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The choice August 23, 2008

Posted by Jeff in "Reality has a well-known liberal bias", Art.
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Satire of Shepherd Fairey poster

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1. Ann's New Friend - August 23, 2008

What does this mean? That you don’t like McCain. Okay. But what has that got to do with anything. The term “Liberal bias” in more serious times might have been an oxymoron. “Liberalism” used to represent an openness to ideas — kind of the opposite of the narrow partisan laundry list it now evokes. It once meant something like generous objectivity. Once it was incompatible with or at least in conflict with the possibility of “bias.”

A genuine liberal would be very keen to hear the ideas of a man like McCain, whether agreeing with those ideas or not, since McCain has lived a fascinating life and has had a long career in government and military service during an intriguing periods of turmoil and change.

One would think a “liberal” would want to hear the ideas of both men and to find the context that surrounds them both — to find the larger sphere of ideas into which they both belong and according to which both might possibly be judged.

Your poster makes McCain look angry. Perhaps it was anger that supported his spirit during five years as a prisoner of war. Meanwhile Obama looks prissy, smug and sanctimonious. Are those supposed to be his particular virtues? It’s interesting because there are a great many more flattering pictures of the Democratic senator that the one might have selected.

“Hope” is not without irony, either, you know. Obama is such an inexperienced and unproven candidate. Goodness knows one needs to “hope” that if elected he will not royally screw things up.

I think pictures tell as much about the viewer as the maker. I see different things within these pictures than evidently you intended.

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