If the merchandise the president is hawking is any indication, all the stereotypes about his supporters are true.
There's a controversy bubbling over an Obama campaign event Tuesday night in New York. The "Runway to Win" event featured designs made for the president's re-election push by big-name fashionistas like Derek Lam and Thakoon Panichgul. The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday that the Republican National Committee sniffs a controversy, alleging that because the items costs less than typical clothing from the same designers, they may constitute a contribution to Obama and therefore violate campaign-finance laws. The RNC probably doesn't really expect to snag Obama in legal trouble. More likely it's a ploy to call attention to a campaign event featuring fashion-conscious Manhattanites -- just the East Coast elites whom flyover-country Americans imagine make up Obama's base.
The truth is you don't have to look at the Runway to Win gear on Obama's site to find merchandise that offers a caricature of Democratic voters from the Beacon Hill to Hyde Park to the San Francisco Bay. Here are the most self-parodic products from the Obama campaign.
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