[TigersEye]

That still seems to me like a substantial alteration. It’s not like he was selling copies of the pic. No one would look at the photo and the poster and consider them to be the same thing.

[WaterBoard]

I don’t remember Nordstrom’s selling Bush shirts yet they sold Obama ‘Hope’ shirts. Won’t shop there anymore.

[paulycy]

That still seems to me like a substantial alteration. It’s not like he was selling copies of the pic. No one would look at the photo and the poster and consider them to be the same thing.

There is such a thing as a "derivative" work. This clearly falls into that category. Anyone looking at the two can clearly see that one is based on the other. A derivative work is covered by copyright law.