Post Post

This week, on one of the most-read pieces of newsprint in the country, was a blatantly racist cartoon that evoked violence against the first black president of the United States.

I saw the comic early the other morning when I was still in bed. I read the New York Post and Daily News cover to cover everyday. It's a habit I developed when I was a staff reporter at the Post, where I worked until late 2008.

When I saw Page Six -- the notoriously edgy gossip section of the paper that most would argue is the only profitable piece of the tabloid -- I threw the paper across the room in disgust. Sean Delonas -- a regular editorial cartoonist for the section -- drew for that day's paper a dead chimp lying in a pool of blood, one white police officer with his smoking gun still in hand, and another white officer next to him with a text bubble that reads, "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill."

For those who need the context, a 200 pound pet chimp named Travis attacked his owner's friend on Monday, leaving her near death. The owner tried to stop the crazed animal, but when cops showed up and Travis went after them, they had no choice but to shoot him. He staggered into his cage and collapsed dead in a pool of blood. It was a great tabloid story.

On the heels of President Obama's signing of the stimulus bill, Delonas and the editors at the Post have done something that goes beyond disgraceful. There is only one way to interpret this cartoon: the dead monkey is Barack Obama. Everyone knows (and Al Sharpton was quick to point out) that racists have long tried to dehumanize black people, often by comparing them to monkeys.

There is no doubt in my mind that the editors who allowed this cartoon to be printed understood what it meant. The people who run the paper are not idiots -- in fact they're quite intelligent. Perhaps they underestimated how much outcry there would be (I'm told the phone didn't stopped ringing at the Post all day). Or perhaps they did. The Post thrives on the sensational. This was a good way to get attention.

The Post was one of a handful of papers in the country that did not support Barack Obama in the general election. The Post's political reporters even lost their seat on Obama's airplane toward the end of the campaign season to make room for other press. Obviously editorial boards have the right to support or not support whomever they chose, but this depiction is the lowest blow imaginable. The cartoon might as well show a burning cross on the White House front lawn.

This is hardly the first time I've been appalled by my former paper's racism. They've dished it out to Al Sharpton, Sean Bell, supporters of the Khalil Gibran International Academy in Brooklyn, and more. One of the reasons I left the paper last year was to distance myself from a place with such a despicable track record.

I have no illusions about the fate of the newspaper business. I'm 24 years old. I know that the chances of working for a paper all my life are slim. The death of American papers makes me sad. But perhaps the New York Post is one paper we all can do without.