I don’t think that’s the message Fran Pavley wanted to convey in this mailer (PDF), but that’s pretty much what I’m getting out of it.  The front page is a polar bear standing on a lonely block of ice after much of it has fallen away into the sea, looking forlorn.  Accompanying the picture is the text “Save a Polar Bear, Vote Carbon Free For Fran Pavley.”  The inside of the mailer explains why; Pavley is an environmental leader, and fighting global warming will help save the polar bears, the reasoning goes.

Now, I’ve already explained once why this carbon-free voting idea is kind of a joke, particularly when it’s being conveyed to the public by using multiple full-color mailers.  I know from my mailbox that Pavley has been far more aggressive in direct mail than her opponent Lloyd Levine.  The new information in this mailer is that Pavley’s campaign has “purchased carbon offsets to cover every vote-by-mail ballot in the 23rd Senate district,” but I’m not getting what the metric is.  Does that cover the ballots?  The constant stream of mailers?  The carbon used by the post office to deliver the ballots?  Does it cover the fact that carbon offsets are kind of an environmental shell game that assuages liberal guilt without taking the meaningful steps needed to reduce our carbon output?

Kind of unclear from this mailer.

UPDATE by Brian: I believe this is actually an Independent Expenditure by EdVoice with the mailing address of a law firm up in Marin. I’m not totally sure what EdVoice, an education group is doing sending out environmental mail, but let’s just go with it.