"A response to Andrew Sullivan" - By Salon's Managing Editor, Re: Bush Assassination Cartoon

Salon ^ | December 13, 2001 | Scott Rosenberg

[Timesink]

A response to Andrew Sullivan
The pundit's charge against Salon cartoonist Carol Lay is just plain wrong.

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Scott Rosenberg

Dec. 13, 2001 | In an item on his personal Web site headlined "Salon's new low," Andrew Sullivan asks, "Would you run a comic strip that treats the murder of president George W. Bush as a) desirable; b) a joke?" (I would link to it but Sullivan's Web site uses frames in such a clumsy way that linking to individual items is impossible.)

As a rhetorical question, this might serve as an interesting debating point: How far do the bounds of free speech reach, and so forth. But Sullivan is under the delusion that Salon has actually run such a comic strip -- in Carol Lay's latest "Story Minute" posting on our site.

All you have to do is actually read Lay's comic to see that Sullivan is simply wrong. (If you don't want to, you may rest assured that what happens in the comic -- in a nightmare sequence -- is the following: A President Bush who has been magically converted to the cause of oil conservation is suddenly shot by faceless assassins. The violent act is presented as a Bad Thing, as well as a dream within a dream; when the narrator says she "liked how [the nightmare] started out," she's obviously referring to Bush's new conservation stance, not to his murder.)

There are only a couple of reasonable explanations for Sullivan's bizarre and contra-factual complaint. Either he's the kind of poor soul who believes that cartoons and cartoonists -- despite the long tradition stretching back to Daumier and embracing, among contemporaries, the likes of Garry Trudeau and our own Tom Tomorrow -- have no right to address the volatile issues of the day in their uniquely populist and authority-questioning medium. Or, perhaps, the opportunity to hang some heavy charge of traitorous malfeasance on Salon's head was so tempting that Sullivan simply couldn't be bothered to notice that it was based on a gross and stupid misreading.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

About the writer
Scott Rosenberg is Salon's managing editor. For more columns by Rosenberg, visit his column archive.

[Timesink]

(I would link to it but Sullivan's Web site uses frames in such a clumsy way that linking to individual items is impossible.)

The Impossible Link:

http://www.andrewsullivan.com/text/archive/2001_12_09_archive_dish.html#7907444

[Timesink]

The original thread, which includes the cartoon in question, can be read here.

[SoDak]

Shouldn't Scott be out on the nearest corner hawking apples to make the next payroll? Daylight's burnin', pardner.

[AlguyA]

Who reads Salon, anyway?

[js1138]

Garry Trudeau and our own Tom Tomorrow

Now THAT'S a pair of fair-haired beauties!

[Timesink]

Ping!

[RightOnline]

How Clintonesque, Rosenberg.

Tell ya what, slick: I'll write about you getting skinned alive. Of course, it'll be in the context of a nightmare within a nightmare, so you'll just have to deal with it. If you complain, I, too, will look down my nose and snort about what an unsophisticated, shallow rube you are.

P.S. Hey, Rosenberg......one other point. I know for a fact that folks have received visits from the Secret Service for less. Chew on that.

[Timesink]

Indexing for Salon Deathwatch bump list.

[Bahbah]

I certainly want to be on that bump list. And thanks for doing the impossible link. Wasn't that a smarmy little comment on Rosenberg's part!

[Timesink]

I don't think individuals can be on those bump lists. You just have to bookmark the page for that bump list. Here's the entire bump list list.

[Timesink]

Indexing for Andrew Sullivan bump list.

[TADSLOS]

So much ink and too little time. The creditors are lining up to take what's left (not much).

[mlo]

All you have to do is actually read Lay's comic to see that Sullivan is simply wrong. (If you don't want to, you may rest assured that what happens in the comic -- in a nightmare sequence -- is the following: A President Bush who has been magically converted to the cause of oil conservation is suddenly shot by faceless assassins. The violent act is presented as a Bad Thing, as well as a dream within a dream; when the narrator says she "liked how [the nightmare] started out," she's obviously referring to Bush's new conservation stance, not to his murder.)

I hate to say it, but I read the comic yesterday when it was posted here on FR and this is exactly the way I read it too. Salon is right on this one and Sullivan is wrong.

[Benson_Carter]

Tom Tomorrow is a blabbering asshole. our local "progressive" rag covers that sh!tty comic "This Modern World", and Salon, my local progressive rag, and This Modern World aren't even good enough to wipe the @ss of my neighbor's dog.

i'm sorry for the language but it makes me THAT #$*%ING MAD!!!!

[Richard Axtell]

"All you have to do is actually read Lay's comic to see that Sullivan is simply wrong. (If you don't want to, you may rest assured that what happens in the comic -- in a nightmare sequence -- is the following: A President Bush who has been magically converted to the cause of oil conservation is suddenly shot by faceless assassins. The violent act is presented as a Bad Thing, as well as a dream within a dream; when the narrator says she "liked how [the nightmare] started out," she's obviously referring to Bush's new conservation stance, not to his murder.)

So, Scott, since the murder which you say was not depicted, is shown as a "Bad Thing", then it is ok to depict, dream or no dream, the violent assassination of a sitting president? What are the boundaries of free speech? Could those boundaries be somewhere near the threshold of outright fraud, as your entire tortured explanation seem be deteriorating into? Rather than a puerile and dissembling response to Andrew Sullivan, you might have saved some shred of your doomed e-rag's dignity if you had penned an apology to President Bush and your erstwhile readers for running that factually vacant and embarrassing "cartoon strip", and fired that talent less and tasteless cartoonist, whats-her-name. But, leave it to Salon to make it's own death that much more agonizing by poisoning the very swamp it is currently drowning in. Ta ta, suckers.

[Mr. Lucky]

Well said.

[Timesink]

I think the cartoon is poorly written enough that it can be interpreted either way, yours or Sullivan's. A lot of people consider the "starting out" part to be the entire first dream, not just the very first panel.

In any case, I still think the main problem is that it's illegal to discuss assassinating the actual living president at all, even as "humor." You want to write a story about President Bartlet taking a bullet, go right ahead. But not President Bush. The Secret Service is supposed to investigate ANY such incident, no matter how benign. This cartoonist obviously is no actual threat, but all that means is she shouldn't end up arrested. It doesn't mean she shouldn't be paid a little visit, just like any other American would be.

I guess, in short, this bugs me because they're acting elitist. If one of us got drunk in a bar and started spinning such a tale, the guys in sunglasses would be pounding at our door within hours. But because she's a writer for a prestigious publication [barf], Salon thinks she, and they, are above the law. And I say the hell with that.

[flushed with pride]

Rosenberg's comments about Lay's cartoon is just more leftist vomit about leftist vomit. Both of these fools are irrelevant.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[JoeSchem]

I had a dream within a dream that Salon was going broke.

Oh wait, it came true!