Scary Salon.com picture: Obama as Spock!

[Berry Cool]

The pic they ran with this one will haunt your nightmares:

http://www.salon.com/ent/feature/2009/05/07/obama_spock/

Obama is Spock: It's quite logical

Our president bears a striking resemblance to the rational "Star Trek" Vulcan whose mixed race made him cultural translator to the universe.

By Jeff Greenwald

...Spock has been on many minds lately, and not entirely because of the new film. Big thinkers in both print media and the blogosphere -- from New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd to MIT media moguls -- have referenced the Enterprise's science officer in recent months, drawing parallels between the dependably logical half-Vulcan and another mixed-race icon: Barack Obama.

They're not just talking about the ears. For those of us who watched the show in the 1960s (or during the countless reruns since), Nimoy's alter ego was the harbinger of a future in which logic would reign over emotion, and rational thought triumph over blind faith. He was a digital being in an analog world; the Pied Piper who led our generation into the Silicon Age.

[Muttocracy]

1. Didn't someone compare him to the newer Star Trek character during the campaign?

Tuvok or something? I remember Michelle Obama saying he's a Trekkie fan, teasing her about one of her belts. :)

[sofa king]

7. Yeah, Tuvok was one of the few "full" Vulcans on those shows.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuvok

Spock, on the other hand, was only half Vulcan, with a human mother. A protege of Mr. Sulu, Tuvok underwent years of study to gain total control over his emotions and make them subservient to rational thought. That makes Tuvok the most Vulcan of the regular players on any Star Trek series.

I suppose it must be mentioned that the character of Tuvok is played by actor Tim Russ, an African American, and he has a physique and facial expressions which are vaguely similar to those of our President.

From this nerd's point of view, it's pretty obvious what purpose Tuvok's background serves: he is the quintessential "rational player" as envisioned in game theory. One of the creators of the series must have planned to drag in some of von Neumann's game theory examples, using Tuvok as the rational player, and contrasting him with one of us much less rational humans.

However, my recollection of the series is that the writing could never rise to such lofty aspirations, and Tuvok therefore came off as somewhat flat.

[Enrique]

2. want the nightmares to get worse?

picture Obama doing this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XC73PHdQX04

[sofa king]

8. Holy... mother... of God.

[BadgerKid]

3. Fascinating

;)

[Clio the Leo]

4. That is disturbingly hot. NT

[HopeOverFear]

5. Damn. I gotta start watching Star Trek. Spock sounds awesome

[LiberalFighter]

6. New movie comes out tomorrow I think.