I've been going back and forth on this, and I honestly can't decide if it's good politics or kind of tacky for a politician to put a campaign bumper sticker on his own car. Especially the car that has easily-identifiable Virginia House of Delegates plates.
2 comments:
Allow me to offer some historical perspective that might influence your thoughts on this subject: Immediately following the American Revolution it was considered extremely dishonorable to actively run for office. Instead, candidates were expected to disassociate themselves from the day to day machinations of elections and act as if they were being summoned by the people to serve, rather than pursuing positions of power in order to satisfy their own desires. In reality, the candidate was usually just as involved as they are today, but they were much more circumspect about it (Thomas Jefferson was probably the best at this, which explains his title as 'America's biggest douche bag'). This facade continued on for longer than you would have expected and it wasn't until Andrew Jackson came along that candidates started to take a more public role in their campaigns. 200 years worth of slippery slopes later and we come to your question of whether or not it is OK for an office holder to put a bumper sticker advocating his re-election on a car that doesn't belong to him, but instead belongs to the state. Hope this helps provide some perspective.
I think the car is his, though in many states, legislators get special plates (as in VA).
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