The kerfuffle over the state Republican Party posting photos of Democratic congressional candidate Max Yashirin on the Internet is another reminder that we live in a media-saturated age.

The 25-year-old college student was dismayed to find that the GOP glommed onto an Internet domain site bearing his name and posted photos of him having a beer and smoking a stogie.

The GOP poached the photos off Yashirin’s own account at Facebook, a popular social networking site.

We are unable to work ourselves into high dudgeon over the incident. In our view, the GOP’s tactics are petty, but the impact scarcely rises above the level of annoyance.

If the photos were damaging, why would Yashirin have posted them on a Web site under his own control? Shouldn’t a veteran of the war in Iraq have the right to a little personal relaxation?

Our muted reaction to the event is based partly on recollection that Democratic Party officials themselves have snapped up domain names of leading Republicans.

In 2005, Heath Mello of the Democratic Party bought rights to names like www.daveheineman.com and www.daveheineman.org, as well as www.tonyojeda.com. Ojeda was then a candidate for the Legislature.

It’s obvious that Internet domain mischief seems much more serious when the other guy is doing it.

“I can’t believe that they would stoop that low,” said Yashirin, who had been a candidate only about a week before the bogus site appeared. The Web site was taken down after only a few days, and, at last check, was still down.

His comments echoed those from Ojeda two years before. “This is very underhanded,” Ojeda said. “The Democratic Party has been trying to take the high road with everything, and there they go again — going back down to where they were before.”

Because Yashirin is a member of the Millennial generation, one would think he would have seen this coming in an era in which it’s virtually impossible to be out in public without being in range of a camera phone, laptop, video surveillance camera or other device,

The reality is that today it’s a fairly simple matter to capture unflattering images and post them online. We live in a paparazzi world.

But the Internet no longer is a new toy. Party officials ought to give up such trivial pursuits. Their energies and the Internet can be put to much better use.