A cartoon likening the author of the stimulus bill, perhaps President Barack Obama, with a rabid chimpanzee graced the pages of the New York Post on Wednesday. The drawing, from famed cartoonist Sean Delonas, is rife with violent imagery and racial undertones. In it, two befuddled-looking police officers holding guns look over the dead and bleeding chimpanzee that attacked a woman in Stamford, Connecticut.
“They’ll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill,” reads the caption.
An email to Delonas and a call to the New York Post went unreturned. The cartoon appears both on the New York Post website and page 12 of the Wednesday paper. At its most benign, the cartoon suggests that the stimulus bill was so bad, monkeys may as well have written it. Others believe it compares the president to a rabid chimp. Either way, the incorporation of violence and (on a darker level) race into politics is bound to be controversial. Perhaps that’s what Delonas wanted.
Huh….what were they thinking?
I’ve often thought of Congress as a bunch of drunken monkeys. As I see the cartoon, the authors of the stimulus bill were Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.
And I think a dead monkey could have done a better job.
This is just comic relief for the right wing nutts. Perhaps it’s even an Obama tactic to keep them occupied. Pretty clever that magic negro.
#24 – Dvorak
I’m not aware of any news stories where Bozo the clown got shot. If so then that would have been just as clever a cartoon and yes maybe even better.
The only Bozo I’m aware of here is bobbo who is desparately trying to get rid of the demons in his head by claiming that we all think racist thoughts like him.
#32–RBG==ha, ha. Gosh, Cut and paste huh? Musta really pissed you off? Good research there but totally off point.
Bush as chimp means Bush is an idiot not up to performing as presnedent.
Obama as chimp means he lives in the jungle, swings from trees, and really isn’t quite human.
Not the same thing at all. Part of the social context that 200 years of slavery brings.
And yes, talking about race relations includes revealing racism when it dishonestly raises its head.
Cartoon still is no where near as injurious to the public good as is the stimulus bill itself though. Hard to concentrate on being a racist when there are so many other things to hate.
Unfortunately, the joke is just not funny. Personally I cant see how its racist. Just lame.
Perhaps the reason why people scream racism when satirizing Obama is that the right wing pointyheads have a tendency to to ridicule with a racial bent, as they seem to find racial innuendo hilarious.
How I wish racists would have the guts to come out of the closet. It would put these line ball calls in some perspective.
People, people, people.
What we are saying is, the cartoonist is either:
A) Incredibly stupid,
B) Incredibly insensitive, or
C) Incredibly intentional.
A, Stupid = didn’t forsee the racist aspect of this cartoon.
B, Insensitive = didn’t care about the racist aspect of this cartoon.
C, Intentional = wanted to make a statement about the stimulus package and those who pushed it, and in particular the figurehead of the package – irregardless of who it offended.
I’m voting for C).
#35–John==”The only Bozo I’m aware of here is bobbo who is desparately trying to get rid of the demons in his head by claiming that we all think racist thoughts like him.” /// Why Johnny, thats not my point at all. How old are you?
No, my point I’ll say again slightly differently:
1. NO ONE knows what was in the artists mind, and its irrelevant anyway.
2. The relevant “art” is what will be perceived by any large segment of the readership.
3. Blacks in America have a long and continuous caricature of being monkeys.
4. NO One knows what any poster here thinks about repesenting Obama as a dead Monkey, sadly, even after they post here.
5. Point being, there is sufficient evidence to mock anyone who thinks the cartoon is NOT racist. All things are possible, but I’ll go with Ah Yea’s restatement of the possibilities at #38.
I’d prefer my political cartooning and social/political commentary as having some insight/bite/criticism about it rather than being rather mindless and pointless?
But then, we all appreciate art at our own level.
Monkey writing the stimulus plan is overrating it 🙂 I think it was a rat that wrote the plan 😀
“Huh….what were they thinking?”
Umm, it was drawn right after that chimp had to be shot by the police. But, whatever, Bush was drawn as a chimp…
McCullough–consider reposting the cartoon and request Captions?
1. Tarzan is going to be pissed when he sees this.
2. Cute when they’re young.
3. The Clone Brothers terminate their third version.
I doubt many will connect it to the “AUTHOR” of the stimulus bill.
When I saw this cartoon, I thought it was in poor taste because of the chimp attack this week. But, I also thought of the “Monkeys, Typewriters, and Shakespeare” theory. Given the way the House of Representatives turned Obama’s stimulus package into porkulus, the cartoon was spot on…
#42 bobbo
McCullough shoots bobbo for requesting a repost and captions.
Hey! That was a good idea.
OK I’m confused. Which Obama are they alluding to…the real Obama or his clone (privately sworn-in the day after the inauguration)?
Naw, I think they’re alluding to the “transparent government” Obama.
And the cops are Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.
Why do liberals always equate monkeys with black people?
#42. I guess we’re alone on this. I liked the fact that you claimed most (if not all) people have “some” racist inclinations.
Those who deny it, are liars. It’s tribal, human nature.
If it wasn’t skin color, it would be beauty, intelligence, religious preference, wealth…take your pick.
I will say the Post made a major Ooops and leave it at that.
It will cost them.
#48 Renman said “Why do liberals always equate monkeys with black people?”
Because they are closet-racists
#24 JCD nailed it when he wrote “the joke would have been just as funny with a dead Bozo the clown. Funnier maybe.”
I think ambiguities can often be useful in humor, but when one of the possible interpretations is racist in the most offensive way, ambiguity should be avoided like the plague. Using a clown would help clarify that the cartoonist is criticizing the absurdity he sees in the stimulus, which is probably the same point he thought he was making with the chimp.
At a time when newspapers are doubly suffering from internet competition and a tough economy, this cartoonist is looking fairly expendable. It just strikes me as commentary well below the level of good political cartooning, which is supposed to be an art.
The willful stupidity around here is as strong as ever.
You are either a liar or a fool if you say that this cartoonist was completely ignorant not only of the vast history of racist comparisons of blacks with monkeys, but also of the many, many high-profile Obama/monkey comparisons that splashed the news just in this last election (the Obama monkey sock puppets, the Curious George Obama shirts, etc. etc.) — and *both* impossibilities would have to be the case if with was “inadvertent”.
The rationalizations people will make to deny racism is truly mind-blowing. If this isn’t racism, nothing is and nothing ever was.
#51–Big Boy==no, its called an education.
Why would an empty noose be associated with the KKK lynching of negro’s trying to vote during reconstruction?===Because the KKK published pamphlets proudly taking credit for it.
Same as the KKK proudly caricatures blacks as monkeys, apes, and gorillas with dunce caps on unable to read or write thus deserving of poverty and welfare?
For the same reason as any thinking white person will not use the “N” word. Because we are knowledgeable of our own history and do what we can to respect it.
If you claim ignorance==learn.
If you feign ignorance==stop it.
#50
you’re probably right.
but i can imagine that the chimp story in nyc and environs was ” the top story this hour is… chimp shot.. bla bla bla”
Photoshop a green tophat on the chimp and you can reuse for St. Patrick’s Day.
#56
Then someone would complain bitterly that they were alluding to doing something untoward to O’Bama on St. Paddy’s Day. HAR!
If someone posted a cartoon of an ugly skinny big nosed jew, there would be demonstrations in the streets and calls for those responsible to lose their jobs and do jail time with visits to concentration camps and public apologies, especially from the NY Post which published the cartoon. Murdoch who is a big supporter of zionism tolerates and encourages racism against blacks and hispanics and arabs while pandering to jews, Israel and their interests. We have become the United States of Israel.
Eddie Murphy once observed that apes have thin lips, no ass, and hair all over their backs just as white people do. So where’s the racism?
Sometimes a joke is just a joke.
If you are reading something extra into it, maybe the problem is you.
Call it racist or not, human beings do resemble apes to greater and lesser degrees. I don’t think it’s wrong to compare humans to apes. You lefty Evolutionist types should be tickled at this acknowledgement that humans and apes look alike! Kudos to the cartoonist.
John F said,
“Now in the past there were racists who openly equated african americans with jungle creatures. I’m sure such racists still exist but they aren’t as open about their feeling since they know most people would disapprove.”
Get a clue, John! Open your eyes and take a look at Barack, yourself, your mom…we are large, bipedal, intelligent apes.