February 2008 Archives

Ben Smith points to an interview with the designer Michael Beirut about the candidate's "branding," elements of which are a nice metaphor for the general consistency of his message:

He's the first candidate, actually, who's had a coherent, top-to-bottom, 360-degree system at work. Whereas, I think it's more more common for politicians to have a bumper-sticker symbol that they just stick on everything and hope that that will carry the day.

The thing that sort of flabbergasts me as a professional graphic designer is that, somewhere along the way, they decided that all their graphics would basically be done in the same typeface, which is this typeface called Gotham. If you look at one of his rallies, every single non-handmade sign is in that font. Every single one of them. And they're all perfectly spaced and perfectly arranged. Trust me. I've done graphics for events --and I know what it takes to have rally after rally without someone saying, "Oh, we ran out of signs, let's do a batch in Arial." It just doesn't seem to happen. There's an absolute level of control that I have trouble achieving with my corporate clients.

Then if you go to the Web site, it's all reflected there too--all the same elements showing up in this clean, smooth, elegant way. It all ties together really, really beautifully as a system.

Beirut says he's also "flabbergasted" at the commercial quality of the branding.

"I'm not sure that the commander-in-chief proves his mettle by getting everyone at his rallies to set their signs in the same typeface, but as someone who knows how hard that is, I'm very impressed," he says.

Update: A friend who's a brilliant graphic designer writes:

type faces are all copyright protected.

Gotham I believe belongs to chichi expensive type company called Hoefler, so you you have to buy usage, one by one.

It nearly impossible to hack the code to copy, it took me forever.

So...

I would never use a Hoefler font for a large campaign.

My friend Whitney Tilson was kind enough to make a YouTube of my appearance on CNN discussing the new Pew study on religion in America. It may be a tad slow, and the sound may be out of sync, but thanks Whitney!

A landmark Pew study on religion was released today and is being discussed far and wide. A couple things leap out of it to me that may have been downplayed elsewhere.

1. Religion is a very competitive marketplace. One in three Americans have changed faiths. And if you count switching denominations within Christianity, nearly HALF OF AMERICANS have changed religions. Forty-four percent, and the number grows if you get into the guts of the survey. This confirms something I've been soapboxing about for a while now: Denomination is dying in America. Religion is no longer something that's passed down from our parents, like genes. Religions must compete, the same as political parties, television networks, hospitals, and laundry detergent. Americans are making their own faith, as they make up their minds about everything else. This is good news for citizens and bad news for ossified religious institutions, but make no mistake: It will change the nature of religion, making it more user-friendly, and perhaps more watered-down, but ultimately more flexibile and practical. It's die or adapt.

Consider just a few facts from the survey: Half of Protestants have changed denominations or left their faith entirely. Half. Twelve percent of adults describe themselves as religious but having no affiliation whatsoever.

2. Protestants make up only half of the United State population now. That's down from nearly 100% of Americans in 1776 and around 80% of Americans just a century ago. And they're dying out at faster rates. In the next decade, the United States will become a minority Protestant country.

Meanwhile, Catholics have a different challenge. One-third of Catholics have left the Church in recent years. The Catholic population has dipped from 25% to 24%. Why such a small dip? The browning of the Catholic church. Hispanic immigrants have filled the pews. Thirty million Americans are now Catholics. The largest bloc of religious people in California, for example, is Catholic. Seems odd on the surface, but makes sense when you think about it -- fewer Italian and Irish as the East Coast and Midwest. If you're a Catholic priest today, hope you like the sun.

3. Finally, and this is the least-reported stat in the survey, from my early scanning. Twenty-seven percent of Americans are married to someone of a different faith. If you count different denominations of Christianity, the number rises to 37%. Nearly forty percent of American adults are in an interfaith marriage. That means in more than a third of U.S. households, the dinner table converation involves balancing interfaith tensions and opportunities. Considering the number of people in their 20's who are unafffiliated -- more than a third -- and that that process begins in the teenage years, the number of interfaith conversations at dinner easily exceeds half the tables. This is a major development, and to me a very positive one. These American dinner table conversations, while tense, are preparing Americans to deal with an interfaith world and allowing us to be pioneers in the next great religious evolution: the acceptance of different faiths into the religious landscape.

We are now officially in the age of Interfaith America.

PS: I'll be in CNN American Morning on Tuesday, April 26th to discuss the survey. I hope to post a YouTube.

What we can expect if this gets to the Pennsylvania primary:

The race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination continues to heat up -- but in one Montgomery County, Pa. household, the debate turned violent.

Prosecutors say that two brothers-in-law tried to settle the presidential race on the kitchen floor of a Collegeville, Pa. home.

Jose Ortiz, 28, is now behind bars on felony assault charges after prosecutors say he stabbed Sean Shurelds inside a home in the 100 block of Honeylocust Court.

District attorney Risa Ferman says a heated debate over the candidates escalated into violence:

"One is a supporter of Barack Obama, the other is a supporter of Hillary Clinton, and an argument of words turned bloody when one brother-in-law tried to choke the other and the victim then responded with a knife and stabbed his brother-in-law in the stomach.”

Central Maine caucuses for WALKING THE BIBLE on Thursday nights.

Central Mainers can "visit" the Holy Land while discussing "Walking The Bible," by journalist Bruce Feiler, at St. Matthew's Intersection Book Club beginning Thursday, Feb. 7. Sessions will also include showings of the three-part PBS documentary based on the book that takes readers and viewers to the lands described in the five "Books of Moses."

The Rev. Beau Wagner, St. Matthew's rector, visited the Holy Land after studying at the American University in Cairo. He approached places in the Bible from a historical perspective.

"By engaging in this history-laden travelogue by a non-Christian, you can begin to understand that biblical events actually happened. They had meaning for the people who walked those lands so many centuries ago. If people actually understand that these stories really happened, it will have a profound effect on their lives," said Wagner in a prepared statement.