At the WaPo, E.J. Dionne unloads the usual liberal conventional wisdom regarding Barack Obama’s condescending view that small town residents are bitter and cling to guns, religion and prejudice due to the last 25 years of US economic policy:
If Obama’s comments about working-class voters had come from the mouth of anyone except a candidate, they might have seemed mildly controversial but broadly true.
Dionne’s fellow columnist Richard Cohen has been tougher on Obama in the past, but buys the same premise now:
Obama should not have attributed a yearning to hunt or attend church to hard economic times. The remarks will haunt him — witness how John McCain has also called them “elitist.” But Obama was right about the economic roots of bitterness and anti-immigrant sentiment.
As noted earlier, Pennsylvania is not as bad off economically as Obama or these pundits seem to believe.
Moreover, Marc Ambinder links to a paper by political scientist Larry Bartels of Princeton, published in the Quarterly Journal of Political Science, which suggests Obama, Dionne and Cohen have it all wrong:
Thomas Frank’s What’s the Matter with Kansas? asserts that the Republican Party has forged a new “dominant political coalition†by attracting working-class white voters on the basis of “class animus†and “cultural wedge issues like guns and abortion.†My analysis confirms that white voters without college degrees have become significantly less Democratic; however, the contours of that shift bear little resemblance to Frank’s account. First, the trend is almost entirely confined to the South, where Democratic support was artificially inflated by the one-party system of the Jim Crow era of legalized racial segregation. (Outside the South, support for Democratic presidential candidates among whites without college degrees has fallen by a total of one percentage point over the past half-century.) Second, there is no evidence that “culture outweighs economics as a matter of public concern†among Frank’s working-class white voters. The apparent political significance of social issues has increased substantially over the past 20 years, but more among better-educated white voters than among those without college degrees. In both groups, economic issues continue to be most important. Finally, contrary to Frank’s account, most of his white working-class voters see themselves as closer to the Democratic Party on social issues like abortion and gender roles but closer to the Republican Party on economic issues.
That last conclusion finds support in the 2004 presidential exit poll data, which shows that John F. Kerry took a majority of voters with an annual family income under $30,000. Kerry and Pres. Bush basically tied among voters between $30,000 and $50,000. Bush won substantially with voters above that income level, representing 55% of all voters. Democrats are fond of calling the GOP the party of the rich, but the historical data suggests that it would be more accurate to label the Democrats as the party of the poor.
The data shows just how badly Obama missed the boat. Instead of suggesting that working-class voters have been bamboozled by GOP appeals to their values and culture, he should have been mocking their intelligence for agreeing with Republican economic policies. That probably would not have gone over well either, but at least Obama would have been addressing his real problem.
Good Morning, Karl. Sticking voodoo needles in your Barack Obama doll. I see you started this day like all others in recent memory.
O!
Barack plays pocket-pool during his speeches. President can’t be grabbin’ his junk.
H!
But a president should have junk.
I!
I blame the inner city public schools. But given what Obama says about black anti-gay sentiment being a function of their being “more churched,” I’m not so sure that it’s all about Whitey’s religion, unless his point is that blacks who subscribe to Whitey’s religion are the ones who are intolerant.
Karl, you keep missing Obama’s point (he made it easy to miss though). He was telling a theory as to why certain people vote the way they do. He’s talking about what people do in the voting booth not what they do in order to give meaning to their lives.
There’s a big difference between materialism which tries to explain all cultural phenomena and a theory of voting patterns .
In the past, Democratic voters in PA and similar states could trust Democrats to deliver economic policies intended to protect labor. Now other issues may have become decisive in the voting booth. There is nothing wrong with pointing that out, unfortunately in a artless way.
Obama insists on saying that it is possible to change our political culture by changing our political discourse.
He insists that he believes this, and I take him at this word. It would be quite odd if he believed this and was also at the same time a Marxo-materialist. It seems to me that you have run with a rather problematic interpretation of his words.
sashal – It is only “problematic” for Baracky.
Yes, JD, it is.
But only for now.
And it will be gone by Novemeber.
He was telling a theory as to why certain people vote the way they do. He’s talking about what people do in the voting booth not what they do in order to give meaning to their lives.
sashal — So why wouldn’t Obama just say, “These people are experiencing bad economic times and in their frustration they look around for someone to blame.” Why add that their plight makes them cling to guns and religion?
Look, I lived in a university town for 20 years as in the belly of the beast. I worked with and attended hundreds of gatherings with liberals who assumed I was one of them purely on the basis of my having been in the Peace Corps. I’ve heard them mouth exactly the same kind of elitist prejudices Obama speaks, and if you classify yourself as liberal, you know this is the kind of stuff liberals spout when they think they are among their own, as in a fundraiser in San Francisco. E.g. “What’s the difference between a Baptist and a Mormon? Mormons can read.” Ha, ha. Boy that cracked me up, oh, hundreds of times.
Yes, but from the primary numbers it looks like the “poor” will turn out in greater numbers in 2008, and from all indications of Barack’s money raising ability, it looks like the “poor” man’s candidate will be quite rich in his war chest. Yes, that poor Kenyan bastard love-child looks like he’ll be the first crypto-Marxist, Black Liberation Theologian, not to mention jigaboo, to obtain the keys to the front door of the White House by will of the “poor” voter. And did you know the White House has its own bowling alley. Yes, and Obama likes to bowl. He will need much practice due, as the rumor goes, to his disproportionately large, black balls.
The meek inheriting the earth is so Biblical. I’m deeply moved. Signing off. Heading to my BLT classes.
O!
So, basically, what we’re hearing is that the left’s gonna cling to their stereotypes regardless of the facts?
How surprising.
“In the past, Democratic voters in PA and similar states could trust Democrats to deliver economic policies intended to protect labor.”
How’d that go?
What was the term?
Oh, yeah.
Rust Belt.
There is some truth in your stereotyping (of course the brush is wide ) Salt Lick.
I have met many people on the right and on the left with elitist prejudices. I would go even further- — i was one of them ( I really changed since i live and contact on every day basis with much more regular folks-business and relationships).
Look, democrats tell the working class that they are going against their economic interests in voting for republicans. The working class respond by asking what Democrats are doing, not about some incomprehensible economic abstraction in Washington or Wall street, but for me me here and now. And I don’t think most democrats have a very good answer.
If Democrats are going to be more successful in rural America then they should offer people something positive that is concrete and immediate and makes a difference in people’s lives right here and now
Comment by thor on 4/15 @ 6:16 am #
“jigaboo”?????
You’re hatred of blacks is peeking from under the hood there, bunky.
If Democrats are going to be more successful in rural America then they should offer people something positive that is concrete and immediate and makes a difference in people’s lives right here and now
I got it! How ’bout they lower taxes and get out of the way of businesses?
Carin – Blasphemy !
Carin your exactly right and I would add quit trying to tell me that weather is climate change, I not so stupid that I don’t know a money scheme when I see one.
That could be a start, carin. Do something..
I’d love my taxes lower…
N O’Brain, I am still laughing how well I got you last night, you courageously accused the republican congressman in racism
Frank, Dionne, and Baracki simply don’t get the gist of what is being said about their thesis – which is that people in small towns in Pennsylvania and Kansas don’t like being told what ought to be most important to them.
Like, if I went into the Barack and Michelle abode and started re-arranging things, throwing out the food in the cupboard I didn’t like, and changing the kids’ bedtimes – but told Barack and Michelle that it was in their best interest, and any objections were the result of them being stupid and frustrated with my brilliant scheme.
Leftists also don’t seem to get that a big part of the American ethos involves self-reliance and self-sufficiency, and that Americans, as a rule, don’t really want stuff that they didn’t earn and that doesn’t belong to them. They’d much prefer a state of affairs in which the head of household can provide health insurance for his own family to one in which the gub’mint provides the healthcare. So, in truth, the appeal of “economic interests” is much less, I think, than what Frank, Dionne et al. think it is.
They also react to being called bitter (euphamism for ‘loser’) because they have managed not to swoon over Barack. There is a good deal of pompousity in there that has been left unexamined in this whole mess.
O!
Took you long enough
dammit
Give a nigger-lover a break.
H!
Give a nigger-lover a break.
Okay – and the chinks.
But not the Irish!
I!
The Irish! I can’t take those kulchies!
O!
We fucked it up and skipped an O! bro. Do-over?
Scratch that. In the heartfelt words of Johnny Mac, “I was wrong.”
What do they call that when the first letter of every line forms a message, an acrostic, I think.
Eduard Limonov’s Memoir of a Russian Punk – you learn poetic details like that from that.
Hey Karl, read that, you faux-Russophile you.
F
Anyone know any Gaelic obscenities besides Collins?
U
It’ll take all day for F R I E N D L Y D E B A T E A T P R O T E I N W I S D O M
Just do “Drink more Ovaltine”
Oh, you’re going for more joyous.
N ?
When are the Proggs going to provide even one valid example of their alleged “bitter rural American” – clinging to guns and religion, reverting to racism, hatred of “immigrants”, etc. – instead of simply demonstrating to us their very own bitterness and bigotry directed at their very own unconsidered perjorative stereotype of Rural Americans – and at anyone else similarly stereotyped who confronts their Cultist memes?
Hey, if O meant how people vote, why did he say ‘cling to to explain their frustrations’?
If Democrats are going to be more successful in rural America then they should offer people something positive that is concrete and immediate and makes a difference in people’s lives right here and now
Bingo. And if Obama wants to change our political discourse, he should
be upfront that he thinks government is the best vehicle to do this, and let the debate begin.
Sorry to log off and abandon this conversation, but Megyn’s wearing red today.
Mustardboy to Barack .. we know what you said was true .. but you’re not supposed to tell ’em that .. and you too Hiliary .. hush now.
E.J. Dionne sounds more like the 5th column than the 4th estate.
“N O’Brain, I am still laughing how well I got you last night, you courageously accused the republican congressman in racism…”
Ooooo, you found a Republican who said something stupid.
The Democrat Party, on the other hand, has always been the party of the four S’s: slavery, secession, segregation and socialism.
So, no, you didn’t “get” me with anything.
And laughing to yourself is a bad sign. Check your meds.
FWIW, I’ve lived in “rural” America now for over 32 years – County pop.=7100 – and the only bitter bigots I’ve seen are the local and visiting Progressives.
Hayseed lover! Get out sometime and you’ll find just how many ball-grabbing, looney-eyed hicks have foamy spittle dripping from their Bibles and guns, and that’s because the suck on those same as you cling to your obscene allusions that the hills ain’t filled the infuriated, three-toed, meth-snorting, incestuous retardates. You Ozark, Yazoo County p.r. image hustler! I’ve been back there and the gimping Bible freaks are bonkers, I tell ya!
K
Here’s the real problem for Baracky (other than thor’s strange gender-bending mandingo thing he has for black men.)
Substitute whatever words you want into Obama’s San Francisco Treat to the “Ha Ha! Buncha rubes!” limo-liberals. Use angry or annoyed or despondant or clueless instead of bitter. Throw out the whole guns, religion, anti immigrant etc. palaver. It still comes down to this meaning.
“These people cling to their regional/class/racial prejudices and fail to divine that they need us, that they need me!!
Frankly I’m astonished that this savvy, Chicago machine activist politician has gone from political sharpie to John Kerryesque class struggle moron in the space of a few weeks. Did all of his advisors develop brain tumors? Did the Dark Lord Rove spike their pomegranate juice with LSD? The transcendant arrogance of that statement reflects the candidate’s apparant belief in his own press of messiah-hood.
Typical reaction of the rubes? “F#ck you, bro!”
Of course he never made this speech in any of the towns in Pa I previously listed. He hasn’t completely lost his mind. However, the campaign really ought to think about having CSI and that hot blond from “Without a Trace” on standby because his political savvy is drifting away.
I think Lisa reflects a rather broad swath of Dems who are beating their heads against walls and tearing their hair out, with good reason. All the planets were in alignment at the beginning of the year for a Dem monster win in November. Now the campaign is in tatters and they still haven’t dealt with Michigan, Florida or the super-dooper delegates. Throw in possible internicene warfare perpetuated by the howling far left in Denver and this could end up as the biggest political disaster in history.
Last thought: Are Barack and the Hopetones so handcuffed to the victimization, class struggle and anecdotal policy platforms that they can’t, for one lousy sentence in one lousy speech, allow their divinely inspired candidate and his bitter, struggling wife to talk about how great this country is despite all of its myriad of problems? I mean, would a hole in the ozone spontaniously appear and suck all of the oxygen out into space if they had something positive to say about AmeriKKKa in a campaign built around the theme of unity??
Inquiring minds want to know…
I wonder what has befallen poor thor such that he must come here: it seems he’s either run plumb out of Head Start mates to torment, or else these permanent infantiles might have finally even shunned one of their own!
infuriated, three-toed, meth-snorting, incestuous retardates.
You forgot “Guitar Hero playin'”
Y
New Obama Slogan:
Unity in Misery: Hope in Handouts!
you cling to your obscene allusions that the hills ain’t filled the infuriated, three-toed, meth-snorting, incestuous retardates.
The Hills around here are alive with the Sound of Music, thor. And from your comment in toto, it looks like you are just about at a critical tipping point. Welcome.
Are Barack and the Hopetones so handcuffed to the victimization, class struggle and anecdotal policy platforms that they can’t, for one lousy sentence in one lousy speech, allow their divinely inspired candidate and his bitter, struggling wife to talk about how great this country is despite all of its myriad of problems? I mean, would a hole in the ozone spontaniously appear and suck all of the oxygen out into space if they had something positive to say about AmeriKKKa in a campaign built around the theme of unity??
Wise words BJTex, wise words.
I can not be completely positive about it, but it seems to me he does talk about our great country in his speeches.
You and me are just being fed with the cherry picked controversies and gaffes about 100 year wars and bitter/happy electorate to cheapen the political discourse , to jump the ratings , to win ugly the political struggle…
The bit about “economic interest” is, and has always been, bread&circuses: “vote for us and the Government will give you money.” It’s not a particularly difficult cipher, either.
The people who hear it look around them and see who the Government gives money to now. They do not (to put it mildly) consider those folks admirable, and resent being lumped into the same category.
There is also a growing minority who understand the de Soto thesis, even if they can’t articulate it; that is, they’re the ones the money comes from, because they’re the only ones who have enough. Not as individuals, but in the aggregate. Confiscating everything from “the rich” wouldn’t run the country for a week. It’s only by salami-slicing the incomes and assets of the great middle that you can get sufficient revenue to keep things going.
Deliberate inflation, a favorite populist tactic, doesn’t work any more because with modern information and communication the bankers and moneylenders it’s aimed at can compensate faster than the Government can debase, which makes things worse instead of better for the populace and barely touches the “fatcats”. I begin to hope, though not yet believe, that the bread&circuses tactic is also approaching a reductio ad absurdum too evident to ignore.
Regards,
Ric
Those are some pretty crap circuses, right there.
I come here to bring you the horrible news of your wrongedness. Even if Hillary properly sucked off every last Super Nintendo delegate, it.. as BJTejas says the Executioner in Braveheart said, “matters not”.
You’re facing Barack Obama in the general election. Sen. John McCain is not a vibrant campaigner. I believe Basketball Jones will soon be playing as muzak in the White House.
Barack Obama will soon Lord over the American landscape, and where the buffalo used to roam there will tribes of people speaking Igbo and dancing in circles. All of Barack’s distant relatives are set to invade! They will bring their pet black mambas and cannibalize entire villages of hillbillies. Mayhem. Mayhem. Mayhem not seen since the Salem witch trials will prevail. Change? You bet. Loin cloths and blow guns? Damn straight.
The Great Compensation, of course, would be hearing the British press refer to him as O-bomber.
Are Barack and the Hopetones so handcuffed to the victimization, class struggle and anecdotal policy platforms that they can’t, for one lousy sentence in one lousy speech, allow their divinely inspired candidate and his bitter, struggling wife to talk about how great this country is despite all of its myriad of problems?
Excellent question, BJT.
That he doesn’t makes me fear he really is courting the America-haters among us, the Ayers and the Wrights. I don’t think he feels the way they do, but he is too afraid to let them know that.
hahahaha,
damn you , thor for #45 post.
Without the proper warning I spilled the OJ(not the coffee)all over my keyboard,
hahahahahhahahahahahahah….
sashal I live in PA and am in the midst of Obama spending a sizable chunk of that internet nugget on ads that uniformly reflect exactly what I’m talking about. He tries to parse it carefully but the underlying message shines through: Everything sucks and I’m the guy to fix it. We must unite in changetudinous and hopeyliciousness by electing me to fix everything that sucks!
His San Francisco Treat added a dimension that is not a long term winner: Not only does everything suck but you rural, back country rubes are a big part of the problem!
Ric nails it in his first two sentences:
Obama’s moving away from the Dem victimization playbook at his own peril (despite thors mandingo man love certainty of Barack’s ascendancy.) He’s supposed to put his arm around those people and comfort them while assuring them that the free milk and cookies is on the way. Telling them that they are part and parcel of the problem (along with Bushitler and, oh, by the way, the Clinton Administration) is a modus operandi guaranteed to bring out the less likely to vote in droves to kick his ever lovin’ elitist ass.
If McCain has half a brain he’ll be running ads about his vision of America that hails the spirit and toughness of the backwater rubes and “real ‘Mericans” backed by soaring strings and brass arpeggios that cause the heart to swoon. Maybe he’ll still come off as the doddering pissed off meddling Bush bot that even people in his own party can’t stand but maybe not.
Ultimately the same thing could happen to Baracky that happened to Kerry. Nobody wants to be told that their country sucks on an ongoing basis and that they are part of the problem.
Bad politics, my friend. Losing politics. I just don’t think that he and his cadre of rocket scientists can help themselves.
thor’s post #45.
QED. Much grass! [See, I am even a-learnin’ to talk immigrant.]
Sorry sashal. But the weak Obama-fu is really terrifying me. All the Bible humpers can come up with is worn out words written on Post It Notes to slap on Obama’s back when he’s not looking.
He’s coming. And they think their slap-fu will stop him. I say no effen way. They can hardly slow him down. If Barack’s numbers only briefly suffered from having a bush Shaman as a Reverend, shit, him calling the hicks hicks will probably make his numbers rise. This guy is good. I don’t think he’s that far left. He’ll cozy up to McCain at the center in the general. He’s smooth. I’m buying the t-shirt.
Yeah. ::sigh:: We do live in sadly degenerate times.
Regards,
Ric
BJTex, you live in PA?
Any chance somewhere close to Phila?
I have relatives in Bucks county who I visit sometimes…
sashal: Chester County, just west of Philly. You may write me at bjtexs at gmail dot com if you are coming in.
Also, this “yearning to hunt” meme is at the same time condescending and delusional, if not also manipulative in the sense of trying to reform reality along the lines of Progressive tactics vs their own confabulational stereotypes.
That’s been a proven loser as well. But it’s their Progg narrative and they’re stickin’ to it. So just who are the real Hicks here, noble Proggs?
Praetorian John doesn’t need to be a vibrant campaigner. He just needs to avoid the kind of dum-ness into which the Obamessiah has repeatedley stumbled.
William McKinley wasn’t a vibrant campaigner, either. He somehow managed to win two elections against the finest orator of his generation.
Anecdotal, but I was talking to a college pal who lives in PA and is planning on holding her nose for Hillary because Barack disgusts her. She said that most Democrats she knows, and especially Hillary supporters, will be able to live with a McCain administration. This speaks not wonders for our boy from the conservative perspective, but it does suggest a thing or two about the general.
Anyway, more popcorn. I loves me the identity-politcs chickens a-roostin’.
I have a tough time visualizing McKinley running in a digital age, lol!
Anecdotal as well: There are a significant number of liberals who are still mindlessly embracing Obama in part beacuse they can’t stand and/or trust the Hildebeast. I’ve mentioned before that one of my best friends, a full on liberal via the Vietnam era, refers to Hillary as “the virus.” He also likes McCain and would probably vote for him over Clinton, although the thought of voting for the same candidate as me has him breaking out in hives. :-)
Obamaman indeed done got a tar babba kind of groove thing goin’ on. It’s called his own bad-self, which he’s Freudianly managed to make “the issue”.
The Obamaman’s actually got many issues. More popcorn, Ma – or else!
bamboozled…
That’s code word for repeating Malcolm
X!
Barack will bring us all sorts of hope and changiness. Starting with an investigation of the Bush administration for war crimes.
Man, it really would be a new day!
I think the thing that sashal overlooks is that Obama made these comments on billionare’s row in San Francisco. A place where people spend more money to cater a party than some of those rubes earn in a life time. If I was a rube and was going to hate someone…they would be on my list of people to resent…but who is Obama giving private audiences to? Who is sucking up to? And where was Huffington when this news broke on her blog? Why on a 454 foot yacht ofcourse. Power to the people and all that crap.
Just because the filthy rich liberals want to appease their guilt by tacking another $100 on some poor sob’s welfare check does not mean I have to play along with this crap.
[Obamaman’s unconsidered perjorative stereotypes] might have seemed mildly controversial but broadly true.
Right, E.J., given just how broad “truth” has oso progressively become amongst projecting, perfectly bigoted Solopsists such as your own effete bad-self, my man[?]. Now, that’s what I’m bitterin’ about, fool.
pejorative
In all the “bittergate” hub bub, it’s easy to lose track of just how damn dumb Obama’s comment really is. Stereotypes are often stupid, but this one is just ridiculous. Did you know that some people when under economic stress fall back on things they think they can count on? How about a big no shit. The rest of the Marxist clap trap makes a mockery of human nature. And I’m guessing that he knows he’s full of crap, but his limo lib donors want to hear the party line.
“Comment by Terrye on 4/15 @ 11:50 am #
I think the thing that sashal overlooks is that Obama made these comments on billionare’s row in San Francisco.”
Gulfstream liberals.
[…] evidence that Barack Obama does not understand most Americans. Ouch. Posted by Karl @ 10:06 am | […]
“Mustardboy to Barack .. we know what you said was true .. but you’re not supposed to tell ‘em that .. and you too Hiliary .. hush now.
E.J. Dionne sounds more like the 5th column than the 4th estate.”
E. J. Dionne sounds more to me like the guy who goes into the men’s room and picks the stall without a door.
[…] the war in Afghanistan.  In contrast, Obama’s insult toward voters in the heartland was largely inaccurate. But I […]
[…] The latest polling data from Gallup suggests that Americans overwhelmingly prefer that the government focus on improving overall economic conditions, as opposed to taking steps to redistribute wealth. Moreover, a majority of those making over $30,000 tend to agree that the government is doing too much (a figure generally consistent with the 2004 presidential exit poll data). […]