I mean, while at least with the Wright controversy Obama could simply announce - as he did, to moderate success - that he disagreed with his pastor's hatred, but as a mentor and friend he could no more "disown" the reverend than he could his own family.
Well, Obama sure would like to disown his comments this weekend, saying:
Here's how it is: in a lot of these communities in big industrial states like Ohio and Pennsylvania, people have been beaten down so long, and they feel so betrayed by government, and when they hear a pitch that is premised on not being cynical about government, then a part of them just doesn't buy it....William Kristol comes right out and says it: Obama's channelling Karl Marx, whose academic scribblings on the crisis of capitalism were among the most influential economic theories of the late-19th and 20th centuries.
So it's not surprising then that 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.
Obama's tried to appear new-Democratish, especially around the time of his speech to the 2004 Democratic convention, but he's gotten pulled back over to the far left end of the spectrum:
What does this mean for Obama’s presidential prospects? He’s disdainful of small-town America — one might say, of bourgeois America. He’s usually good at disguising this. But in San Francisco the mask slipped. And it’s not so easy to get elected by a citizenry you patronize.I'll have more updates. This "Bittergate" scandal's a good one!
And what are the grounds for his supercilious disdain? If he were a war hero, if he had a career of remarkable civic achievement or public service — then he could perhaps be excused an unattractive but in a sense understandable hauteur. But what has Barack Obama accomplished that entitles him to look down on his fellow Americans?
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