The New York Post has now officially — and somewhat surprisingly — apologized for the cartoon it ran Wednesday, the one that used a dead chimp as a stand-in for the author of the stimulus. It’s not exactly the most apologetic apology ever, and the paper tries to re-direct some of the ire that’s been aimed its way at the Rev. Al Sharpton, which isn’t totally honest; the cartoon was already causing controversy without him. But just seeing the Post apologize in any form is pretty unusual.
An excerpt:
It was meant to mock an ineptly written federal stimulus bill.
Period.
But it has been taken as something else – as a depiction of President Obama, as a thinly veiled expression of racism.
This most certainly was not its intent; to those who were offended by the image, we apologize.
However, there are some in the media and in public life who have had differences with The Post in the past – and they see the incident as an opportunity for payback.
To them, no apology is due.
Sometimes a cartoon is just a cartoon – even as the opportunists seek to make it something else.
