Tina Brown on Newsweek's Cover: 'Obama Earns Every Stripe in That Gay-Lo'

Brandon posted Newsweek's new cover over the weekend.

Editor Tina Brown tells Politico today:

“If President Clinton was the ‘first black president’ then Obama earns every stripe in that ‘gaylo’ with last week’s gay marriage proclamation. Newsweek’s cover pays tribute to his newly ordained place in history."

New 'Newsweek' Cover: The First Gay President

Here's the cover of the new Newsweek:

The headline tries for wit in its unsubtle recollection of a profile of Bill Clinton authored by Toni Morrison, entitled "Clinton as the First Black President," which appeared in the New Yorker in 1998. In it, Morrison wrote:

Years ago, in the middle of the Whitewater investigation, one heard the first murmurs: white skin notwithstanding, this is our first black President. Blacker than any black person who could ever be elected in our children's lifetime. After all, Clinton displays almost every trope of blackness: single-parent household, born poor, working-class, saxophone-playing, McDonald's-and-junk-food loving boy from Arkansas.

Andrew Sullivan's Newsweek story has yet to be posted to the web, so there's no telling if he's written similarly of Barack Obama. Hard to imagine he would. I'm pretty sure Obama's never "displayed" any gay "tropes," if such things exist at all.

'Newsweek' Drops 1960's-styled issue for 'Mad Men' Return, Ads Included

Today, Newsweek heads back to 1965, dropping a retro issue inspired by Mad Men's return.

Ad Age reports:

The "Mad Men"-themed issue can't include one big category from the 1960's: tobacco advertising, which Newsweek no longer accepts. But Newsweek is trying to interest other marketers in either reviving their own ads' look from the time or, for newer brands, imagining how their ads would have looked in those days.

"We've challenged agencies and clients to do '60s-inspired creative, but for modern messages and products," said Rob Gregory, president at Newsweek Daily Beast.

"It's analogous to when the NFL has a game and the teams wear their vintage uniforms," he added. "It's a nod to retro style, but it's a live game and it counts."