Update: Well that was quick. Perhaps seeing the error of her ways (and noticing that both the left and right sides of the political spectrum have gathered together to condemn her in a rare showing of national unity), Kathy Griffin has released a video apologizing for the images and taken down her tweets that displayed it.

At this time, the images are still on Tyler Shields Twitter page. New York Magazines Yashar Ali, who spoke to Griffin about the images, has also taken down his tweets quoting her tweets that were embedded in this article without explanation.

The rest of Salons original post continues below.

It easy to imagine the entire right-wing of this wide country of ours in apoplexy over a recent photo taken by Tyler Shieldsof comedian and liberal media presence Katy Griffin holding a bloodied mask of Donald Trump a photograph some say suggests our current President met the business end of a executioners axe.

Oh, wait, you dont have to imagine it at all.

Shields an artist who has been accused quite fairly of plagiarism and sensationalism told the Huffington Post,Kathy is all about pushing the limits and she went above and beyond on this one. Now lets just hope she stays out of jail. His interview with the Boston Herald is a blithe, lyrical word salad of equivocation and missed points thats impressive in its own way.

Griffin, for her part, offered aseries of comments to New York Magazines Yashar Ali who then posted them to his Twitter account.

The comedianfollowed this up with a series of tweets from her own page.

All thought is, of course, private and we cannot know exactly what Griffin or Shieldsintended when they collaborated to make this image. Nonetheless, one wouldnt be out of bounds to suggest that bothparties maybe indulging in some after-the-fact disingenuous cleanup here. At the very least, ifneither wantedto portray the aftereffects of beheading our much-unloved president, they failed spectacularly.

Both Griffin and Shields have histories of choosing shock over substance, crudeness over insight. Given that the image has riled up the right without adding a single valuable thing to the liberal critique of a president who offers more reasons to doubthim every day, thatseems to be the case here.

In giving us a content-free source of controversy, Griffin and Shieldshavent aligned themselves with Trumps growing chorus of critics. Rather, theyve giventhe red-meat, red-statetalking heads and flag wavers whatthey expect (and hope) to see out of liberals. More than anything else, this photo feedsthe nationaliststrain in this country that ushered the president into power and continues to coarsen public discourse and threaten our democracy.

Also, its dumb. Its really, really dumb.

Its not necessarily a good thing when you look at a David French tweet and think, same, but here we are.

Continued here:

Kathy Griffin apologizes for bloody Trump head photo - Salon