National Review had no ill intentions when they photoshopped anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist out of their May cover, editor Rich Lowry explained in a tongue-in-cheek statement Friday.
The cover, entitled “Rubio’s Folly,” features a smiling Marco Rubio but omits several people found in the original photograph of a “Gang of Eight” immigration event — including unlikely attendee Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.
“Sorry, Grover,” Lowry said in a statement provided to TPM. “But our extensive market research shows that partially obscured bearded anti-tax activists do very poorly on our covers. In addition to a partial Grover head, we removed a detached arm and a few other random heads from the image to make it more visually clean and to focus on the politicians in the foreground.”
He added: “The table of contents of the issue contains this disclaimer: ‘The cover image was altered slightly, to remove people standing in the background.'”
