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We love effective satire — crisp, cutting wit that criticizes behavior and exaggerates faults with irony, sarcasm and/or relentless ridicule.

Effective satire makes us laugh out loud and spit our coffee across the breakfast table. It makes us scratch our heads as it challenges our perspectives.

The reaction to effective satire is immediate and organic.

What's not effective satire: The New Yorker magazine cover illustration that depicts presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama in stereotypical Muslim garb and his wife, Michelle, in Angela Davis-like, Black Panther-esque attire while toting an assault rifle.

Cartoonist Barry Blitt, in the image titled "The Politics of Fear," carries the concept further by having the couple doing their victory fist bump from the night Obama clinched the Democratic nomination. They are depicted in the Oval Office while an American flag burns in a fireplace that has a portrait of Osama bin Laden hanging above the mantel.

The New Yorker told readers in a statement Monday that the cover illustration is a caricature of the use of scare tactics and misinformation against Obama.

Uh uh.

Sorry, if you have to explain the satire, it's not effective.

"The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create. But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton about the magazine cover, according to wire reports.

Arizona Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, said at a news conference Monday that it was "totally inappropriate, and frankly I understand if Sen. Obama and his supporters would find it offensive."

The New Yorker did not explain the illustration in its July 21 issue out this week, but did have a 15,000-word story about Obama's early years in Chicago.

Nowhere in the illustration was a spear at the folks slamming Obama's campaign with misinformation or at those using the scare tactics.

The cover illustration could have been a frame from a storyboard for a "Saturday Night Live" sketch. In the hands of skilled satirical comedy writers, we could have heard the inflections of the actors' voices as they mocked scare tactics and lampooned distortions and misinformation.

The two-dimensional image fell flat as it feebly tried to make a multi-dimensional point. Using satire, sarcasm and being flip can be tricky and easily misunderstood — especially in written or illustrated form.

Late-night talk-show hosts and comedians like Stephen Colbert can get away with this comedy form because a sketch is multi-dimension and the issue or point being made is usually explained.

However, Colbert's sarcastic humor was not especially appreciated during his roast of President Bush during the 2006 annual White House Correspondents Dinner.

Satire doesn't work unless the subject being skewered has a huge base of understanding among readers or viewers.

The New Yorker magazine is known for its elite audience and its liberal leanings.

Perhaps sophisticated Manhattanites "got it," but the message was lost when the magazine crossed the bridges out of the borough.

We discourage guest opinions or letters to the editor that are satirical or laden with sarcasm because many readers won't get it.

For that reason, Star editorial cartoonist David Fitzsimmons seldom risks using satire.

Several years ago he drew an April Fool's Day cartoon featuring the face of then-Arizona Gov. Evan Mecham, the conservative who served 15 months as governor before an impeachment trial removed him, on Mount Rushmore.

Fitzsimmons received numerous calls — these were the days before e-mail — checking on his sanity for suggesting such an idea. That satire was not effective.

The New Yorker should learn from this cover the lesson Fitz learned from the Mount Rushmore cartoon: Use satire sparingly and make sure readers will get it.

And most importantly, make sure the illustration does not propagate the distortions and misconceptions that are intended to be satirized.