Comedy campaign : satirical websites

Political satirists have a found a new platform on the web in the run-up to the presidential election, write Jane Perrone and Mark Oliver

Thursday May 13, 2004
Snip from The Guardian

Democrat presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson once observed of the Republican party symbol that "the elephant has a thick skin".
George Bush junior's hide is being tested to its limits by satirists' barbs during the current election campaign, although monkeys, not elephants, dominate the caricatures.

The satirists' art is to unearth a candidate's unflattering characteristic and worry away at it like a loose tooth, however harsh or broad-brushed the caricature may be. Or, as Barry Burden, assistant professor of government at Harvard University, puts it, satire is "a powerful medium for making a simple point about some absurdity or contraction in public life".

For instance bushorchimp.com carefully aligns pictures of America's commander in chief with monkeys bearing not dissimilar expressions. There's even more monkey fun at stepahsmith.com.

Satire matters in US politics, both on the late night chat and politics television shows and on the internet. The talk shows, dominated by the figures of David Letterman, Jay Leno and Jon Stewart, have traditionally been the natural outlet of such comedy.
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More:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uselections2004/story/0,13918,1215821,00.html

Talking about a serious site taken for satire when its not ...

Over at McSweeneys.net they have a Daily Reason to Dispatch Bush which sounds like it might be funny but each day actually has a serious charge against his administration. Day 33 includes the sobering line: "For his first two years in office, the president's staff spent only 30 to 45 minutes a week discussing policy with him. Clinton spent the same amount of time per day on the subject."
...

Damn. I mean it. :wtf: