I'm bummed that the very funny Donald Glover isn't playing Obama on Saturday Night Live as rumored (he auditioned, but didn't get it). They kept it in-house and gave it to Fred Armisen. I didn't watch it so I don't know how good his impression was, but judging by the screenshots, they've definitely nailed the look.

But wait! Armisen's not black. How can they have a non-black guy playing a half-black guy? That ain't right, according to Maureen Ryan at the Chicago Trib:

Call me crazy, but shouldn't "Saturday Night Live's" fictional Sen. Barack Obama be played by an African-American?

...The producers of "SNL" have had months to think about and plan for the dozens of Obama sketches we'll no doubt be seeing this year. They couldn't find an African-American performer who was funny enough to play the junior senator from Illinois? They couldn't find one in New York? Not anywhere in the country? Really?

Apparently not. Should they have postponed their return until they found somebody with a sufficient skin tone?

This identity politics crap is tedious. Besides, it's not the first time they've cast against type. I mean, look at the history of SNL:

• Cheri Oteri, a woman, played Ross Perot, a man.
• Tracy Morgan, a man, played Star Jones, a woman.
• Eddie Murphy, a black man, played Jerry Lewis, a white man.
• Darryl Hammond, a white man, played Jesse Jackson, a black man.
• Maya Rudolph, a half-Black and half-Jewish woman, played [insert name of white person of either gender here].

Just off the top of my head. How about judging them by whether they're funny or not, rather than how genetically similar they are to their targets? There's plenty to criticize about SNL without insisting that they institute quotas or something.