ALL THINGS TO ALL MEN REQUIRES A PROFOUND VAGUENESS:

Why Barack Obama Is Still Your New Bicycle: San Francisco writer and meme creator Mathew Honan explains BarackObamaIsYourNewBicycle.com, Twitter publicity, and what it's like to have the Obama campaign favorite his photo on Flickr (Jen Phillips, August 05, 2008, Mother jones)

Mother Jones: What was the genesis of the site?

Mathew Honan: My wife Harper and I are both avid cyclists. Harper is absolutely consumed with cycling; it's what she talks about all the time. Just before Super Tuesday she just went full-bore Obama. It was all she could focus on. She was canvassing, making phone calls, spent all Super Tuesday standing outside with Obama signs around town. So I said to her, "Barack Obama is your new bicycle." She thought it was funny; I thought it was funny. And then on February 13, I was going home from the library on the bus and I started thinking how Barack Obama is kind of like the whole country's new bicycle. I had the idea for the site around 5 p.m., and it was live by around 9 p.m. [...]

MJ: Why do you think it's been so popular?

MH: I think to some extent it is kind of an empty vessel. I've had people convinced it's an anti-Obama site. I've had people convinced it's a pro-Obama site. And I didn't intend it as either of those things. I was just trying to comment on the fervor there is for Obama and the excitement that he has generated in his supporters. I think it was popular because people who didn't necessarily support Obama found it funny.

It's almost as if he doesn't get that the "new bicycle" is the empty vessel, yet another illustration that when liberals are funny it is because the humor is conservative.

Posted by Orrin Judd at August 6, 2008 11:14 AM