Iowa '12: Tiny Tim

I’d call this a little visual media pushback against the almost perpetual presidential campaign cycle.  (And I don’t blame Getty’s Chip Somodevilla, who has to endure so much of this insufferable dog-and-pony business, a bit for it.)

But then, what is the image saying exactly, given GOP-hopeful Tim Pawlenty in the center of this blue jean crew at his book signing at a Christian bookstore in “first in the nation” Iowa with everybody’s head cut off? Unless just some latent hostility on Chip’s part, Maybe it’s just a tongue-in-cheek statement about the thorough anonymity of such exercises, also stressing “Tiny Tim’s” status (way back there) as an unknown right now — the point driven home by five copies (at an especially painful distance, if that’s the main selling feature) of a book making Tim out less as Tim, than as a male stand-in for Sarah Palin.

And here’s our second pic at Tumblr.

Slide show: Former Minnesota Gov. Pawlenty Promotes His Book In Iowa

(photo: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images caption: Former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty talks to reporters after signing copies of his new book, “Courage to Stand,” at the Family Christian Book Store January 30, 2011 in Ankeny, Iowa. Pawlenty is eyeing a run for the GOP presidential nomination and has made several trips to Iowa, which will be holding its famous “first in the nation” caucus in about a year.)