The Bumper Sticker Gets Bumped During Campaign

This is just one more dimension of the 1988 presidential election that turned out to be bad news, but it’s probably worth noting that the fall campaign was a real bummer for the bumper-sticker business.

Neither George Bush nor Michael Dukakis generated the sales the political-paraphernalia industry had expected.

Why? My theory is that the American people didn’t need mass-produced signs and slogans this year because they did so well at making their own.

Whatever may have happened with bumper stickers, 1988 was a bumper year for hand-painted signs and banners at campaign rallies. One of the redeeming features of this much-deplored race was the rich daily outpouring of wit and wisdom in the crowds--political commentary that ranged from filthy to funny to ferocious.

Party Lines Straddled

The sign-makers’ ingenuity straddled party lines. For every striking homemade poster at a Dukakis rally (e.g., “Keep America Out of Deep Doo-Doo”; “Wanted: President--No Wimps or Draft Dodgers Need Apply”) there were equally good ones from the Bush partisans (“Duke--Northern-Fried Carter”; “Reagan Takes Naps--Dukakis Causes Them”).

The sign-bearers were right on top of the news. One day after Bush flubbed an important date, this sign appeared in Illinois: “Where? George. Why? Quayle? When? Pearl Harbor?” Bush’s harping on the Pledge of Allegiance drew this response in Portland: “Sen. McCarthy--Alive and Lurking in G. Bush.” At the edge of an environmental rally for Dukakis, I saw this commentary: “That’s not tea in Boston Harbor.”

No candidate inspired sign-making fervor as much as Dan Quayle. The most common home-made signs on view at Quayle rallies conveyed simple hostility: “Chickenhawk” or “ ‘60s Chicken, ‘80s Hawk” or “Honk if You’re Smarter than Quayle.” A memorable, if somewhat murky, sign at Quayle’s rally in Charlotte read “Scared to Fight? Call Daddy at 1-800-WA-WA”

A Leavening of Wit

But many anti-Quaylites delivered their venom with a leavening of wit. “Mediocre Students for Quayle,” read a bed sheet banner at Rutgers University. A young woman in a dressed-for-success gray suit at the edge of a rally held up a neatly lettered sign: “But Can He Type?” Nearby, a woman had a poster board with a photo of Quayle in that hurt-puppy look he assumed after Lloyd Bentsen zapped him in debate. Next to it was a single word: “Cute?”

The issue that brought out the broadest range of home-made signs was, once again, abortion. Anti-abortion demonstrators were a fixture at Dukakis rallies. They held up giant pictures of aborted fetuses and carried dolls that dripped a blood-like liquid. Some of their signs went right for the jugular: “Duke of Death” and “Murderer Mike” were both common.

But they also produced flashes of wit and subtlety. “Real Greeks Don’t Kill Babies” showed up here and there across the country, as did “EQUAL RIGHTS FOR UNBORN WOMEN.” Campaign sign aficionados are always on the lookout for “twofers”--the single phrase that encompasses two issues. The anti-abortion folks had a great one: “Furlough the Unborn.”

The makers of signs were attuned to minute details of campaign news. Last month, for example, singer Loretta Lynn stood up at a Bush rally to ridicule Dukakis’ foreign origins. She joked that she couldn’t even pronounce his name.

That smug little burst of ugly nativism was largely lost amid the major-league mudslinging from the two campaigns. But at a Dukakis rally in an Italian neighborhood of New Haven three days later, there was a voter who had heard of Lynn’s crack--and had taken the trouble to paint a big, carefully laid-out poster articulating why it was offensive.

“Loretta Lynn, We Don’t Think It’s Funny What You Cant Pronounce,” the sign said in block letters. “Army Cemeteries Are Full of Gravestones With Names You Can’t Pronounce. Those Boys Wouldn’t Laugh at Your Joke and THEY ARE AMERICANS TOO!”