Welcome Michelle Malkin readers.

In New York today, an art exhibit was shut down.

This morning, a Boston-born performance artist, Yazmany Arboleda, tried to set up a provocative art exhibition in a vacant storefront on West 40th Street in Midtown Manhattan with the title, “The Assassination of Hillary Clinton/The Assassination of Barack Obama,” in neatly stenciled letters on the plate glass windows at street level.

By 9:30 a.m., New York City police detectives and Secret Service agents had shut down the exhibition, and building workers quickly covered over the inflammatory title with large sheets of brown paper and blue masking tape. The gallery is across the street from the southern entrance to The New York Times building.

The police officers declined to answer any questions, and at first would not permit reporters to speak with Mr. Arboleda, who was wearing a black T-shirt and making cellphone calls from inside the makeshift gallery.

Later, Mr. Arboleda, who is 27, said in an interview: “It’s art. It’s not supposed to be harmful. It’s about character assassination — about how Obama and Hillary have been portrayed by the media.” He added, “It’s about the media.”

Mr. Arboleda said the exhibition was to open on Thursday and run all day.

Now let's say it -- the title of the exhibit was overly provocative. There was, however, no need to shut the exhibit down or require the promotional sign to be covered.

Why not? How about because of this from 2006.

The Republican Party in Texas has said it is "shocking" and "disturbing" that a TV drama is to depict the assassination of US President Bush.

Death of a President uses archive footage, actors and computer effects to portray the president being shot dead.

UK broadcaster Channel 4, who made the mock documentary, said it explored the effects of the War on Terror on the US.

But Gretchen Essell, a spokeswoman for the Republican Party of Texas, called for it not to be screened.

"I cannot support a video that would dramatise the assassination of our president, real or imagined," she told the Press Association news agency.

"The greater reality is that terrorism still exists in our world. It is obvious that the war on terror is not over.

"I find this shocking, I find it disturbing. I don't know if there are many people in America who would want to watch something like that."

How disturbing are the images? I'll let you decide, with this YouTube clip that you can view right now.

An American company will be releasing the film in this country on January 20, 2009. I somehow doubt we will see any effort by the Secret Service or local law enforcement to prevent the release of the film, the showing of the film in a theater, or any of the film's advertising. After all, you've just seen the depiction of the murder of a sitting president hosted on YouTube!

Not to mention threats by Air America Radio.

Why are Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton treated any different, especially when it is clear that the exhibit in question is a critique of the media coverage of the just-concluded race for the Democrat presidential nomination? Could it be that Assassination Chic is only cool if the target is a Republican?

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