The divisions in the Democratic Party have made fanatics of Obama and Clinton supporters. Both Obamaniacs and Hillaristas are intransigent and view the selection of a candidate as an ideologically zero-sum choice, despite political agendas that are more similar than disparate. Supporters of both candidates have imparted messianic qualities to each, as if their candidate – and their candidate alone – could save the nation from peril.

Now graphic artists in both camps have tapped into this zeitgeist and come up with unofficial – and surprisingly similar – campaign posters that capture precisely this true-believer impulse. Both of the posters featured here are striking for their obvious differences from the red-white-and-blue milquetoast blandishments candidates typically proffer up. Indeed, the posters are more reminiscent of Soviet Russia and Maoist China than of anything we’ve seen in this country.

And that’s precisely the problem. Both posters give off what one blogger described as “a whiff of totalitarianism.” In Obama’s, the senator from Illinois looks out sternly, focused on something in the middle-distance, while his arms are crossed defiantly on his chest. He is also, to judge from the perspective used, a literal and metaphorical giant. Clinton’s is likewise bizarre: she radiates, she effervesces, she is serene and powerful and motherly – and about twenty years younger.

While the posters are, from a purely artistic perspective, refreshing and interesting, we should nevertheless remember that these posters have meaning. We, as Americans, have a representative government, not a king or queen or chairman or Dear Leader. Hopefully, with time, the rhetoric of the Obamaniacs and Hillaristas will settle into a tamer, less spooky, form of discourse.