Flying colors

 I was throwing out yesterday's Vadim Mozyrsky campaign flyer, when I noticed something:

Is that the Ukrainian flag? Mozyrsky's a native of Kyiv, and so maybe it's a bat signal to the Ukrainian voters and the many supporters of that embattled republic.

But is that kosher? I don't believe I've ever seen a campaign flyer for a Portland politician with the flag of a foreign country on it. Would his opponents seize upon this as somehow unpatriotic?

But of course, it's not really the Ukrainian flag, which has just two bars, in two colors, not five in three. Plus, the blue and the gold are a little different.

And then I noticed something else, which made me realize that I had my tin foil helmet on. The color scheme of Mozyrsky's mailer was the same as the one used on Tobias Read's mailer of the day before:

And so rather than being some sort of subtle international political statement, it's probably a coincidence. Both flyers were probably designed by the same political consultant types. Or maybe the print shop was giving a discount if you used some colors that they had extra of.

You wonder whether the candidates coordinated this, or even knew about it. Fascinating stuff for the wonkier among us. But both flyers have still found their way to the round file.