Because images are everything and because many people out there (i.e., “low information voters”) can’t be bothered to read articles or photo captions or process anything at all except in terms of their gut, Barack Obama loses because of the New Yorker cover. We are a nation of fourth-graders. This, in any event, is the view of Newsweek‘s Jonathan Alter, a fair-minded guy who (to judge by his “Countdown” appearances) is some kind of Obama admirer, or at least not with the dissers.