How Obama should have handled the New Yorker cover

Isaac Chotiner is surely smoking something if he thinks that “no one would have even noticed” this week’s New Yorker cover had Team Obama not made such a stink about it. We’re talking about a magazine with a paid circulation of more than a million, one that is read by probably half the country’s media ...

By , a former managing editor of Foreign Policy.
594045_080714_newyorker5.jpg
594045_080714_newyorker5.jpg

Isaac Chotiner is surely smoking something if he thinks that "no one would have even noticed" this week's New Yorker cover had Team Obama
not made such a stink about it. We're talking about a magazine with a paid circulation of more than a million, one that is read by probably half the country's media elite. No way this is getting ignored.

Isaac Chotiner is surely smoking something if he thinks that “no one would have even noticed” this week’s New Yorker cover had Team Obama
not made such a stink about it. We’re talking about a magazine with a paid circulation of more than a million, one that is read by probably half the country’s media elite. No way this is getting ignored.

No, the smart play here for Obama would have been to laugh it off as brilliant satire. Imagine if he’d said something like this:

“I love it,” Obama told reporters, referring to the controversial magazine cover. “It does a great job of showing just how ridiculous a lot of this stuff that gets said about me really is. Kudos to the New Yorker for creativity. I hope they sell a lot of magazines.”

Would that end the controversy? Of course not. The cable talk shows would chew this thing to death regardless. But laughing it off would project a real air of confidence. Instead, the campaign just looks rattled.

Blake Hounshell is a former managing editor of Foreign Policy.

Read More On Media | Politics

More from Foreign Policy

Children are hooked up to IV drips on the stairs at a children's hospital in Beijing.
Children are hooked up to IV drips on the stairs at a children's hospital in Beijing.

Chinese Hospitals Are Housing Another Deadly Outbreak

Authorities are covering up the spread of antibiotic-resistant pneumonia.

Henry Kissinger during an interview in Washington in August 1980.
Henry Kissinger during an interview in Washington in August 1980.

Henry Kissinger, Colossus on the World Stage

The late statesman was a master of realpolitik—whom some regarded as a war criminal.

A Ukrainian soldier in helmet and fatigues holds a cell phone and looks up at the night sky as an explosion lights up the horizon behind him.
A Ukrainian soldier in helmet and fatigues holds a cell phone and looks up at the night sky as an explosion lights up the horizon behind him.

The West’s False Choice in Ukraine

The crossroads is not between war and compromise, but between victory and defeat.

Illustrated portraits of Reps. MIke Gallagher, right, and Raja Krishnamoorthi
Illustrated portraits of Reps. MIke Gallagher, right, and Raja Krishnamoorthi

The Masterminds

Washington wants to get tough on China, and the leaders of the House China Committee are in the driver’s seat.