Rethuglican Redux

So someone stole our John Kerry sign. I went and got a new one and put it out.

When I mentioned that our first sign was stolen, the folks at the Demo headquarters started to tell stories about how to prevent theft. The most reasonable was to put the sign in a window (not an option at our house, due to the trees). One of the least reasonable but more amusing options was a guy who hooked up a horn to the sign so that if the sign was removed, the horn would go off and let everyone know that someone was sign-stealing. When I put the sign out, I noticed it left a trail of grease on my hands (it's a metal frame with the sign attached) and had evil thoughts of putting itching powder on it. I doubt I'll go to such lengths, unless the sign is constantly removed in the next seven weeks.

I'm against sign stealing for any party. I'm ashamed to admit that I was a party to the theft of a sign in High School. The instigator was a good friend of mine, and we were coming back from a meeting at another school (I think it was a Junior Achivement meeting, but I'm not sure) when he told me that he wanted a sign for so-and-so to put in his yard. And he knew where there was a sign that was hard to see from the road. Would I be so kind as to grab it for him? I did it, and I'm still embarrassed about it. But then, the sign went into a higher traffic area... and he was right, it was really hard to see from the road (I seem to recall telling him there was no sign there until he pointed it out to me). So I guess it was a case of positive sign stealing? I'm still embarrassed. I suspect that if I'd hung out with my friend a bit more I would have gotten into more dubious adventures. Just as well that I wasn't very outgoing back then.

Was there a point to this post? Oh yeah. Sign stealing is wrong, and annoying. It's also tells me that people aren't confident in their candidate. The only reason you would want to remove the name of the opponent from the public eye is if you know your guy is unlikely to be voted in. So it's an indication of both desperation and thuggery. I guess that makes my younger self a desperate thug. Sounds about right.