Kellyanne Conway sits weird: racist?

By Dan Brooks in Epistemology 4 Comments

Kellyanne Conway sits on an Oval Office sofa in this photo by Brendan Smialowski.

As of this writing, the internet is aflame over the above photograph of Kellyanne Conway during a meeting between President Trump and the leaders of historically black colleges and universities. You should know that this photo was taken shortly after Conway took a picture with her phone, so she’s seeing how that picture came out rather than just ignoring black education to check Twitter. Still, her posture is weird. Are we to believe that she is shoeless? Or has she crammed her shoes between the cushion and the back of this Oval Office couch? There is something adolescent about her pose, or maybe…coquettish? It’s peculiar, is what it is, and this photo has become a lightning rod for interpretation.

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What is Borowitz up to?

By Dan Brooks in Satire 2 Comments

A tweet from the New Yorker

I would describe The Borowitz Report as very gentle satire. While The Onion and its imitators have pushed satire toward surrealism with farfetched premises, Andy Borowitz has staked out territory closer to real life. His satire is dry. Often, his premises are not exaggerations of popular values but expressions of them, as in Stephen Hawking Angers Trump Supporters With Baffling Array of Long Words. Where The Onion’s premises are audacious, Borowitz’s are so plausible that they were routinely mistaken for actual news, before The New Yorker began labeling them “satire from Andy Borowitz.” But today’s report takes dry to a new level. With Americans Overwhelmingly Say Lives Have Improved Since Kellyanne Conway Went Away, the hygrometer is bottoming out. My throat may become too parched to laugh.

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Friday links! Go Patriots edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 0 Comment

Patriots superfan Victor Thompson of Florida—photo by St. Petersburg PD

I think I speak for all of us when I say, what time is the Super Bowl? Super Bowl broadcast time and how to watch is one of the foremost questions of the day in that famous country we all know and love, America. In fact, the only thing I like thinking more than what channel is the Super Bowl on? is how I can be more patriotic? The United States needs patriots now more than ever. If we’re going to make America great again, we need to rekindle the revolutionary spirit that once burned in every heart from Boston to Atlanta. Hawks falcons need to come together to protect us from all enemies, foreign and domestic. Today is Friday, and patriotism is on the march. Won’t you line up and salute with me?

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