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This Is What He Thinks?

5:47 PM, Apr 11, 2008 • By MICHAEL GOLDFARB
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As reported by the Politico's Ben Smith, Obama psychoanalyzes Pennsylvania's white voters:

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 to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

That's not going to go over terribly well in rural Pennsylvania, though it was probably a hit with the San Francisco audience that first heard it. Still, it isn't a gaffe, just a revealing slip of the tongue. Orthodox, secular liberals like Obama tend to explain religious fervor as a symptom of fear and bitterness. Likewise the irrational racism, xenophobia, and attachment to firearms of the "typical white person."

But it is strange that Obama would include anti-trade sentiment in this diatribe. Isn't Obama against every free trade deal this country has ever signed? Hot Air has the response from the McCain camp, no word yet from Hillary Clinton responds here: "Pennsylvanians don't need a president who looks down on them."

More by Michael Goldfarb

Update: Go read Ace's headline.