Just some casual observations regarding political bumper stickers around the Cleveland, Ohio area.
[ul][li] Kerry stickers outnumber Bush stickers 2:1, but Bush is catching up.[/li][li] I haven’t seen a Kerry sticker on a pickup truck or SUV. About half of the Bush stickers I’ve seen are on LARGE pickups and SUVs; the bulk of others are on newer traditional American sedans; big Buicks, Oldsmobiles and Chevrolets. [/li][li] Honda Accords and Toyota Camrys are mixed; about half Bush, half Kerry.[/li][li] With one exception, EVERYBODY I’ve seen with a Bush sticker is a white male. No minorities, no females, except for a Buick driver with a “W is for Women” oval sticker. Kerry sticker drivers are mixed, but it seems like a slight majority are female.[/li][li] Traditional factory working blue collar ethnics – burly guys with names you can’t pronounce driving slightly rusted late 1980s and early 1990s American sedans – are usually free of political stickers, although there’s often a union sticker on the car.[/li][li] There seems to be a correlation between Jesus fish and Bush stickers. Not all Jesus fish drivers have Bush stickers, and not all Bush drivers have Jesus fish, but it seems like about 10% of those with Bush stickers also have Jesus fish. I have’t seen any Kerry drivers with Jesus fish.[/li][li] I haven’t seen any African-Americans with political bumper stickers.[/li][li] I haven’t seen any stereotypical Volvo-driving liberals - no college professor-style Volvo bricks with completely plastered bumpers around these parts. [/ul][/li]
Driving to Buffalo on Friday night, I was tailgated (while driving 70, in the right lane on I-90) by a battered pickup truck. Finally, after about five minutes, the truck finally decided to pass me. They honked, and a passenger threw me the finger as they passed. WTF? The truck tailgate was loaded with patriotic/rightie bumper stickers (Support our Troops ribbons, Power of Pride, Marines, NRA) and … you guessed it, a Bush-Cheney 2004 sticker. I know not all Bush supporters are like this, but I’ve seen similar reports online from others who have Kerry stickers on their vehicles.
I have certainly seen Kerry stickers on SUV’s and pickups. The SUV is the vehicle of choice for the affluent with kids in the DC area, and many of these folks are Democrats.
Pickups in lots of areas, including where I grew up in the Pittsburgh area, can be driven by union voters or tradesmen. They split heavily toward Kerry. Other pickup owners, though, obviously favor Bush.
Larger American sedans are driven primarily by the established 50-and over crowd. They’ll generally be more conservative than college kids, obviously.
Can’t speak to bumper stickers, but there are people of all races at the Bush parties I’ve been attending this year.
My wife proudly displays a Bush sticker, so you can count her.
I was behind one of those little Honda jeep-type vehicles this morning with a “Lick Bush and Dick in '04” this morning. And then a Subarau station wagon driven by – yup, a white male – passed both of us on the right. :dubious:
Female SUV driver here with a “Throw the Son-Of-A-Bush OUT!” bumper sticker. I honestly don’t see a lot of Kerry bumper stickers in this area, but I get a lot of positive comments about my sticker. Maybe people in this area are afraid to put Kerry stickers on their cars?
I’ve noticed most Bush (Shrub)/ Cheney (Cheat’em) stickers on either old, beat up pickup trucks with the NRA signs or nice, new luxury cars with the Jesus Fish.
I’ve seen like, two Bush/Cheney stickers (can’t remember what the vehicles were, but not really a large enough sample size to say much), and about eight hundred Kerry/Edwards stickers here in Chicago, on all sorts of cars.
This got me wondering: Have there been past elections that have prompted such behavior? Voicing one’s opinion or participating in a heated debate is one thing. But aggressive driving, flipping the bird, and in some cases vandalism is going too far.
I was living in the US in 1996. I got targetted by the Democrats asking me to register or for my opinion several times (white/hispanic female, late 20’s, college educated). Never got a peep from the Republicans.
I spent last year in the US as well. Can’t tell about bumper stickers, but every co-worker who said either
“we just should bomb any country that has terrorists living in it” (thank you, we in Spain appreciate it and I’m sure the Irish will too)
or
“let’s just kick all those f*****g Muslims out of the country, this oughta be a Christian country and I don’t care if they’re Arabs or black or what, they’re all murderers”
was a Dubya fan. I know because I confronted them every time. That’s about a dozen Dubya fans who were morons. I’m sure not every Democrat is in-tah-lli-ghant, and not every Republican is an idiot, but guys like those make me wish I was part of another species. Like, say, amoebas.
One of them was a white female; the others were white males. No Hispanics; mostly English and German lastnames; at least one Polish lastname. One of the guys who wanted to kick Muslims out was shorter than me, I left him sputtering just by asking how many friends would he need to shove our coworker Joe (US born, American citizen, Muslim, black, played some sort of defensive football position in college) out of his chair, much less out of the country.
Here in Northern NJ, I’d say we’ve got about an even mix of Bush and Kerry bumper stickers. Speaking for myself, I’m a late-twenties female who drives a Honda CR-V with a bumper sticker that says “LET’S NOT ELECT HIM IN 2004, EITHER.”
I haven’t received any death threats or anything. But yesterday outside Dunkin’ Donuts, a very old man pointed to his own Bush/Cheney bumper sticker as I drove past him and his car and winked at me. Better than giving me the finger, I suppose.
I don’t mind bumper stickers, for the most part. You’ve got the same ol’ boring ones (Bush/Cheney '04, Elect John Kerry) of course. Safe to say I like my car well enough to not waste time putting some inane crud on it. Rather, I look for something a tad more entertaining, original, heck, even insightful as I peruse vehicular advertising.
Still, I have to admit I’ve seen this year’s leading contender for most idiotic bumper sticker, and it’s a Democrat favorite up here in liberal Seattle. I cannot believe anyone with a shred of intelligence puts this on their car. But there it be. In bright, bold colors. Do they have a clue what they’re saying?
I don’t have a W sticker on my car, but I’m reasonably sure I’ll be voting for Bush in two months.
We have a minivan and a sedan in the Bricker household. Both have yellow “Support the Troops” ribbon-type stickers and red, white, and blue ribbons emblazoned with “Freedom Isn’t Free.”
[slightly related opinion]
I think campaign bumper stickers are dorky, who wants an outdated sticker on their car? It’s not like everyone hurries to scrape them off once the election’s over.
[/slo]
I work at a UAW factory, the number of Bush stickers seen in the parking lots far outweigh the Kerry ones. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a pro-Kerry one, actually, just a few of the Anybody But Bush types. Trucks of every flavor, vans and SUVs are the usual vehicle choices, regular cars of any size are sort of unusual in our lots.
One might think all us good union folk would be an automatic Dem vote, and while the UAW officially endorses all the Dem candidates, quite a large majority of the masses are more concerned with keeping their guns and being all asskicky towards the rest of the world than they are with traditionally Democratic issues.
Democrat drivers :rolleyes: