"Two's a Crowd" — a New Yorker cover by Barry Blitt.

Nicely conceived and drawn.

The expressions are great — especially that one eye of Trump's.

Our awful gerontocracy is unleashing retrograde ageism.

That's the new New Yorker cover, by Barry Blitt, discussed at "Barry Blitt’s 'The Race for Office'/The artist discusses hernias, walkers, and the joys of old age." Or... no... he never discusses the use of aging stereotypes in this cartoon — only his own aging. 

It's a well-drawn cartoon. I don't want to focus on Barry Blitt's use of walkers to express oldness. I want to raise the general topic: Our justified desire to criticize those who are clinging to power and subjecting us to a gerontocracy should not release us from the ethical responsibility to refrain from expressing contempt and disgust toward the old. 

By the way, only something like 15% of those who war 80+ years old use a walker, and some of them might be safer without it. I don't think it's good to think of aging as necessarily involving the use of a mobility device. And obviously, none of the oldsters on that New Yorker cover actually use a walker... not when we're able to see them, at least. We're all getting older, and it's better not to lean toward pessimism. There are lots of things you can do every day to enhance your capacity to walk unassisted when you are 80, 90, or 100.

I'm annoyed at the gerontocracy for existing in the first place, but also for bringing negativity into the way we think about getting old.

The bankruptcy barrel.

I was amused by these "Exclusive Emojis from Elon Musk" drawings from Barry Blitt (in The New Yorker). Please check them all out. I'm just going to focus on one (and not because it's the best in the set of 12):

  

I just want to talk about the image — which I've seen all my life — of a guy wearing a barrel. I understand it means you're so poor you don't have even a shred of normal clothing and your only hope of modesty is wearing this very bulky, unwieldy object, the barrel.

Anti-Trump sketches from the artist Barry Blitt that The New Yorker rejected.

Video here.

Click my "Barry Blitt" tag if you can't remember Blitt's finished work that The New Yorker has published. I love seeing the work at the sketch phase — raw and closer to a mere idea — and it's interesting to know what falls below the anti-Trumpism that permeates The New Yorker and seems to torment Blitt.

I see that The New Yorker is now running a series called "Barry Blitt's Sketchbook"... I mean: "Blitt's Kvetchbook." Here, under the headline "The Latest on J. D. Salinger Unearthed," is a drawing captioned "J.D. Salinger, moments before he became disgusted with something." You either already have a New Yorker subscription or you just became disgusted with something.

ADDED: After publishing this post, I clicked my own "Barry Blitt" tag, and I was amazed to see that I had not written a post with that tag since May 2017! To me, that says a lot about what anti-Trumpism has done to humorists who are not Donald Trump. That's the only Blitt cover about Trump that I've seen fit to blog during the Trump administration.

It shows James Comey being dragged off an airplane. And I commented back then about "the loss of a sense of humor in Trump's America":

I think Trump thinks he's funny, and I think he's funny. But when the funnyman holds vast power, he's like the classic bully whose taunt is "What's the matter, can't you take a joke?"

And yet, if political discourse loses its humor dimension, and it becomes nothing but outrage and That's not funny, many people — I feel it happening to me — will turn away. We need the leavening, most of us.

The next newest one is a cover that bears the date January 23, 2017, but it was out before the inauguration, and I blogged it on January 13th.

Barry Blitt depicts the Comey ousting...

... on the cover of the new New Yorker:



ADDED: WaPo interviews the lawyer for the man who was dragged off the United flight:

Would you compare Dao’s dragging to Comey’s firing?

Dr. Dao had his glasses askew, he had blood coming out of his mouth, he may have been unconscious at that point. And here Mr. Comey is looking as dapper as ever, and he’s not harmed.

The analogy was not respectful of what Dr. Dao went through.

AND: The lawyer's remark exemplifies the loss of a sense of humor in Trump's America. I understand why a lawyer would maintain a humorless demeanor, and I even understand why Trump's antagonists won't absorb his weirder statements — "James Comey better hope that there are no 'tapes' of our conversations before he starts leaking to the press!" — as comedy. I think Trump thinks he's funny, and I think he's funny. But when the funnyman holds vast power, he's like the classic bully whose taunt is "What's the matter, can't you take a joke?"

And yet, if political discourse loses its humor dimension, and it becomes nothing but outrage and That's not funny, many people — I feel it happening to me — will turn away. We need the leavening, most of us.

"To borrow from Woody Allen’s distinction between the miserable (something we all are) and the horrible (fortunately suffered by only a few)..."

"... we must now distinguish resolutely between the sickening and the terrifying. Many programs and policies with which progressive-minded people passionately disagree will be put forward over the next few years. However much or strongly one opposes them, they are, like it or not, the actual agreed-on platform of a dominant national party... One may oppose these things—and one should, passionately and permanently—but they are in no sense illegitimate.... Calm but consistent opposition shared by a broad front of committed and constitutionally-minded protesters—it’s easy to say, fiendishly hard to do, and necessary to accomplish if we are to save the beautiful music of American democracy."

From Adam Gopnik's most recent meditation on the coming Trump presidency.

That's in The New Yorker, which just came out with this cover for the inauguration week issue:

“It’ll apply next week, whether it’s one or the other. And it’s nice to take a break and not have to draw Trump—or Hillary, for that matter.”

Barry Blitt's New Yorker cover for the issue dated November 14th:



At the link, there are more of Blitt's covers from the mind-bending 2016 election season. Not all of them, though. Not this one of Hillary Clinton, the fighter.

Barry Blitt mocks Trump's mockery of his beauty queen.

"Watching the debate, the artist Barry Blitt recognized a significant moment in the Presidential campaign. Of all Trump’s dangerous beliefs, Blitt said, his misogyny 'might just be his Achilles’ heel.'"



ADDED: That might be the ugliest New Yorker cover ever. I've been looking at New Yorker covers for more than 50 years, and I'm very familiar with the light touch and sweet charm of most of them. Blitt brings more political satire than anyone else, but he has a light touch too, with his very thin quill pen marks and highly diluted watercolor washings. But this one... yeesh.

At least he put Trump in a one-piece bathing suit. When's the last time pageant contestants wore one-piece suits?

ADDED: The original swimsuit competition — with Miss America in Atlantic City in the 1920s — had one-piecers like this...



... kind of a cool mini-dress. I like the dots. It's sort of: woman as Wonder Bread.

2-piece suits began in Miss America in 1997, when they were first permitted — with the top of the bottom no lower than 1-inch below the belly button. That rule went away.

And I can see that an occasional contestant still does wear a one-piece suit. I see some discussion back in 2011:

In this year's competition, all but one contestant wore a black bikini and high heels. (Apparently pageant officials give contestants few swimsuits to choose from.) The young woman who donned a one-piece swimsuit was not 17-year-old Teresa Scanlan, Miss America 2011, former Miss Nebraska, and a devout Christian. No, the brave one-piecer was 19-year-old Miss Idaho Kylie Kofoed, a Mormon and music major at Brigham Young University.

So, notice: It's not just feminists who have a problem with the body-judging in the swimsuits. There are also some conservative religionists. Trump has to appeal to a middle group that is more easygoing about exhibiting and enjoying the seeing the female body. 

"BRITISH LOSE RIGHT TO CLAIM THAT AMERICANS ARE DUMBER."

Humor in The New Yorker... which also came up with this "silly walks" new cover by Barry Blitt:

"Melania is as imperial as her husband, if not more so."

"Most aspiring First Ladies chase accessibility to the point of absurdity—Teresa Heinz Kerry called herself an 'African-American' when she spoke to black audiences—but Melania positions herself as aspirational, playing ice queen rather than soccer mom. Not only does she never joke about her husband; she is entirely self-serious. The most un-American thing about her is that she is discreet about her weaknesses. She doesn’t attempt to bond by deprecating herself. She makes no apologies for her twenty-five-carat diamond (a gift from Trump for their tenth anniversary), her formal life style ('He’s not a sweatpants child,' she has said, of Barron), her multiple houses ('Bye! I’m off to my #summer residence #countryside #weekend')."

From "The Model American/Melania Trump is the exception to her husband’s nativist politics" in The New Yorker. (Worth clicking through for the Barry Blitt illustration, which captures, among other things, her ever-smizing eyes.)

Why is "Sympathy for the Devil" played at Donald Trump rallies?!

From "The Duel/The Trump and Cruz campaigns embody opposite views of politics and the future of the G.O.P." by Ryan Lizza in The New Yorker:

Donald Trump has a rule at his rallies: for the fifty minutes before he takes the stage, the only music that can be played is from a set list that he put together. The list shows a sensitive side, mixing in Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer” and music from “Cats” and “The Phantom of the Opera.” But it’s heavy on the Rolling Stones—“Sympathy for the Devil,” “You Can’t Always Get What You Want,” and the famously impolitic “Brown Sugar.” The young volunteer in charge of music for one rally sent me the full Trump-curated playlist and asked for requests. “Remember,” he said, “the more inappropriate for a political event, the better.”

And don't miss the great Barry Blitt cover ("My biggest challenge was to alter the Presidents’ expressions to make them reflect attitudes of consternation... Teddy Roosevelt generally looks angry and somewhat appalled, so he was the easiest."):



ADDED: What does the song "Sympathy for the Devil" mean? Mick Jagger has said that it's not about the mythological figure Satan but about the evil within human beings. The lyrics support that interpretation as they call attention to war and assassination. But the "I" singing the words is Satan. Still, no ordinary politician would want to allow any room for speculation that he's the Devil. The line I find most interestingly connected to Trump is: "But what's puzzling you is the nature of my game."

"Trump Defeats Kanye" = Kanye wins in 2020 (and Trump wins in 2016).

A nice new New Yorker cover, by Barry Blitt:



Historical reference:

"The Founding Fathers!: Those Horse-Ridin', Fiddle-Playin', Book-Readin', Gun-Totin' Gentlemen Who Started America."

That title and illustrations by Barry Blitt were enough to get me to put this book in my Kindle.

ADDED: This book is aimed (according to the publisher) at children in grades 2 to 5. I did a screen shot of a bit about James Madison to give you an idea of the style and attitude. (Click to enlarge.)



I picked Madison not because I'm a conlawprof or because I live in Madison but because — I see here — Madison was the "first president to wear long pants."

AND: In case you think Madison's owning a parrot was special, here's a website called "Presidential Parrots & Birds - A Brief History." Today I learned that Ulysses S. Grant had a parrot, Teddy Roosevelt had a parrot, Andrew Jackson had a parrot that he taught to swear, William McKinley had a parrot named "Washington Post," and George Washington had a parrot that he disliked.

"Barry Blitt drew next week’s cover, inspired by the photographs of the Selma-to-Montgomery march that are everywhere again."

"'It struck me that King’s vision was both the empowerment of African-Americans, the insistence on civil rights, but also the reconciliation of people who seemed so hard to reconcile,' he said. 'In New York and elsewhere, the tension between the police and the policed is at the center of things. Like Trayvon Martin and Eric Garner, Michael Brown and Officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, Martin Luther King was taken way too early. It is hard to believe things would have got as bad as they are if he was still around today.'"

"Playing in Traffic" — a Barry Blitt cover for the New Yorker.

(Link.)

Another Barry Blitt New Yorker cover about Obama.

"When I heard that the troubled Obamacare Web site was built by a Canadian company, of course I felt personally responsible," says Blitt (because he's from Canada). "I’ll be happy when the glitches are all worked out and everything’s running smoothly, so I can put this all behind me."

Nice drawing. The sentiment is rather stickily sweet for the circumstances, but it's The New Yorker, shoring up support for the once-beloved President.

"One on One" — the New Yorker cover by Barry Blitt.

"This image seemed like a proper response to the first Presidential debate... but I’m not sure I realized how hard it is to caricature furniture.”

Remember Blitt's famous cover from the 2008 campaign.

"'Call me garbage,' one of the twins said again. 'I dare you.'"

"'O.K.,' I said, trying, for once, to be a good mother. 'You’re garbage.'"

Elizabeth Kolbert writes about "Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother" in the New Yorker. Bonus: An illustration by Barry Blitt. (Click my Barry Blitt tag if you can't remember by loving Barry Blitt.)

A smiling John McCain crushed under Palin's high-heeled shoe.

Nice illustration by Barry Blitt (the artist who did the famous Michelle-and-Barack New Yorker cover).

The accompanying column, by Frank Rich, is not Palin-friendly:

But the debate’s most telling passage arrived when Biden welled up in recounting his days as a single father after his first wife and one of his children were killed in a car crash. Palin’s perky response — she immediately started selling McCain as a “consummate maverick” again — was as emotionally disconnected as Michael Dukakis’s notoriously cerebral answer to the hypothetical 1988 debate question about his wife being “raped and murdered.” If, as some feel, Obama is cool, Palin is ice cold. She didn’t even acknowledge Biden’s devastating personal history.

The bitch! Hey, wait, does that mean she's cerebral now?

... She has more testosterone than anyone else at the top of her party.

And a guy.

Palin is an antidote to the whiny Republican image that [Barney] Frank nailed.

Frank's column is full of sexual imagery, but I think that one was unintentional. (And, by the way, the Blitt illustration is arguably sexual.)

You have to wonder how long it will be before [Republicans] plead with [McCain] to think of his health, get out of the way and pull the ultimate stunt of flipping the ticket. Palin, we can be certain, wouldn’t even blink.

When Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart met Entertainment Weekly.

They made a great cover! If you're looking for the old posts about the great, hotly controversial New Yorker cover by Barry Blitt, they're here and here.



The EW interview:

STEWART: I keep hearing that [Sarah Palin is] ''like us.'' There's this idea that people who hunt and have ''good'' values are somehow this mythological American; I don't know who ''this'' person is, I've never met them. She is no more typical ''us'' than I am, than Obama is, than McCain is, than Mr. T is. If there is something quintessentially or authentically American about her, I sort of feel like, you know what? You ''good values people'' have had the country for eight years, and done an unbelievably s---ty job. Let's find some bad values people and give them a shot, maybe they'll have a better take on it.....

There are a lot of issues in this election. The biggest one right now is the economy.

STEWART: We were in this huge credit crisis, out of money. Then the Fed goes, We'll give you a trillion dollars, and all of a sudden Wall Street is like, ''I can't believe we got away with it!'' Can you imagine if someone said, ''I shouldn't have bought that sports car because it means I can't have my house,'' and the bank just said, ''All right, you can have your house. And you know what? Keep the car.'' [He throws up his arms joyfully and shouts] ''Yeaaaaah, I get to keep the car! Wait, do I have to give the money back?'' ''No, it doesn't matter.'' ''Yeah, I'm gonna get another car! I'm gonna do the same thing the same way, except twice as f---ed up!''

COLBERT: The idea that Lehman Brothers doesn't get any money and AIG does reminds me very much of ''Iran is a mortal enemy because they have not achieved a nuclear weapon. But North Korea is a country we can work with, because they have a nuclear weapon.'' The idea is, Get big or go home. How big can you f--- up? Can you f--- up so bad that you would ruin the world economy? If it's just 15,000 who are out of jobs, no. You have to actually be a global f---up to get any help....

More at the link.