Rorschach Test

The Democratic National Committee had a lovely front page for dealing with issues relating to the US Armed Forces. It's a place where they can voice their concern over the way the Bush Administration is handling matters and they can worry about the future of the US military.

This is what the page used to look like.


This is what the page looks like now.



Notice the difference? They've replaced the soldier that was in the original spot, and put in the image of a portion of the U.S. flag. That's a nice touch, but why would they have to make the change?

Well, it appears that whoever put together the DNC website didn't quite know what a US soldier looks like. Charles at LGF (who else?)and Michelle Malkin note the discrepancies, and where the photo originally came from. It was a stock photo from a web repository, iStockPhoto, and the insignia was purposefully edited out by the photographer to conform with the iStockPhoto's copyright policy.

The soldier in the image is, in fact, a Canadian soldier honoring the fallen on Remembrance Day, which explains why he's wearing a poppy on his lapel.

So, that's the technical reasons of how the image was created. The larger question is why the sitemaster couldn't find a photo of a US soldier.

Can they not recognize what a US soldier in uniform looks like? Do they have such a hard time recognizing the uniforms of the US Armed Forces that they couldn't find someone to model for them?

This is truly a minor issue, but it does speak to how the Democrats view the US Armed Forces. They talk the talk, but can't walk the walk. They apparently can't recognize a US soldier unless they're busy trying to blame said US soldier for atrocities.

Now, is it unfair to the DNC that their website managers can't figure out what a US soldier looks like? Is it that difficult to find stock images of US soldiers in the same database? With just a bit of effort, I found two images that would be wholly appropriate to the page here and here.

Blackfive notes:

...how screwed up must you be to post about how much your party supports the troops, but not know who your troops are? 'Embarassing' hardly begins to describe this error.

Ed Morrissey observes:

Does anyone at the DNC know what an American soldier looks like? They accuse the Republicans of hiding behind the flag all too often. This appears to be a much more blatant example than anything I've seen from the GOP.

Lorie Byrd also comments.