Elizabeth Crum

Jonah has an update saying some left-wing emailers claim the “O” sign thing is a joke.  I did some reasearch and here’s what I found out (from this blog post at US News and World Report):

George Bush had his three-fingered W salute that supporters flashed when greeting him at presidential campaign events in 2000. And now, if a Los Angeles creative agency gets its way, Sen. Barack Obama will see fans meet him with his own salute like the one above.

 ”Our goal is to see a crowd of 75,000 people at Obama’s nomination speech holding their hands above their heads, fingers laced together in support of a new direction for this country, a renewed hope, and acceptance of responsibility for our future,” says Rick Husong, owner of The Loyalty Inc.

Husong tells me that he got the idea after seeing the famous Obama-Progress poster by artist Shepherd Fairey. “We wanted to get involved some way,” he says. So, the agency came up with their own a symbol of hope and progress that also plays off Obama’s name. “We thought, ‘Let’s try and start a movement where even while walking down the street, people would hold up the O and you would know that they were for Obama,’ ” says Husong.

Much thought went into the relatively simple idea. “You interlace your hands in a circle, the interlacing being a symbol of different types of people coming together and the circle a symbol of unity,” he says. Their design, unlike Fairey’s, is free, and Husong is urging people to download it and print it on posters and T-shirts. “We want to see it everywhere, but more importantly we want this sign to take the world by storm.”

A reader just commented that the Obama sign looks a lot like Jay-Z’s Roca-wear symbol as seen here.  In light of Obama’s love for Hip Hop and relationship with Jay-Z…well, make of it what you will.

From The Corner:

We Are One   [Jonah Goldberg]

It seems a lot of folks beat me to this, though I confess it came to my mind the second I saw the Obama “O” salute. The Obama salute appears in the Star Trek episode The Way to Eden. I suppose National Review is Herbert.

I also remember that Star Trek episode.  The Enterprise is hijacked by a crazy doctor and some fanatical followers in an attempt to find Paradise.  The “O” symbol is their special sign.

Obama’s campaign is all just a little Too Much and getting Silly-er by the minute. 

Apparently Obama’s staffers and followers still cannot see the cult-ish-ness of these signs and emblems and zealous group-think.  Blindness to the truth about their Leader and the rationality or virtue of his Mission is a characteristic of all cult followers.