Does anyone remember a few years ago, Sprite was using the slogan “Image is nothing, thirst is everything.” I do. The funny thing is, I think they also unveiled their new logo. So that was funny.

I was thinking about image and the political campaigns. A few days ago, I posted the list of O’Jokes, and one that stood out to me was the O’Bama shirt that was designed and being sold by the Obama campaign. It’s not like I needed another (insubstantial) reason to support Obama, but that shirt certainly provided it. It got me thinking more about the stuff they have to sell and the imagery they use in the campaign.

The element of their imagery that really stuck out to me was the rising sun, red-white-and-blue O logo:

It’s especially cool because it works really well as a logo for Obama and has all the colors and the stripes, etc, that you look for in a typical campaign piece, but it’s also… pretty. It works as a logo on it’s own. Most of the time you don’t see good or bad political images, it’s just like a checklist of silly cliches. Of course, this has them, but it just looks god. It’s patriotic, it evokes the “heartland”, it’s got a rising sun, and it even kinda has a rainbow in it. (Re: “heartland”- The red and white stripes make me think of fields of growing vegetables of some sort. I don’t know if its just me, but that’s that.) Anyhow, the point is that it’s awesome.

So I went to the Obama store to see if their other gear was equally attractive, and it really is. Sure, they’ve got the standard-looking Obama’08 shirts that are boring, but they’ve got a huge range, and a lot of them are really attractive. Good design, not just good political design. Check them out here. Here are some of my favorite things. And there’s plenty more.

After gushing for an hour or so about Obama’s imagery, I went to compare against Clinton and McCain to see how they compare. I mean, it’s 2008! Everyone should be super hip and cool and have access to the same type of creative designers, right? Let’s see.

Clinton has 10 different shirts, and I’d say maybe 2 of them are kinda interesting. Still, that’s not bad, though Obama has 30 designs, not including state-specific shirts, 10 of which are actually somehow remarkable. Clinton also has two artsy-ish posters, as does Obama, though I think his are infinitely better. One of Clinton’s, I think, is especially disturbing:

Um, Mr. Chairman, anyone?

I mean.. it’s probably just me, but as soon as I saw that I immediately thought of godless communists.

Man, I didn’t intend for this post to be this long. So, will McCain save us? Let’s see. He’s got variation, with more than 25 different designs, although only one of them is both not really ugly and not just his name. That would be this one:

I particularly like that one, because the Republican logo is kinda cool, the shirt has an old-fashioned style to it, and it reminds people of his party affiliation, which I think lots of people on both sides forget. (McCain also has an Irish-themed, St. Patrick’s day style shirt. I wonder if that was the impetus for the Obama shirt- making a good joke while subtle mocking McCain.) Nothing very interesting in his store other than that, though there are copies of his books. There’s also a “rollabana” and idfk what that is, but I’m stoked that he has it. Maybe it’s a dog whistle. Ha.

That’s it for me. Sorry this was so long-winded, and sorry that it was so boring. But hey, if it wasn’t overly long and overly boring, it just wouldn’t be a blog, would it?

(UPDATE: If this didn’t bore you to tears, you might find this interesting.)