In 1987, R.E.M. released “It’s the End of the World as We Know It.” In 2004, the band opened a concert for the first time with that song, at Madison Square Garden, two days after the re-election of George W. Bush. Today, German magazine Der Spiegel repeats the famous chorus, minus the “It’s,” with only half the American electorate feeling fine.

Looking at this great piece of artwork, it’s hard not to think of a certain Time magazine cover. The artist responsible for that August“Meltdown” illustration , is also the author of this Der Spiegel Trump comet.

And since we’ve connected in this item Michael Stipe to Trump, we would be remiss to not mention the singer’s provocative comments this week on Alec Baldwin’s WNYC podcast Here’s the Thing:

“It’s so sad that we have allowed ourselves to sink to this level of, really, entertainment, that’s what it is… I blame media completely for it. Including Saturday Night Live, sorry to say it.”

This week’s Der Spiegel cover frames an astonishing 57 pages of related content inside the magazine. A spokesperson tells FishbowlNY they are translating two of the articles at press time into English and will post those around 7 p.m. Berlin time today. More will follow next week.

To bookmark-listen to the full podcast conversation with Stipe, click here

P.S. One of the lyrics in the aforementioned R.E.M. song seems strangely prophetic with regards to the current President-elect: ‘Team by team, reporters baffled, trumped, tethered, cropped.’

H/T: @JackTindale