Entertainment | 07/15/2008 12:00 am

The wOw Cartoon of the Week: Spelling Lesson

Liza Donnelly, noted cartoonist for The New Yorker, is also the editor of the new book Sex and Sensibility: Ten Women Examine the Lunacy of Modern Love … in 200 Cartoons.

2008_0616_donnelly_cover.jpg.jpg

Click here for more cartoons from Sex and Sensibility.

56 Reader Comments (so far…) Sign In or Register to comment

Any reference to the ‘New Yorker’ magazine today seems in bad taste.

By C A Rose on 07/15/2008 12:07 am

e-mail alert

I agree. The cover’s depiction of Senator Obama and his wife totally missed the mark of satire and demonstrated a clear ploy to negatively manipulate the public toward this candidate creating controversary for future fodder the media can play off of during the campaign. Shame on the New Yorker— their personal bias is too visible on this one.

By Dee T on 07/15/2008 5:56 am

e-mail alert

The cartoon on the cover of The New Yorker isn’t good satire. You don’t satire the victim, you satire the perpetrator. Had The New Yorker put that same cartoon into the context of a computer screen in front of a toothless redneck with an evil smirk, just about to hit the “send” button on his e-mail, THAT would have been good satire. Better yet, make that Karl Rove about to hit the “send” button! Or, if the cartoon had been shown as a backdrop on a “news” set with FOX commentators sitting in front of it looking “concerned and serious” into the camera, THAT would have been good satire. But as it is, this cartoon does nothing more than perpetuate the misinformation and downright vicious propaganda campaign that has set out to depict the Obamas in this manner. The Low Information Voter is not going to get the satire, in fact, I am dreading the day this cartoon shows up in my e-mail mailbox with the subject heading, “The New Yorker Exposes the Truth about the Obamas!”

By DeBúrca obj on 07/15/2008 7:50 pm

e-mail alert

Please don’t condemn all of us who do work for the magazine! The cover was done by one artist, and approved by the editors. And the magazine has done more good over the years in its political reporting, in my opinion.

By Liza Donnelly on 07/15/2008 7:54 am

e-mail alert

As so many Obama supporters have been telling women during this campaign to “lighten up” “get over it” “it doesn’t exist” “stop being a whiner” when our qualified candidate was being pushed out by the DNC and in Michigan our votes were not going to be counted . It is a little harder for me to be too sympathetic over a cartoon - remember the world reaction- rejection to the Muslim outrage over the Danish cartoon ???? A little perspective goes a long way. Obama is in the toughest of all races - the stakes are high - winner takes all- everyone is playing hardball in the political game. A little cartoon regarding a “celebrity” - goes with the teritory and he knew this going into the race. Fighting back against the cartoon is also what was expected. But no The New Yorker should not go away, it should not be tainted - in fact it will become another “historic” moment.

By Kay Sara on 07/15/2008 7:30 pm

e-mail alert

Must everything come back to Hillary … ?! LET IT GO already …

By Mary Lou From Maine on 07/16/2008 11:27 pm

e-mail alert

Would a joke be funny if it were in “good taste”? Just asking.Laughing is an invokuntary response elicited many times by surprising the listener.

By Star Lawrence on 07/15/2008 8:50 am

e-mail alert

Invokuntary? I meant involuntary. Nuts—will this be a bad eye day? I saw a comment in the NYT on that cover that said the New Yorker should disappear. Really? Anything we disagree with should disappear—or BE disappeared? Now THAT was not funny!

By Star Lawrence on 07/15/2008 8:52 am

e-mail alert

The New Yorker cover was supposed to be satire not a joke. It was lousy satire though. Good satire makes fun of the perpetrator, not the victim.

By DeBúrca obj on 07/15/2008 7:43 pm

e-mail alert

The cartoon is really quite funny. So many have tried to make Senator Obama into a new type of senator….a senator who was above partisanship and politics and instead we are seeing each day that he is just like many politicians with his finger in the wind testing public opinion. He is becoming quite notorious for his changes on political positions. So, I guess the cartoon is also a salute to his political agility which also was a compliment so attributed to President Clinton.

By Bonnie Oliver on 07/15/2008 12:24 am

I was surprised Obama voted for FISA. My 22 year old son who donated his money to Obama’s campaign is now no longer going to vote for Obama - the last straw was this vote for Fisa. Who is Obama? What does he really stand for? What will we get? Does he have the experience and judgment to make the tough decisions? Don’t know. Right now I hear more and more people voting for Nader. I am upset with the DNC for not voicing opposition to sexist mysogeny comments and their disregard for the 54% female voting population that they took for granted as always being there for whomever they put up as their candidate. This is way beyond Hillary Clinton treatment issues and I do not blame sexism for Hillary’s “loss” totally (it was one of the contributing factors, however). I was so insulted when democratic female politicians trying to ease the anger of their female voters said that they were going to form a coffee klatch to discuss the “macaroni and cheese” issues women had! How trivializing of our inequality, human rights violation issues. The constitution promises equality - yet when women are not treated equally- they view it as a “macaroni and cheese” issue! They think we only care about balancing work and family and pro-choice. Quite frankly, I am sick of Emily’s List and ACLU calling me and using pro-choice as the “grabber” issue - there are sooooo many more women’s issues - macro issues besides pro-choice. And for this baby boomer woman who no longer can get pregnant - the pro-choice passion has subsided - I now want equal pay, same opportunity to advance and use all of my talents, fair and equal access to the courts to bring the discrimination and domestic violance to trial, no more ignoring mysogeny and sexist attitudes, no more sex trafficking.. These democartic female politicians said they would take time away from focusing on the “macro” issues to look at women’s “macaroni and cheese” issues! My blood is boiling over this. I wrote to every democratic senator yesterday over this insult and lack of understanding of what women’s issues even are. I was also outraged when I saw the topics the senators listed to select for the issue you were writing to them about. Almost all had “animal welfare” listed. Only about a dozen if that had “women’s issues”. Mostly had to select “labor” or “civil rights”. We are below animals in their priority of concerns, ladies. I was also dismayed to hear Obama unable to address these real women’s issues- serious sissues- in his speech directed at wooing female voters. All he came up with was a generic hurting economy. We are forgotten segment of the population. McCain and Obama are clamoring for the Hispanic voters- so the headlines read yesterday. Who is really trying to get our votes? Oh well, as the Obama m & DNC say- in the end the women will vote for us- we are more in their best interest to do so. Okay- I am now getting off of my soap box. I wake up feisty.

By Kay Sara on 07/15/2008 5:10 am

e-mail alert

Kay, you and many others have eloquently stated the obvious, yet the Democratic Party still doesn’t get it. They still think it is about Hillary, and that we’re sulking sore losers who are willing to bite off our noses. The only thing about Hillary that it is, is that she inadvertantly opened a long festering wound. Michael Kinsley has an essay in the latest Time magazine: “Divided They Fall — If Hillary’s supporters refuse to vote for Obama, her agenda will fade.” In it he uses words like ‘childish’ and ‘revenge’, sentences like “Now is the time to just get over it.” In other words, fall in line ladies, or you get nothing. Well, Michael, since we’re used to nothing, the fall won’t damage us too much. As for Hillary’s agenda fading, it hasn’t mattered to the the DNC and Super Delegates until now that it appears they’ve selected the weaker candidate.

By Marjorie C. on 07/15/2008 6:17 am

e-mail alert

Marjorie, your entry is music to my ears! I am so tired of these people calling us “whiners” “sore losers”. You are so right, it isn’t about that. it is that we are viewed as door matts. And you are so right, Hillary just highlights the condition of women, how we are ALLL pushed aside, our votes don’t count and basically we are a dependable stand by - whose concerns and lack of equality are completely insignificant and trivial. “Macaroni and cheese” vs thr real “macro” issues.

By Kay Sara on 07/15/2008 6:34 am

e-mail alert

Kay Sara - Yes, you do wake up feisty, don’t you? But you also wake up eloquent. I would like to comment about the pro-choice debate. It seems that some groups like the ACLU and the DNC are still in the business of instilling fear by raising the issue that Roe will be overturned if a Republican is elected President. It does not matter that we have had Republican presidents and still Roe is the law of the land. I think it is an argument whose time has come and gone. The likelihood of the Supreme Court revisiting the issue is doubtful and the likelihood of them reversing Roe is ever dim. There was a Conservative Court majority for many years and the only action taken by the Court was, I believe, with regard to third trimester or late term abortion. The debate is over; women have won and, hopefully, this issue can be shelved especially since younger women do not understand what all the fuss is about. The issue is settled.

By Bonnie Oliver on 07/15/2008 7:28 am

Bonnie, you make an excellent point- “the fear factor”. I had not thought of that angle and I think you are right on many points. It is an overdone debate and the younger women “don’t know what any of the ‘fuss’ is about ” - maybe that is what we have been wanting to achieve, yet our rights (civil and human) are far from stable. I am going to go read Cynthia’s article on sex trafficking girls in this country.

By Kay Sara on 07/15/2008 7:20 pm