N.Y. Post apologizes to some over Obama cartoon

[jefferson_dem]

Source: AP

N.Y. Post apologizes to some over Obama cartoon



NEW YORK (AP) — The New York Post is apologizing for a cartoon that critics say links President Barack Obama to a raging chimpanzee shot dead by police in Connecticut. But the newspaper also says the image was exploited by its longtime antagonists.

After two days of protests, the paper posted an editorial on its website Thursday saying the cartoon was meant to mock the federal economic stimulus bill, but "to those who were offended by the image, we apologize."

The editorial also says some people who have long-standing differences with the paper saw the cartoon "as an opportunity for payback."

The editorial calls them "opportunists" and says: "To them, no apology is due."

The drawing was published Wednesday. It shows a dead chimp, with the caption reading: "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill."

Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-02-19-nypost-a...

[qanda]

1. That is far from good enough

Why apologize to "some"? It just means that they aren't at all serious.

[targetpractice]

4. True. Sincere apologies...

... never start with "if" or meant for "some".

They should acknowledge it was indeed offensive and a mistake, and then apologize without qualifications.

I would accept that.

[pacalo]

2. Some guy who wrote a book about Rupert Murdoch & Faux News was on Olbermann tonight

& he said that Murdoch is probably livid over the cartoon & there's a possibility that the NYPost editor will be canned for this. The editor, who is from Australia, & Murdoch have been growing apart, due to the fact that Murdoch likes Obama. His opinion was that Murdoch has been becoming more liberal in his old age.

(If that's true, why hasn't he done something about Faux News?)

[No Elephants]

26. I don't think Fox got the memo about this alleged Murdoch Obama love, either.

[EFerrari]

3. AP headline shows who's winning this media battle. n/t

[OneBlueSky]

5. other than their sports section, all the Post is good for is birdcage lining . . .

birds love shitting on it . . . maybe they have more brains than we give them credit for . . .

[BeatleBoot]

6. New York Post apologizes for, yet still defends, chimp cartoon

Source: CNN

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A day after publishing a cartoon that drew fire from critics who said it evoked historically racist images, the New York Post apologized in a statement on its Web site -- even as it defended its action and blasted some detractors.

Many of those critical of the cartoon said it appeared to compare President Barack Obama to a chimpanzee in a commentary on his recently approved economic stimulus package.

"Wednesday's Page Six cartoon -- caricaturing Monday's police shooting of a chimpanzee in Connecticut -- has created considerable controversy," the paper said about the drawing, which shows two police officers standing over the body of a chimpanzee they just shot.

The drawing is a reference to the mauling of a woman by a pet chimpanzee, which was then killed by police. In the cartoon, one of the officers tells the other, "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill."



Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/02/19/chimp.cartoon.apology/...

[Mz Pip]

7. Why has yet to be explained to me

is how the chimpanzee that was shot had anything to do with the stimulus package. Kind of like comparing some guy who stole a pizza to the rising price of shoes at Payless.

Or it was exactly as people perceived it to be - a blatantly racist attack on Obama.

[soothsayer]

9. I think it's a million monkeys typing for a million years would eventually write the works of

Shakespeare, or however that goes.

[No Elephants]

15. What one policeman says to the other in the

cartoon is the point: "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill."

Question: Why does a dead chimp equate to needing to find a new an author for the the next stimulus bill?

Answer: The dead chimp was the author of the first stimulus bill.


You know the first stimulus bill, right? The one referred to as the President's stimulus bill?

[marksmithfield]

31. Because the stimulus bill

could have been written by a deranged monkey for all the good it will do.

[Hugabear]

8. That cartoonist is a right-wing, homophobic, racist fuck. Here are some of his other works:

[ronnie624]

12. His contempt for Muslims, Arabs and homosexuals

is blatantly obvious in the subject matter of his 'cartoons'. As for his Travis the Chimp work, I can't imagine how it would make any sense if it wasn't racist in nature. But even if it isn't a conscious expression of racist contempt, the chimpanzee attack against that woman was far too horrific to become fodder for a joke, especially so soon after it happened. It seems akin to pointing and laughing at someone bleeding to death on the sidewalk.

What a revolting person this 'cartoonist' must be.

[riverdeep]

13. He really really has a problem with 'the gays'.

Methinks he doth protest too much.

[No Elephants]

17. Because of my strict religious upbringing, calling someone a fuck is not the first thing

that leaps to my mind, even now. However, you could not be more right. Er, I mean, you could not be more correct.

[boilinmad]

23. What an idiot...

...Sean Delonas (the cartoonist) is. Another one to add to my list of major assholes. Can somebody please tell me why he draws McGreevey to look like Obama. I'm confused.

[ronnie624]

30. I was struck by the resemblance to Obama as well.

Perhaps it is some sort of subconscious expression by the 'cartoonist'. His hatred for homosexuals is readily obvious in his 'cartoons'. Perhaps there are yearnings that he is unaware of; yearnings that compel him to express anger toward homosexuals in his work. President Obama is quite handsome and hale.

[Name removed]

36. Deleted message

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[Imagevision]

10. Isn't ther New York Post owned by FOX?

[Starbucks Anarchist]

29. Owned by NewsCorp, which owns Fox.

[ConcernedCanuk]

11. Fuck New York Post - that was ignorant and uncalled for

.
.
.

I have no respect for the New York Post after this disgraceful conduct

Not that I have a whole lot of respect for most USAmerican newspapers anyway

but they are scraping the bottom . .

[riverdeep]

14. I have to admit, I didn't get the cartoon the first time I saw it.

What does a random chimp attack have to do with stimulus package? I didn't think that he could have meant Obama because that would be too blatant.

"The Post said the cartoon was meant to mock what it called an "ineptly written" stimulus bill."

-how? The connections are tenuous, at best. It's like a dog getting run over by a car, did he write it? Or maybe a bird flying into a window, did he write it? If you have to have a joke explained to you...it's not funny.

If he really did mean to imply Obama's a monkey, the cartoonist and the Post really need to have the guts to stand up and say that, and let the chips fall where they will.

[No Elephants]

16. Please see post # 15. What the policeman says about needing to find an

author for the next stimulus bill explains exactly what connection the cartoonist saw between the dead chimp and the stimulus bill that Congress just passed. The dead chimp was the author of that stimulus bill.

America's first African American President depicted as a dead chimp.

[No Elephants]

18. For those of you who do not know Keller, he is a smarmy, right wing

"political analyst" in Massachusetts, broadcast over WBZ radio and TV there (local CBS affiliate).

This is what he wrote Wednesday on his blog about the cartooon.

"Sick and Negligent
Posted by Jon_Keller
No possible excuse for thisI don't think it's even a close call - this vile New York Post cartoon is racist and deplorable, as is the fact that the Post's alleged editors thought it was OK to print and are defending that decision instead of abjectly apologizing."


This is what Keller said yesterday about the Post's alleged apology.


"Sick, Negligent and "Sorry"
Posted by Jon_Keller
It was quite a day for journalism in New York City, where not one but two of the city's major dailies issued weaselly public statements about controversial things they've printed. The editors of the New York Post, 48 hours after they printed a cartoon that used the image of a chimpanzee to depict the author of the federal stimulus bill just signed into law by our first African-American president, ran this preposterously defensive, disingenuous statement apologizing to "those who were offended." But they stood by the assertion that it never dawned on anyone in their hard-boiled newsroom that the use of a primate to represent legislation closely identified with President Obama was in questionable taste, to say the least. And their grudging statement was packed with self-serving paranoia about how the uproar over their incredibly poor judgement is mere "opportunism" by those who's had differences with the Post. The world's largest special-interest group!"

http://cbslocalblogs.prospero.com/n/blogs/blog.aspx?web...




A right wing con says it's not even a close call. Yet, posters here who are supposedly Democratic are spinning themselves into crap and twisting pretzels to give this cartoon non-racist meaning. Whom do they think they're kidding?

[Chrisssy]

19. The NYPost is such a tool

I wonder why people still take it seriously

[underpants]

21. Welcome to DU

“(Getting the truth in the New York Post has been as) difficult as finding a good hamburger in Albania.”
_Paul Newman
http://thinkexist.com/quotes/paul_newman/2.html

[Tab]

20. Oh, bite me.

They're not apologizing for anything, except for the possible loss of readership.

The Post has always been a cheap rag, but lovable in a New York sort of way, but every once in a while they go beyond the pale, and this was one of those times.

And it's not just the cartoon, it's the editors who approved it. Crap like "if you were offended, we apologize" is very different than "we apologize for being offensive and we should never have run that cartoon and you'll never hear from that cartoonist again". It's more like "we're sorry we got caught".

[closeupready]

28. Their readership is so low, they can't even GIVE their paper away in Times Square once per week.

You'll see them trying to give it away beginning about 11:00 a.m., and they're still there at 4:00 p.m., stack only slightly lower, lol.

[LynnTheDem]

22. RACIST.

Shockingly so.

Whine all you want, you MFers, the entire world knows RACISM when it sees it.




Just as the entire world knows stupid rightwingnut bullshit.

[yellowcanine]

24. "to those who were offended by the image, we apologize."

Puts the onus on "those who were offended". Back handed slap apology and thus no apology at all, imo. Particularly when coupled with the "To them (the "opportunists"), no apology is due." Sorry Charlie, you don't get to pick and choose who is "deserving" of an apology. You apologize for what you did, not what others make of it.

[No Elephants]

25. Amen. People who recognize that the Post is a rag have as much right to be offended by racism as

anyone else does.

[closeupready]

27. Not good enough.

[bosbdd2009]

32. Pretty Lame........

Whats funny is they claim it was not racist and not about Obama at all. Then why add a caption saying now they will have to find someone else to write the stimulus bill. What does shooting a monkey dead have to do with the stimulus bill, nothing as far as I can see.

It implies the monkey is Obama, and calling a black man a monkey is a racial slur, so what did they think people would see in that stupid cartoon. It's racist, plain and simple. It just shows what a racist paper the right-wing NY Post is, and the fact it got past an editor speaks volumes.

It shows that not only are they racist, then dont care if anyone else knows it.

[Butch350]

33. What a way to boost sales of a rag sheet....

Too bad the architect of the cartoon caption has lost his creativety (sp) and has to resort to creating a tastless
and insulting cartoon to get attention and to make money for that sorry ass paper he works for.

[slackmaster]

34. Yes, and its a shame people are playing into it by giving it so much attention

[Name removed]

35. Deleted message

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[uppityperson]

37. You might last longer if you post something different

simply copy/pasting the same thing over and over falls into the "spam" category which is against DU rules.

[Supersedeas]

38. to our friends who appreciate our diversionary explanation--we apologize