal involvement with Synagro are misleading and without factual basis,’ Stinger wrote. ‘At that time I will also be free to correct the blatant misrepresentations and tawdry allegations that have been attached to me.’"

Unity Speaker Reproached for Crimes Against Journalists

President Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal, due to address the Unity: Journalists of Color convention in Chicago next week, is proving a controversial choice. As recently as June 26, the Committee to Protect Journalists wrote to Wade:

"Following the brutal beating of two Senegalese journalists by police after a soccer match on Saturday, we are writing to express our alarm at an increasing pattern of physical attacks and threats against independent journalists in the line of duty in recent weeks and months. Thorough, transparent police investigations or prosecutions of these abuses have seldom taken place. We are deeply concerned about an ongoing culture of impunity for crimes against journalists."

Barbara Ciara, president of the National Association of Black Journalists, told Journal-isms on Wednesday, "Like most political leaders who come before our journalism association I would guess he should expect to hear some questions about the issues that have been raised when he speaks before the convention."

Wade’s remarks on July 25 at the McCormick Place Convention Center "will mark the first occasion for a visiting Head of State to address the world’s largest gathering of minority journalists," according to an NABJ news release.

"President Wade will address Senegal’s geographic position and the impact of climate changes on the African continent. With its coast at risk and agriculture affected by climate disruptions, including drought and floods, he will present a perspective to the climate change discussion not often addressed in U.S. media coverage."

BET Outlines Coverage Plans for Democratic Convention

"In the weeks leading up to the Democratic Convention in August, when the first African American will accept the Democratic nomination for President of the United States of America, BET News will unveil a new and timely weekly talk show, THE TRUTH WITH JEFF JOHNSON, premiering on Friday, August 15 at 11:00 P.M.," Black Entertainment Television announced on Wednesday.

". . . During a special 2008 election report, THE TRUTH will travel to Denver for the 45th Democratic National Convention. Broadcasting live from inside the Pepsi Center and Invesco Field, Johnson will provide extensive event coverage, including Senator Barack Obama’s speech on Thursday, August 28. He will be joined with other leading media figures such as political strategist and BET J host Keith Boykin; San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris; and political pundits Jamal Simmons, Keli Goff, Angela McGlowan. THE TRUTH WITH JEFF JOHNSON will take a frank look at news, trends, pop culture, current events and politics from an unapologetically Black point of view."

TV One, the cable network targeting an older African American demographic, previously announced its plans for covering the Democratic convention.

Myrlie Evers-Williams Sees "Political Lynching"

NAACP leader Myrlie Evers-Williams, who saw her husband killed in 1963 over his civil rights work, said Tuesday that presidential candidate Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, are undergoing "political lynching" in the media, Denise Smith Amos reported Wednesday for the Cincinnati Enquirer.

The NAACP is holding its annual convention in the city.

"Evers-Williams, 75, the widow of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers, told an NAACP luncheon group Tuesday that political spin masters and the news media are painting the Obamas as unpatriotic and dangerous radicals. She said the attacks are serious enough to use the term lynching, even though that usually refers to racially-motivated killings," Amos wrote.

"Evers-Williams, a chairwoman emeritus of the civil rights organization, said New Yorker magazine’s recent cover is an example. The magazine’s cartoon cover shows a turban-clad Barack Obama bumping knuckles with a gun-toting [Michelle] Obama as an American flag burns in a fireplace.

"’As I watch the political scene unfold, I realize there is more than one way to lynch someone,’ said Evers-Williams. ‘I look at the picture of the New Yorker and to me that was subtle, political lynching. You can call it satire if you want.’"

Short Takes

  • Although media coverage of the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis, "both understandably and expectedly, declined since early May, the fall has been particularly precipitous because Myanmar’s military junta has closed the country to foreign journalists," Megan Garber reported for the Columbia Journalism Review. "Getting into Myanmar requires sneaking past the government; reporting on its plight requires the same. Covering the story is a dangerous endeavor — but one, of course, no less worth undertaking for the danger." The cyclone, which struck on May 2-3, killed 130,000 people and affected 2.4 million.
  • David DuPree David DuPree, the longtime USA Today writer covering the NBA, and Bob Wolff, who has broadcast basketball in eight decades, have been selected to receive the 2008 Curt Gowdy Media Award from the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame during Enshrinement festivities Sept. 4 and 5 in Springfield, Mass., the Basketball Hall of Fame announced on Wednesday. "Named in honor of the late legendary sports broadcaster and former Basketball Hall of Fame President Curt Gowdy, the prestigious awards are given annually to one member of the print and one member of the electronic media whose efforts have made a significant contribution to the game of basketball," the organization said. DuPree covered the NBA for nine seasons for the Washington Post and 23 seasons for USA Today before taking a buyout there in December. His column appears weekly at SI.com.
  • The Detroit Free Press received a national Emmy nomination for news and documentary programming for "40 Years of ‘Respect’" a package featuring photos, video, a reader quiz and narrative coverage of the significance of Aretha Franklin’s chart-topping 1967 hit, "Respect. "The package, by Kelley L. Carter, now at the Chicago Tribune, appeared on freep.com, the Free Press reported on Tuesday. Television journalists associated with nominated work include Russ Mitchell of CBS; Ann Curry and Hoda Kotb of NBC; Maria Hinojosa of PBS; those who worked on "Aqui y Ahora" for Univision; Ismael Estrada of CNN; Elizabeth Vargas, Anna Sims-Phillips, Jim Avila and Joseph Diaz of ABC; Marcela Gaviria, Cara Mertes and Almudena Carracedo of PBS. Also, those who worked on "Who Cares About Girls?: Slave Girls of India" for the Oxygen Network and "A Distant Shore: African Americans of D-Day" for the History Channel.
  • Rafat Ali "Rafat Ali was just another freelance journalist back in 2002, and wanted to strut his stuff on a blog, so he started PaidContent to write about his take on the business of digital content. Now he is much richer for his efforts, having expanded the blog into a mini-media empire with venture funding and last week selling it entirely to Guardian Media Group for about $30 million," Mark Glaser reported for PBS Mediashift.
  • The Federal Communications Commission last week ruled against an appeal by two public-interest groups, Chicago Media Action and the Milwaukee Public Interest Media Coalition, that stations in Chicago and Milwaukee should lose their licenses, Robert Feder reported in the Chicago Sun-Times. In Chicago, "The group claimed that by not providing adequate coverage of local and state elections in 2004, they failed to serve the needs and interests of the public. Those are requirements for license renewal." The Milwaukee challenge was similar.
  • "A drama that has been playing out for a week on Spanish radio ended Thursday with the news that talk and information station ‘Radio Lider’ will cease programming on Saturday," Mark Washburn reported July 3 in the Charlotte (N.C.) Observer. Radio Lider was Charlotte’s first Spanish station.
  • "In a report issued Tuesday, the Government Accountability Office said the International Broadcasting Bureau failed to follow proper federal contract-awarding regulations when it authorized the no-bid deals totaling $1,069,451 for WAQI Radio Mambi 710 AM and TV Azteca," Alfonso Chardy reported in the Miami Herald. "The 30-page report is the first in a series of GAO reports on the operations of Radio and TV Marti, which beam commentary, entertainment and news to Cuba under the Office of Cuba Broadcasting, which is based in Miami."
  • The Federal Communications Commission’s edict banning "no urban" or "no Spanish" dictates, under which advertisers redline urban- or Spanish-formatted stations, went into effect on Tuesday. The Minority Media and Telecommunications Council urged the FCC to appoint a senior official to enforce it.
  • A delegation of students, alumni, faculty and staff from the City University of New York’s Graduate School of Journalism will use mobile blogging, video cameras and other high-tech tools of their trade to cover the Unity: Journalists of Color Convention in Chicago July 23-28, the school announced last week.
  • In a letter to the editor, Wayne Dawkins of Hampton University reminded readers of the Daily Press in Newport News, Va., that when it commemorates Independence Day to recall "Benjamin Banneker, who on Aug. 19, 1791, asked Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson to remember the words he wrote in the Declaration of Independence and slavery that contradicted his words."
  • The inaugural Asante Award Essay Contest for high school seniors and college students asks entrants to prepare an essay on Dallas Morning News columnist Norma Adams Wade, a founder of the National Association of Black Journalists. The contest is sponsored by Dallas’ Don’t Believe the Hype Foundation.

Feedback: The Nation’s Cartoon Made Me Jump With Joy

Re: the Nation’s cartoon —

I jumped up and said YES!!! Now that’s satire!! And it is the greatest cartoon since the Egyptians invented cartooning 4,000 years ago.


David Honig
Executive Director
Minority Media and Telecommunications Council
Washington
July 16, 2008

Feedback: New Yorker’s History Belies Its Claims

The New Yorker editor, David Remnick, says that the New Yorker cartoon about Barack Obama as a Muslim president and Michelle as his Black Power spouse was meant to ridicule the unfounded rumors about the candidate.

The controversy has made cable for days with the usual panels, mostly white, who didn’t know the difference between a caricature, a satire, a lampoon and a parody.

In order to combat the ancient slander that the Jews kidnapped Christian children for ritualistic purposes, suppose The New Yorker did a cartoon of Sen. Joseph Lieberman preparing a Christian child for sacrifice (a cartoon theme in the old New Yorker depicted blacks with bones in their noses boiling people: their dinner). Do you suppose that there’d be arguments about First Amendment rights were such a cartoon to appear?

Also, some years ago, when Henry Louis Gates Jr. edited a black issue of The New Yorker, some black cartoonists said they were censored by Tina Brown, the then editor.

As for the claim that the New Yorker has a tradition of printing bold political cartoons, Art Spiegelman, Pulitzer Prize- winning cartoonist, who defended the Obama cartoon, said that he quit The New Yorker in February 2003 because, “The New Yorker was marching to the same beat as The New York Times.” He said he had trouble getting his anti-Bush cartoons printed there.

While Gates was hired by The New Yorker to denounce Minister Louis Farrakhan, Robert Crumb, a cartoonist whose cartoons have been considered so racist that they have earned a spot at the Jim Crow Museum online at Ferris State U., is a regular New Yorker cartoonist. One of his cartoons shows a black power dictator murdering the white president while the white first lady fellates him.

Finally, Harold Ross, The New Yorker’s founder, said that "Coons are
either funny or dangerous," according to "Here at the New Yorker" by Brendan Gill. I guess the Obama cartoon was supposed to be funny.

Ishmael Reed
Oakland, Calif.
July 16, 2008

Ishmael Reed’s book, "Mixing It Up, Taking On The Media Bullies," was published this month by De Capo.

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