Signs of the times

Affixed to a utility pole northbound on Route 18 near the N.J. Turnpike in East Brunswick are two election posters: for Clinton-Gore and Dole-Kemp in '96. How's that for staying power! Let's hope current candidates putting up election signs this year don't expect them to last that long. In fact, they shouldn't put them up at all.

Oh, I know all about how political signs are an exercise of the First Amendment right to free speech and expression. But do the candidates - and the power brokers who finance them - really think they work? All they do is litter the landscape with the lowest form of visual pollution. They say nothing about what the candidate stands for or would do in office. Most of them don't even give the political affiliation anymore. It's just about name-recognition, with not an ounce of substance. The electorate deserves better than that.