Sunday - April 13, 2008

OBAMA ‘BELITTLES SMALL-TOWN AMERICA’

The Sunday Morning Headlines

Barack Obama regrets comments about ‘bitter’ small-town Americans

Well sure he does. Now.

By Tim Shipman in Washington and agencies
Last Updated: 3:13am BST 13/04/2008

Barack Obama’s presidential campaign has been knocked off balance after the Democratic White House frontrunner was caught on tape apparently belittling the fears of small-town Americans who have lost their jobs.

Senator Barack Obama speaks at a town hall meeting at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana

The senator from Illinois was forced into a frantic damage limitation exercise after a recording emerged in which he appeared to dismiss impoverished blue collar workers as bitter individuals who have turned to God, guns and immigrant bashing to make themselves feel better.

In comments which may seriously damage his chances of winning the forthcoming Pennsylvania primary election, Mr Obama told fundraisers: “You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing’s replaced them.

“It’s not surprising then they get bitter. They cling to guns, or religion, or antipathy to people who aren’t like them, or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

His rivals and political commentators seized on the comments, pronouncing them a watershed moment that raises questions about whether he understands many of the people he hopes to lead - for whom religion and the right to bear arms are positive and wholesome aspects of their lives, not a crutch fashioned from bitterness.

Mr Obama, campaigning in Indiana, initially refused to apologise for his remarks, but last night admitted they were ill chosen.

“I didn’t say it as well as I should have,” he said at a campaign rally at Ball State University in Muncie.

He later added: “If I worded things in a way that made people offended, I deeply regret that.”

Mr Obama has recently narrowed Mrs Clinton’s lead to between four and seven points in the latest polls, after pouring record sums of money into television in the state.

In the last three weeks alone, he has spent more than $6m, three times that of his rival. As a result, an average voter in the major cities and the Philadelphia suburbs, the key to the election, can expect to see each Obama advert more than 20 times.

A media monitoring group last week said he has now screened 100,000 commercials nationwide this year - five times the number John Kerry aired as he won the 2004 nomination.

But he has struggled to win over blue collar workers, hit hardest by the economic downturn and competition from overseas jobs. The forum in which he made the comments - an upmarket fundraiser with wealthy Californians last weekend - appeared to reinforce claims by his opponents that Mr Obama is an arrogant elitist, with little feeling for ordinary voters.

Michael Goodwin, a columnist for the New York Daily News, accused Mr Obama of “de-legitimising the way people choose to live in America” and argued that the furore would be even more damaging for Mr Obama than the previous row over inflammatory comments by his pastor Jeremiah Wright.

for more of the story if any still interested, >>> http://tinyurl.com/6396rd

Posted by Drew458     on 04/13/2008 at 09:24 AM   
Filed Under: • Politics •  
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