Newsweek has released the cover of their next issue with the title of 'The First Gay President'.
In a gutsy move, Newsweek has released the cover of their next issue, on the cover of which they depict President Obama with a rainbow halo and the title of 'The First Gay President'.
Tina Brown, who edits the magazine and its sister website The Daily Beast, is known for her love of controversial covers to help boost public interest and sales.
After Time magazine went with a cover shot of a young blonde mother breastfeeding her 3-year-old boy, Ms Brown is said to have taken it in stride, saying 'let the games begin!'
The article accompanying the cover was written by the news magazine's regular blogger, Andrew Sullivan, who is an openly gay self-titled conservative political pundit.
'When you step back a little and assess the record of Obama on gay rights, you see, in fact, that this was not an aberration. It was an inevitable culmination of three years of work,' Mr Sullivan said in a statement about the article.
'He had to discover his black identity and then reconcile it with his white family, just as gays discover their homosexual identity and then have to reconcile it with their heterosexual family,' he wrote, describing the similarities between Mr Obama and the gay community.
This was, however, the first time that a sitting President had done so, and the magazine asserts that such a move was a calculated one that had been thoroughly planned.
'It’s easy to write off President Obama’s announcement of his support for gay marriage as a political ploy during an election year. But don’t believe the cynics,' representatives from the news magazine told Politico in a statement about the article.
President Obama's announcement came several days after Vice President Joe Biden said that he was 'absolutely comfortable with the fact that men marrying men, women marrying women and men and women marrying are entitled to the same exact rights, all the civil rights, all the civil liberties.'
The move, thought to be a misstep as he made his opinion known before Mr Obama publicly declared his, was criticized by many within the administration and outside of the White House.
Mr Romney re-affirmed his opposition to gay marriage in a speech to graduates of evangelical Liberty University in Virginia last week. He described marriage as an 'enduring institution' and said that it should be 'a relationship between one man and one woman'.
美国《新闻周刊》近日公布了下期的封面照，大胆地将奥巴马称为“第一位同性恋总统”，还在他的头上绘出代表同性恋的彩虹光环。
《新闻周刊》杂志及姐妹网站《每日野兽》的主编蒂娜-布朗偏爱富有争议的封面，以提高杂志关注度和销量。
据称，在《时代》杂志采用年轻的金发美女妈妈给三岁儿子哺乳的封面照后，布朗选择从容应对，她说：“游戏开始了”。
封面照片的相关文章由《新闻周刊》常驻博主安德鲁•苏利文撰写，苏利文是公开的同性恋者，还自称是保守派政治权威。
苏利文在关于这篇文章的声明中写道：“当你回顾一下，评估奥巴马在有关同性恋权利方面的记录，你会发现他支持同性婚姻并不奇怪。这无疑是其三年总统工作的一个顶峰。”
他在描述奥巴马和同性恋群体之间的关系时写道：“他必须要发现自己的黑人身份，并与所在的白人家庭融洽相处，就像同性恋发现了自己的身份后，也要和所在的异性恋家庭融洽相处。”
这是美国首位在任总统表态支持同性恋，该杂志断言，这是早就计划好的，经过了深思熟虑。
该杂志的代表在有关这篇文章的声明中告诉政客新闻网：“在总统大选之年，把奥巴马总统表态支持同性恋写成是政治策略很容易，但不要相信这些愤世嫉俗的人们的言论。”
奥巴马公开表态前几天，美国副总统拜登就表示，他“完全接受”同性恋婚姻，并表示同性恋夫妇有权获得与异性恋夫妇完全同等的权利，包括全部的公民权利和公民自由”。
拜登在奥巴马公开申明之前就做出了表态，这被认为是一个失误，遭到了美国政府内部和外界人士的批评。
罗姆尼上周在对弗吉尼亚州福音派教会的利伯缇大学的毕业生发表演讲时，再次重申了反对同性婚姻的主张。他表示婚姻是“永久的制度”，婚姻关系应该存在于“男女之间”。
take in stride: 从容应对
pundit: 权威人士，专家
aberration: 离开正道，脱离常轨，过失
sitting: 在位的，现任的、
evangelical: 新教的，福音派教会的