The Sincerest Form of Flattery

Julian Sanchez | April 2, 2004

Hey, did anyone else find the concept behind the cover image of the most recent issue of The Economist vaguely familiar?

Comments

|4.2.04 @ 1:07AM|#

Two thumbs down for originality.

Dave Weigel|4.2.04 @ 1:38AM|#

They're not the same thing at all. The Economist suggests where Bush's weak spots are so that a Democrat may attack. Reason cherry-picked the select positive aspects of Dem candidates and built two golems.

Also, is this the first Economist cover to feature dick and fart jokes? That's another difference.

|4.2.04 @ 1:52AM|#

Dick & Fart in '04!

|4.2.04 @ 3:06AM|#

Dick's The One.

|4.2.04 @ 3:08AM|#

I can remember something similar in Le Monde Diplomatique concerning Mitterand from the early 1980s.

|4.2.04 @ 3:12AM|#

I like the Economist. I don't always agree with their editorial standpoint, but I always find their reporting interesting.

|4.2.04 @ 3:19AM|#

FWIW, I don't actually imagine the Economist art people were inspired by the Reason poster; just amused by the coincidence.

|4.2.04 @ 3:22AM|#

Well, if they copied Reason then they should have duplicated it to test attitudes on copyright.

|4.2.04 @ 4:13AM|#

Looks more like the back cover of Mick Foley's "Have a Nice Day" to me.

|4.2.04 @ 4:46AM|#

(useless nostalgia follows) What made me first pick up a copy of the Economist in high school was a Reason article on what magazines you should subscribe to given an $100-a-year budget (the others were the Atlantic, Scientific American or Technology Review, and of course Reason). I have used it to appear smart to my airplane seatmates ever since.

|4.2.04 @ 5:16AM|#

"FWIW, I don't actually imagine the Economist art people were inspired by the Reason poster; just amused by the coincidence."

Julian,

You DID say "The sincerest form of flattery", which implies imitation, which implies their having seen the Reason art.

garym|4.2.04 @ 7:58AM|#

The one done by Mad Magazine (one of the ones done by Mad, anyway) made the composite candidate look like Alfred E. Newman.

|4.2.04 @ 10:48AM|#

I have MAD Magazines from the 60s that did this.

|4.2.04 @ 11:05AM|#

Well, if it turns out that folks across the pond at The Economist are reading Reason, this is a good thing. It seems a reasonable speculation, at least.

|4.2.04 @ 11:37AM|#

go write your comments in "The Nation", Julian.

|4.2.04 @ 11:41AM|#

Yeah, I have to agree with Dink; this is not similar enough. If the Economist had Martha Stewart gazing upward or Rupert Murdoch as a dominatrix, that would be a different matter.

|4.2.04 @ 11:42AM|#

It is indeed a very old concept, graphically.

|4.2.04 @ 11:45AM|#

Per Larry, I DID enjoy the Rupert Murdoch as a dominatrix, however. It kinda gave me nightmares. Kinky ones.

Mo|4.2.04 @ 12:07PM|#

Heck, I saw this same concept in SI talking about the perfect pitcher.

|4.2.04 @ 12:37PM|#

The Economist is pretty much an older version of Reason. Their opinions and analysis on all major issues is entirely congruent with Reason's.

However, they have started to lose the plot recently. For instance, they prematurely decided that Dean was going to the be Democratic nominee. And in the past few issues they have shown an ever greater bias in favour of John Kerry (see for instance last week's Lexington).

Reasonable analysis must be based on facts, not bias - which is why I am switching subscriptions.

|4.3.04 @ 1:06AM|#

>...the Democratic alternative (almost certainly to be John Kerry as of this writing)...

|4.3.04 @ 8:23AM|#

There are enough layers of production that, by the time an issue's in your mailbox (April shipped at the start of March), it's probably been at least a month and a half, possibly more, since the articles inside were written. So we've got to hedge a bit.

Linda|4.4.04 @ 3:25AM|#

MAD > Reason > Economist

I'm confused. Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

I certainly like Reason the best!

|4.6.04 @ 10:28AM|#

Speaking of nostaligia, I've missed the Terry Colon contributions to Suck's Fillers'. Thanks for keeping him in work, Mr Mxylpyx and, uh, was it Bertoldt Blecht or BarTel D'Arcy?

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