It’s important that we pay a lot of attention to Obama’s gun-religion-etc. words. Obama made the astonishing comments at a fundraiser filled with wealthy San Franciscans. He was describing the Democratic voters for whose votes he is now campaigning as “losers” who cling to implicitly stupid ideas, like religion, guns, racism, because their formerly well-paying jobs are not coming back.
In order to charm, impress, and get money from rich San Fransisco Democrats he is willing to denigrate, and display pity and contempt for the beliefs of benighted working class middle Americans. Nice. Make sure you listen in full. You will hear that these remarks were delivered as part of an earnest analysis of what he — and they, the donors — will have to change. He did not mean them negatively. They reflect his most honest assessment of non-wealthy Pennsylvanians.
It is striking that Obama makes clear that he believes that clinging to religion is no different than clinging to guns, (– we know his class of elitist Democrats has no respect for either the Second Amendment or deer-hunting –) racism, xenophobia, and anti-trade sentiment — as if they are all equivalent signs of lack of education and gullibility.
I now feel fully vindicated in my suspicion that Obama’s attendance at Wright’s church was entirely political and expedient. No one who has a personal relationship with Jesus Christ — or even moderate respect for other people’s religious views — thinks in these terms about why working class people might believe in God. Or believes that a more enlightened government will supplant that.
The McCain campaign rightly described Obama’s views as “breathtakingly out of touch with average Americans.” The Clinton campaign rightly pointed out that when she looks at that landscape Hillary sees hard working people who retain optimism about the future. They both should keep the audio of this before the nation as long as Obama remains in the race.
Life in what used to be called the Rustbelt has been tough for 30 years now. The Sunbelt is thriving because many people have left for other opportunities. Over that time various candidates — of both parties — have sometimes been touched by the plight of people in areas of upstate New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana and, yes, Illinois, where factories and mines have closed, for good. Usually they come to admire their resilience. Nor do most candidates seem to feel that the best way to help such people is by “closing tax loopholes for the rich,” as Obama does. It is fairly shocking that Candidate Hope and Change thinks these people are rubes — unlike the much better paid, if not more productive denizens of Hyde Park, Cambridge, or a random prep school in Hawaii. What does Barack Obama, of the international upbringing and elite education actually know about ordinary Americans?