Does the first HN guideline still apply? There has been a significant increase in political submissions (not about some new phenomenon):

"Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon."

http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

It is possible to click "flag" on them, but I try to only flag things that are blatant; this seems more like naivete.