The fact that the New Yorker has a racist, anti-Obama image on its cover shouldn't surprise. The magazine has in the past slimed Al Gore and its editor, David Remnick, cheered on the Iraq war in 2002-3. From a Guardian article about Remnick:
He came out in favour of the war in Iraq, for instance, on the grounds of concern about weapons of mass destruction, and says now that 'I was wrong about that, totally wrong, as events proved very quickly.'
Remnick is currently defending his decision to smear the Obamas--let's see how quickly he decides he was "wrong."
Update: We are discussing this over at Paddy's.
Update 2: The headline of Gary Kamiya's Salon article on this topic is "Rush Limbaugh was right: The blogosphere's reaction to the New Yorker cover proves that the Bush era has killed a lot of liberals' sense of humor. And that's not funny." What's funny is watching Salon striving so hard to be centrist that it cites the concern trolling of a hate radio star. What's not funny was watching that image spread to every mainstream and middlebrow organ yesterday (including Salon), so that undecided voters see the media approvingly putting out the message that racial caricatures of the candidate are A-OK. Karl Rove, "unofficial" adviser to the McCain campaign, must have been cackling.