I was hoping to do a roundup of a bunch of the Presidential hopeful logos like I did during the last election, but this one couldn’t wait. As I’m sure everyone is aware by now, Republican Senator Ted Cruz has become the first person to officially throw his hat into the ring. I took a quick glance at his new website today (after first discovering that he doesn’t own tedcruz.com) and was shocked by what I saw. Now, taking all political preferences out of the discussion, this is a bad logo for a Presidential candidate.

Interviews with a bunch of well-known designers have quickly commented that is looks like a flame made out of an American flag. Or that it looks like the logo for The Onion or Al Jazeera.

More than any of those things, I would say the design looks like it could be the logo for the Water Company, or the Gas Company. Either way, if you are launching a brand that will potentially spend close to one billion dollars in advertising in the span of two years, you’d think you might develop an identity that is creative, unique, and unambiguous about its meaning.