Time magazine's upcoming issue features George Bush walking off the page. It's hard to miss the symbolism here. Images move us beyond words, but when words dennoting failure are mixed with a light-hearted, almost cartoonish picture, there's a larger message to be read here.
The juxtaposition of George Bush, in words, is described as a lone ranger, while the image shows him exiting to the right. The combination of words and image force the viewer into thinking that the politico is all but defeated.
It's interesting how in any given week the president may be pictured as a golden boy and the next week he could be shown as some sort of rube. The pattern of using images as sort of visual barometer to indicate favor or failure in the White House goes back to the Nixon Administrator, but really didn't catch on as an aesthetic footnote until Clinton's saga of sexual indiscretion.
What sort of confidence could big media possibly hope to engender when it trivializes an array of complex social, economic, political, and cultural realities?
Remember this picture?
Convicted Abu Ghraib prison abuser, former Sgt. Santos Cardona, second from right, isn't heading back to Iraq as planned. After serving 90 days of hard labor and being demoted in rank, the Pentagon had planned to send the dog-hander back into action. After word got out that Cardona might be returning to Iraq, critics complained that his presence might appear to Iraqis as a sign of arrogance and insensitivity on the part of the Americans.