Garry Trudeau has gone ahead and drawn next week's Doonesbury strips to presume an Obama win on Tuesday. Amazingly, some newspapers are considering not running the strips because…well, even after reading this article and this article, I'm not sure I understand the reason. If Obama wins, fine. A lot of these same newspapers are practically awarding Obama the job on their front pages. What's the big deal if Wednesday's comic strip mentions it?
And if Obama loses…well, that's funny. I mean, it won't be funny for the country but McCain supporters will be too busy dancing to complain. Or if they do notice, it will just add to their glee to see Trudeau make a jerk of himself. I really don't see the problem.
It does bring to mind 1960 when MAD Magazine had an issue going on sale a day or two after that year's presidential election. The issue was long since printed, of course, and it had been configured with two covers — one congratulating Kennedy on his victory and one congratulating Nixon. The insides of the magazine were arranged so that half the innards faced one way and half faced the other…so neither cover was really the front cover.
There was no controversy then but I always thought there was an aspect of it worth debating. Let's say you were a newsstand proprietor and you're putting those issues on display right after Election Day. Which cover do you feature? The Kennedy one because it's accurate? Or the Nixon one because that would be funnier? I've polled the editors of MAD from back then and they weren't sure. Bill Gaines, the publisher, said he didn't care but he hoped the two covers prompted some people to buy two copies.
Lastly, do you all know about the World's Greatest Crossword Puzzle? It ran in The New York Times on Tuesday, November 5, 1996, which was Election Day for the contest between Bill Clinton and Bob Dole. Here — this video will tell you all about it…