Brilliant satire or offensive?

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by maycocksean

oh snap.

and still, no one quite understands my Cheesecake Factory metaphor.

excuse me, i need to peruse People and sip Red Bull down at the 7-11 while the guy behind the counter goes and fetches my Newports.

[MrsSpringsteen]

Well I read People and I don't read the New Yorker. I'm doomed.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by MrsSpringsteen

Well I read People and I don't read the New Yorker. I'm doomed.

ah, but would you wait in line for 3 hours to eat at The Cheesecake Factory?

[MrsSpringsteen]

I could never eat cheesecake, it would make me too fat. Have never had it actually.

[Vincent Vega]

Cheesecake.

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by yolland

I thought INDY was commenting on the notion that this particular cartoon is too impossibly sophisticated for 50% of Americans to comprehend, not on the general character of The New Yorker magazine.

That's right.
Sure, there's an elitist crowd in journalism, academia and politics (of both parties) that don't "get" much of what passes for life here in America. I looked at their reaction to Tim Russert's death the same way they probably looked at Dale Earnhardt's death several years ago. "Wow, I never knew."

Just because this election started 1&1/2 years ago (back when Hillary & Rudy were the nominees -- McCain was for immigration reform and Obama wasn't wearing a flag pin) and just because we now have three 24 hour cable networks and a legion of bloggers that NEED SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT, does not mean the rest of the country has to be paying that much attention.

It is not "too highbrow," for 50% (no doubt the same half that was so dumb as to vote for GWB... twice) of Americans to comprehend, it's just too unimportant, at this time, for 50% to give a rat's.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

That's right.
Sure, there's an elitist crowd in journalism, academia and politics (of both parties) that don't "get" much of what passes for life here in America.

see, this i have a problem with.

do not the intelligentsia of the Upper West Side, Dupont Circle, Cambridge, Berkeley, Ann Arbor, etc., not also live "here in America"?

what is it about being anti-intellectual that makes one more American than not?

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

ok, but seriously, do you think it's a good thing that we have such an anti-intellectual movement in this country? the New Yorker is nothing if not outwardly and unapologetically "elite" -- in that the articles are long, sophisticated, highly literate, and meant to be read by a very well educated audience.

does this then disqualify the magazine from having an authentic point of view?

Not at all. Like I mentioned in another thread about popular culture, I bemoan the loss of subtlety and sophistication in our popular culture. Most everything now reduced to "the lowest common denominator" and created with little imagination.

Life, to me, should be like watching an episode of mst3k. Some jokes you get, some go right over your head and you should be equally proud of both.

[INDY500]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

see, this i have a problem with.

do not the intelligentsia of the Upper West Side, Dupont Circle, Cambridge, Berkeley, Ann Arbor, etc., not also live "here in America"?

what is it about being anti-intellectual that makes one more American than not?

You're putting words in my mouth. I didn't say less American and I said nothing of intelligence. I'm talking about priorities. The daily ins-and-outs of politics are just not a priority with most Americans. And there's nothing wrong with that.

And back to Russert. What is the one thing that was said over and over by everyone who knew him?
"He never lost touch of where he came from." If that is unique than the opposite must be the rule.

[Irvine511]

Originally Posted by INDY500

You're putting words in my mouth. I didn't say less American and I said nothing of intelligence. I'm talking about priorities. The daily ins-and-outs of politics are just not a priority with most Americans. And there's nothing wrong with that.

i agree with this, but it was this statement ...

that don't "get" much of what passes for life here in America.

... where i thought you were emphasizing the belief that what happens between the coasts -- or at least outside of the urban coastal media latte bubble -- that's authentic American life.

might have misread.

[Irvine511]

[INDY500]

How many layers of irony can there be?

To put this Obama-as-a-Muslim issue behind him for good, the last thing Obama should be doing is getting upset over a cartoon.

I mean, who does that?

[deep]

Originally Posted by INDY500

How many layers of irony can there be?

To put this Obama-as-a-Muslim issue behind him for good, the last thing Obama should be doing is getting upset over a cartoon.

I mean, who does that?

It is a strategy called

working the refs.


They have employed it before.

[maycocksean]

Originally Posted by Irvine511

and still, no one quite understands my Cheesecake Factory metaphor.

excuse me, i need to peruse People and sip Red Bull down at the 7-11 while the guy behind the counter goes and fetches my Newports.

Well, I'll be the first to admit that I don't get it. Perhaps I'm not as much of a highbrow elitist as I thought. :hmmm:

I guess I'm confused becaue I enjoy perusing People but I don't like The Cheesecake Factory at all. And the Red Bull/7-11/Newports thing just totally threw me off. . . .



I guess I must have pretentions to elitism then. . .

[maycocksean]

Originally Posted by INDY500

That's right.
Sure, there's an elitist crowd in journalism, academia and politics (of both parties) that don't "get" much of what passes for life here in America. I looked at their reaction to Tim Russert's death the same way they probably looked at Dale Earnhardt's death several years ago. "Wow, I never knew."

See this is the argument that I'm just not totally buying. When Dale Earnhardt died, they had a feature about him in TIME magazine--a bigger one than when Russert died, if I recall correctly. It was all over the media and I never got the impression of "Now this Dale fellow? Who is he now? The nation is rising up in collective mourning and we don't know why. Guess we better report this."

To be honest all but the most hard-core racing fans and political news junkies were genuinely torn up about the death of either of these men. "Regular" Americans generally save their grief for people they actually know. I can only think of a few famous figures (JFK comes to mind) that seemed to bring forth genuine sorrow from "regular" Americans when they died. And this buisness of not "getting" life in a partiuclar part of the country. . .it implies that there is a certain kind of "genuine American life" that is reflected by certain parts of the country--"Here in Indiana" for example. (I lived in southwest Michigan and was in and out of Indiana regularly and I never found the people living there to be more or less American). But again this kind of populism has been used in presidential campaigns going all the way back to Andrew Jackson and it was then what it still is and always will be--a lot of nonsense.

Originally Posted by INDY500

Just because this election started 1&1/2 years ago (back when Hillary & Rudy were the nominees -- McCain was for immigration reform and Obama wasn't wearing a flag pin) and just because we now have three 24 hour cable networks and a legion of bloggers that NEED SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT, does not mean the rest of the country has to be paying that much attention.

It is not "too highbrow," for 50% (no doubt the same half that was so dumb as to vote for GWB... twice) of Americans to comprehend, it's just too unimportant, at this time, for 50% to give a rat's.

And this to me is exactly the problem. There are too many people in this country for whom the leadership of our country "is just too unimportant" and who "arent paying attention." There are far too many people, who are otherwise quite intelligent, who don't bother to be informed and thus make ill-informed decisions. And I'm not saying that if everyone "paid attention" they'd all be liberal. I consider you to be one of those who chooses to be "informed" and "pays attention" and obviously you have kept your conservative views.

[deep]

two more

who could believe the New Yorker cover is supposed top be taken as factual ?

[maycocksean]

How big a deal is the Obama campaign making of this in actuality? I saw an article on the web about some "furor" but since then the most "furor" I've seen over it has been here in this thread (and even here I'm trying to think of whose been stoking the fires of mortification on this thread. . .and no one is coming to mind).

Has Obama released any more statements since his initial one complaining about the cover?

How much TV coverage is it getting?

[deep]

This thread did get off to nice little running start.

Until someone started posting reasonable questions.

[maycocksean]

Went back to the first page. . .didn't seem to be much furor there either.

The strongest thing most people were saying was they didn't think it was that brilliant.

[MaxFisher]

Originally Posted by maycocksean

How big a deal is the Obama campaign making of this in actuality? I saw an article on the web about some "furor" but since then the most "furor" I've seen over it has been here in this thread (and even here I'm trying to think of whose been stoking the fires of mortification on this thread. . .and no one is coming to mind).

Has Obama released any more statements since his initial one complaining about the cover?

How much TV coverage is it getting?

“The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama’s right wing critics have tried to create. But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree,” spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement.

Obama slams New Yorker portrayal - Yahoo! News