OFF THE CUFF

I was driving over the Warren Avenue Bridge to catch a ferry a few weeks back when I noticed a bumper sticker on a car in front of me: “War leaves every child behind,” it said.

“What does that even mean?” I thought.

Obviously it was intended as a shot at the Bush administration, but, “War leaves every child behind”? It would have worked had it said, “War leaves soldiers’ children behind,” but as it was, it came across as ill-conceived. I just haven’t met too many kids — other than the aforementioned soldiers’ offspring on both sides of the conflict — who have felt “left behind” by any war, ever.

It wasn’t so much the misguided message that concerned me as the fact that someone felt so strongly about it that they decided to emblazon their car with it — a brand new Audi no less! It got me thinking about all the ridiculous bumper stickers I’d ever seen and my struggle to understand peoples’ reasoning behind buying said stickers and stamping their cars in the first place.

I’ve always looked at the bumper sticker as the tattoo of cars. If anyone knows of an adhesive removal device that will remove all the sticker junk without stripping the paint off my car, let me know. Maybe I’d change my “no bumper stickers” policy if I knew the process was reversible.

For that reason — the permanence of stickers — it’s always struck me as odd that people were so willing to tat such an expensive piece of property.

The big head-scratcher for me is the popularity of political stickers. Even if you’re supporting an incumbent, like “Bush/Cheney in ’04,” you’re potentially setting yourself up for failure. For every Bush/Cheney sticker out there, there are at least as many for Kerry/Edwards (which could make sense, depending on who you believe really won the election.).

This is one of those “good idea at the time” kind of things and it’s completely ridiculous. To put it in a sports context, it would be akin to me pasting, “Seattle Mariners for 2008 World Series Champions!” on my car as opposed to just, “Go Mariners!” Not only could I end up looking like an idiot in 2009, but I’d also have to cope with being cut off and flipped off by every M’s diehard who thought I jinxed the team.

This is what worries me about Barack Obama’s campaign slogan, “Yes We Can!” It sets itself up for the usual downfall of being completely dated within a year, but it also exposes itself to the embarassing backlash of “…But You Didn’t!” stickers that will surely be produced, should Hillary prevail or John McCain become the oldest president ever.

It would make a hell of a lot more sense for politicos to get stickers that said, “Washington State Republicans,” or “People for a Democratic Washington” (No complaining about how that sticker doesn’t exist — Adobe Photoshop and HP photo paper have been around for at least a decade now.).

The country picked up on this gist enthusiastically in the wake of 9/11. I couldn’t illegally merge into an HOV lane without seeing a silhouette of the Twin Towers and, “We Will Never Forget,” or “Proud to be an American” next to someone’s tailpipe. People were so swelled with American pride and anger over the attacks that there seemed only one logical solution: bumper sticker-meets-bumper.

Bam — take that Al Qaeda!

Nevertheless, the spirit behind the stickers was sound: we’re American and we support America. Simple. Sensible.

It seems like at the very least we could try and remedy any nightmare scenarios by laying out some ground rules for applying bumper stickers.

For instance, we could agree that the number of stickers you’re allowed should depend on how awful your car looks. An old Datsun pickup, for example, really doesn’t look much worse with bumper stickers completely eclipsing its back window. A hot red Acura? You probably want to stick with one color-coordinated Dragon Sunglasses sticker justified in the top center.

For that matter, let’s agree that stickers should only go on windows and never on bumpers. Keeping stickers on windows means you can remove them with harsh chemicals if you ever need to and I don’t know why, but it just looks better.

The real solution, of course, is to just not deface your car with bumper stickers in the first place. It may sound like a hard thing to do, but think about this: remember the guy you knew in college who thought it was a good idea to get the REO Speedwagon logo tattooed on his bicep? Once you’ve slapped a bumper sticker on your car, you’re no better.