Has Gambit endorsed Obama?

I like Dirty Coast Press. In the years following the Federal Flood, the little company has claimed a niche as the place to go in New Orleans for locally inspired original T-shirt designs. The February edition of ANTIGRAVITY Magazine (PDF) described Dirty Coast as "a symbol of New Orleans's struggle to rebuild without losing our unique soul." Maybe that's a bit of an over-the-top description of a T-shirt outlet but still... they turn out some pretty cool stuff. Recently Dirty Coast (in a collaborative effort with cartoonist Greg Peters) produced a shirt featuring Ashley Morris's famed FYYFF slogan which you should go buy right now since proceeds from the sale of these shirts go to benefit the Ashley Morris Memorial Fund.

For the past few years, a number of local blogs (this site included) have sported a little graphic in the sidebar plugging Dirty Coast. The graphic itself (not a paid advertisement... as if this space were even worth the effort) is managed from deep within the Dirty Coast bunker and is frequently manipulated to display new and popular designs. Right now it says "Soul Sister for President" which is perfectly fine with me... especially since Soul Sister is not currently a candidate. I've often wondered, however, what might happen if Dirty Coast produced a design backing an actual political candidate and chose to promote that design via the use of the mysterious blog graphic.

Now, typically on the Yellow Blog, we don't find it necessary to disguise the general political leanings of the author. However, the observant reader will notice that those leanings rarely if ever tend favorably toward any particular candidate with much enthusiasm. Quite the contrary we take it nearly as a matter of principle around here that the mere act of standing for public office demands that one be regarded at best with suspicion... although more often ridicule and/or despising. It follows then that the sudden appearance on the Yellow Blog of a Dirty Coast graphic (even a really pretty or clever graphic) proclaiming the awesomeness of a particular candidate (even a candidate we're more suspicious than despising of) would bring about a certain dissonance with the text of the posts. Would we have to take the graphic down? Luckily this is a question that has not demanded an answer... yet.

I bring this up because at this very moment the Gambit Weekly's companion Blog of New Orleans is running a paid advertisement from Dirty Coast which features the new (and fairly clever) Geauxbama design. Now if a stupid little inconsequential blog like this one finds itself a bit squeamish over the possible confusion brought about by the appearance of an apparent political promotion in a portion of the site not controlled by the editor, shouldn't a major publication like Gambit have a similar concern?

I know that the day a little smiling blue Obama pops up in my sidebar, that doesn't mean that I have personally endorsed the candidacy but I can see why most people visiting the site won't assume that. So now that smiling blue Geauxbama sits at the top of the screen when you load Blog of New Orleans, does Gambit expect its readership to assume differently? Or maybe Clancy Dubos views the content of his paid advertisements the same way he once characterized polite criticism from local bloggers on his site; "part of that free speech thing that we all have to put up with" Either way, I'd like to hear the explanation. Or more accurately, I'd like to know if Gambit even noticed.