4um: Obama on small-town PA: Clinging to religion, guns, xenophobia

Huffpo's Mayhill Fowler has more from Obama's remarks at a San Francisco fundraiser Sunday, and they include an attempt to explain the resentment in small-town Pennsylvania that won't be appreciated by some of the people whose votes Obama's seeking:

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. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.

And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations. That's a pretty broad list of things to explain with job loss.

If you are offended, then I suppose it was insensitive. But I honestly don't think he meant it that way.

'Individuals should not take responsibility for their own defense. That’s what the police are for. ... If I oppose individuals defending themselves, I have to support police defending them. I have to support a police state.”' Alan Dershowitz

That is very true. Maybe he meant they are leaning back on what is familiar and secure.

I can assure you that thousands of Pa neanderthals will be POed tomorrow morning.

Any man that would make such a statement has no qualifications for the office of president, none. He suffers from elitism hoof and mouth disease.

I'm actually not offended. Nothing a politician says can offend and/or shock me any longer. I've written them out of my life. Believe it or not I'm being objective here and IMO his comment is a mega mistake. His 2nd amendment positions will now be the focus of both Hillary and McCain and when it's examined closely, it's a deal buster for middle America.

Nope, it's pure communism in action. Using peoples hard times against them again -- making an assertion that guns and religion are false posessions of security. The right leader will help relieve you to cast away such antiquated thinking and fetishes. We will give you a new religion and security state.

Man, I think (hope) you're right. Dude can't help but step on his own, true colors.

"Corporation: An entity created for the legal protection of its human parasites, whose sole purpose is profit and self-perpetuation." © IndieTx

While there are a cpl small towns here, that "may" fit his statement, the other 99% of Pa does not fit it.. Yes, we have Guns, Yes, we go to Church and Yes, we have lost Jobs, but we Don't Give Up and we sure don't Give In..

...Both methods yielded similar results, which support the previous findings; that is, of all modern human samples, sub-Saharan Africans again exhibit the closest phenetic similarity to various African Plio-Pleistocene hominins...
Ancient teeth and modern human origins: An expanded comparison of African Plio-Pleistocene and recent world dental samples, Journal of Human Evolution Volume 45, Issue 2, August 2003, Pages 113-144

For years we had a large sign along the main road that leads to civilization that read, "FLATLANDERS GO HOME".

"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," he said.

"Robert A. Gleason Jr., chairman of the Republican Party of Pennsylvania called the remarks "incredibly insulting" and predicted that many in his state, where Mr. Obama has trailed Mrs. Clinton in surveys and polls poorly against Mr. McCain, would agree.

"In light of this most recent statement, I believe Americans are going to have even more questions about his values. Not only do these comments reveal a condescending elitism, Obama illustrates to us just how out of touch he is with middle-class America." Mr. Gleason said."

I'm not surprised that Barry slipped on a banana peel, after all haven't we spent the better part of last month documentation his various left-wing political positions? Even his admirers can't rationally argue that he isn't a gun grabber. What blows me away is that despite what we've uncovered, he is still their guy. Geraldine Ferraro is right; if he were white, he'd never be where he is today.

I've heard people say they will not vote for the lesser "evil". Well I will, even though Diebold exists; I must try to minimize the damage.

John McCain is so undeniably worse than Barack Obama, there is no contest. Europe is "socialist" or "liberal", yet they are not on the brink of destruction, yet. But we are. We can survive a liberal presidency, but we will not survive another NeoCon administration.

Anyone who takes the time to watch the speech can see that Obama was empathizing with the people he has observed.

But the large knee-jerk proportion of the populace led by an MSM that loves to throw what they perceive as red meat to the yahoos .... and, of course, the phony, hypocritical, demagogic establishment opponents of the new guy jump in with relish.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

I submit that GWB is both a liberal and a neocon, proving that neos and libs aren't mutual exclusive. Barry's multiple positions indicate he's more of the same, with an even more left leaning domestic agenda than the current occupant.

Our local university has been recruiting superb athletes out of that area for many years.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

I have a dear friend whom I met in a golf league and who later became my partner in that league.

He was to become the attorney I leaned on later to support my precious youngest daughter in court after she became crack addicted.

I am convinced that many here have an acquaintance with blacks formed only via the eleven o'clock news.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

In reality it appears to be the white half that is speaking. Blacks that I know love their guns and go to church, and like Obummer, live in white neighborhoods.

So we have a far leftwing gun grabber that parades his ties to a church that thinks that is all a bad idea.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

Yep, the neighborhood activist suffers from elitism, but you side with the Wellesley girl, and the "dump you're crippled wife and marry into money", Annapolis son of Admirals as being jus' folks.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

What an amazing ignorant statement. I grew up in Brooklyn and spent nearly 15 years in the NYPD so I have friend and foes who are black. It's the sheltered closet liberals who fawn over the Big O simply b/c he's black.

The man is a gun grabbing leftist, with close ties to other leftists. Your cheer leading for him is borderline cultist.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

I grew up in small town western PA and Obama is right on target. When a new Wal- Mart store opens, it's a step up for many.

Who's Blogging

Barack Obama, who informs campaign audiences that he taught constitutional law for 10 years, might be expected to weigh in on the historic Second Amendment case before the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices are pondering whether the 1976 District of Columbia law effectively prohibiting personal gun ownership in the nation's capital is constitutional. But Obama has not stated his position.

Obama, disagreeing with the D.C. government and gun control advocates, declares that the Second Amendment's "right of the people to keep and bear arms" applies to individuals, not just the "well regulated militia" in the amendment. In the next breath, he asserts that this constitutional guarantee does not preclude local "common sense" restrictions on firearms. Does the draconian prohibition in Washington fit that description? My attempts to get an answer have proved unavailing. The front- running Democratic presidential candidate is doing the gun dance.

That is a dance that many Democrats do, as revealed in private conversation with party strategists. As urban liberals, they reject constitutional protection for gun owners. As campaign managers, they want to avoid the fate of the many Democratic candidates who have lost elections because of gun control advocacy. The party's House leadership last year pulled from the floor a bill for a congressional seat for the District to protect Democratic members from having to vote on a Republican amendment against the D.C. gun law.

Hillary Clinton has extolled the Second Amendment, though not to the degree Obama has. Campaigning at Iowa's Cornell College on Dec. 5, he asserted that the Second Amendment "is an individual right and not just a right of the militia." He has repeated that formulation along the primary trail, declaring at a Milwaukee news conference before the Feb. 19 Wisconsin primary: "I believe the Second Amendment means something. . . . There is an individual right to bear arms."

That would imply that the D.C. gun law is unconstitutional. Mayor Adrian Fenty's brief to the Supreme Court rests on the proposition that the Second Amendment "protects the possession and use of guns only in service of an organized militia." Consequently, I concluded in a March 13 column about the case that Obama had "weighed in against the D.C. law."

On March 24, a reader wrote in an e-mail to The Post that "Obama supports the D.C. law" and demanded a correction. That was based on an Associated Press account of Obama's Milwaukee news conference asserting that "he voiced support for the District of Columbia's ban on handguns." In fact, all he said was: "The notion that somehow local jurisdictions can't initiate gun safety laws to deal with gang-bangers and random shootings on the street isn't borne out by our Constitution."

That leaves Obama unrevealed on the D.C. law. In response to my inquiry about his specific position, Obama's campaign e-mailed me a one-paragraph answer: Obama believes that while the "Second Amendment creates an individual right, . . . he also believes that the Constitution permits federal, state and local government to adopt reasonable and common sense gun safety measures." Though the paragraph is titled "Obama on the D.C. Court case," that specific gun ban is never mentioned. I tried again last week, without success, to learn Obama's position before writing this column.

Obama's dance on gun rights is part of his evolution from the radical young Illinois state legislator he once was. He was recorded in a 1996 questionnaire as advocating a ban on the manufacture, sale and possession of handguns (a position he has since disavowed). He was on the board of the Chicago-based Joyce Foundation, which takes an aggressive gun control position, and in 2000 considered becoming its full-time president. In 2006, he voted with an 84 to 16 majority (and against Clinton) to prohibit confiscation of firearms during an emergency, but that is his only pro-gun vote in Springfield or Washington. The National Rifle Association grades his voting record (and Clinton's) an "F."

There is no anti-gun litmus test for Democrats. In 2006, Ted Strickland was elected governor of Ohio and Bob Casey U.S. senator from Pennsylvania with NRA grades of "A." Following their model, Obama talks about the rights of "Americans to protect their families." He has not yet stated whether that right should exist in Washington.

Several decades ago I stopped with my family in a small western PA town, filled with boarded up small businesses to spend the night in a a beautiful new 3-story motel. It's management and staff were a wonderful congregation of optimistic, eager to serve folks. It was one of the nicest stopover experiences we ever experienced. They even supplied a babysitting service which my wife and eagerly took advantage of for an refreshening evening of drinks and dinner. Our six kids loved the pool.

I passed through the town a few years later and this magnificent enterprise too was boarded up.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

I don't understand Jethro. How will it hurt him? You said you don't vote because the vote is rigged. So how would a rigged vote affect him?

I'm sure Obama is somewhat conflicted on the issue having spent many years in an area where drive-by shootings abound.

Success is relative. It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. T. S. Eliot

I found it interesting that both "sides" of the party, Clinton/McKook DID find it offensive. Very unusual.

Politicians who use Deliverance-like stereotypes to paint white voters with a broad brush will always fail .