{"id":30671,"date":"2012-09-25T06:31:15","date_gmt":"2012-09-25T11:31:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=30671"},"modified":"2012-09-25T06:31:15","modified_gmt":"2012-09-25T11:31:15","slug":"the-campaign-that-couldnt-shoot-straight-part-i-signs-signs-everywhere-are-signs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=30671","title":{"rendered":"The Campaign That Couldn’t Shoot Straight, Part I: Signs, Signs, Everywhere Are Signs"},"content":{"rendered":"

The other day, I took a rare drive\u00a0thorough\u00a0the western suburbs. \u00a0I don’t get out there much, so it’s always fun to drive through a place that’s been good Republican territory – or at the very least, a place with a vigorous two-party government (which most of the “safe Republican” districts in this state are, in stark contrast to the one-party DFL gulags of Minneapolis, Saint Paul and Duluth). \uf729<\/p>\n

And I gotta say – I love the smell of a Republican-dominated district in the morning. \u00a0It smells like…prosperity. \u00a0And competence. \u00a0And hope.<\/p>\n

It’s campaign season, so I noticed a lot of campaign signs. \u00a0There were lots of DFL signs sprinkled with healthy clusters of GOP signs in Bloomington. \u00a0The balance shifted decisively the farther north and west I got – Minnetonka, Maple Grove and the like. \u00a0Lots of signs for city council, Henco Commission and of course Erik Paulsen.<\/p>\n

One that I completely missed? \u00a0Third District DFLer Brian Barnes. \u00a040-odd days before the campaign, I saw not a single Barnes sign.<\/p>\n

Now, we’re told that’s about to change. \u00a0Candidate Barnes tweeted this, last Wednesday:<\/p>\n

Lawn signs are in! Get one this Saturday at one of our Day of Action events: facebook.com\/events\/4455344\u2026<\/a>#MN3<\/a>#stribpol<\/a>twitter.com\/BarnesForMN\/st\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Brian Barnes (@BarnesForMN) September 19, 2012<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Say what you will about Barnes’ politics – whatever they are – but that is one adorable baby).<\/p>\n

But let’s not focus on babies. \u00a0 Look at the sign.<\/p>\n

We’ll come back to that.<\/p>\n

———-<\/p>\n

Now, I don’t know much about Federal Elections Commission law – other than that it’s incredibly intrusive, and that Sheldon from “Big Bang Theory” isn’t anal-retentive enough to follow it. \u00a0I’ve seen campaigns for federal-level office – Senate, Congress – have to completely redesign entire literature pieces, signs and other products to fit some picayune codecil or another in FEC law.<\/p>\n

But here’s the book<\/a> – literally – for Congressional Candidates and their committees. \u00a0All 180-odd pages of it. \u00a0It’s the sort of stuff campaign managers and communications people make the big bucks to know.<\/p>\n

And tucked away on page 66 is this little\u00a0bon mot<\/em>:<\/p>\n

A disclaimer notice must be clearly and conspicuously displayed. A notice is not clearly and conspicuously displayed if the print is difficult to read or if<\/p>\n

the placement is easily overlooked. 110.11(c)(1)…In printed communications, the disclaimer must be contained within a printed box set apart from the contents of the communication. The print of the disclaimer must be of sufficient size to be \u201cclearly readable\u201d by the recipient of the communication…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So where’s the “Paid for by…” whomever disclaimer?<\/p>\n

In this photo, it’s that little squiggle of white tucked into the lowest of the stripes on the “flag”.<\/p>\n

Aesthetically, it works for me – I mean, I didn’t write that FEC crap – but that’s no box,, and “inside the stripe” is the very definition of not<\/em> “set apart from the contents of the communication”.<\/p>\n

The FEC goes on:<\/p>\n

…and the print must have a reasonable degree of color contrast between the background and the printed statement. 110.11(c)(2)(ii) and (iii). Black text in 12-point font on a white background is one way to satisfy this requirement for printed material\u00a0measuring no more than 24 inches by 36 inches<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

While FEC regulations make me look for fiber supplements, we’re on my turf now.<\/p>\n

Thin white type on a red background is a fairly low-contrast combination, especially on a sign that ‘s supposed to be viewed from a distance. \u00a0Indeed, for the 10% of men who have some degree of red-green color-blindness and depend on contrast to see reds and greens, it is to some degree or another nearly unreadable at all.<\/p>\n

If these are the signs they handed out last Saturday, then they’re going to have a problem.<\/p>\n

(And I’ll solicit feedback from my readers in the Third. \u00a0Are you seeing these signs out there?)<\/p>\n

———-<\/p>\n

Now, \u00a0this is pretty niggling stuff. \u00a0True, it’s the stuff campaigns pay “consultants” the big bucks to know – and Barnes’ campaign has certainly ponied up for consultants. \u00a0Like, thousands and thousands of dollars worth. \u00a0 And it does have the salutary effect of infringing federal campaign regs<\/em> – so even if I think it’s no big deal, there’s a building full of intensely anal-retentive people in DC who likely do.<\/p>\n

It’s just the first – and, let’s be honest, the most understandable and least not-ready-for-prime-time – of a series of flubs the Barnes campaign has put out in recent weeks.<\/p>\n

———-<\/p>\n

As a complete side issue, I’m going to make the first of my fearless \u00a0predictions; \u00a0Barnes may do better than Jim Meffert in 2010 – but not much. \u00a0I say Paulsen wins in November by 16.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The other day, I took a rare drive\u00a0thorough\u00a0the western suburbs. \u00a0I don’t get out there much, so it’s always fun to drive through a place that’s been good Republican territory – or at the very least, a place with a vigorous two-party government (which most of the “safe Republican” districts in this state are, in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[155],"tags":[162],"class_list":["post-30671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mn-congressional","tag-mn-cd3"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30671"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30671\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30673,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30671\/revisions\/30673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}