Although Oboma seems to have a lead over Clinton in the primaries, and is gaining her in the super delegates votes, the race for the democratic nominee seems far form over. At an April 6 fundraiser in San Francisco, Oboma made some comments that his, yet again, at the center of attention and controversy. Please note that this was a private fundraiser and was not open to the press.

“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,” he reportedly said.
“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.”

Obama’s comments are posted curtsey of Mayhill Fowler on Huffingtonpost.com.

Click Here.

Claudia’s thoughts:

Is this for real? At first sight it seems like Mayhill has a pre-existing agenda.
To say that people “cling to religion and guns” can be taken as insulting, patronizing, shallow and bigoted. One would think with all his education that he should speak more eloquently than that. But in a day and age where “keeping it real”  and “bling” ( I hate that word!) is said mundanely by news anchors on the nightly news, it seems that being politically correct has gone out of the window.

Other than that, what is wrong with what he said? His statement does ring true for many people. Many are now calling Obama an elitist. Being schooling in a private prep school in Hawaii, Columbia and then Harvard, Oboma works hard  to appear to be a man of the people. He didn’t get nearly the money Hillary did for her book and the royalties are trickling in at a few hundred thousand per year. His wife’s house is only worth $1.6 million .He does not have near the wealth of the Clintons or McCains, so it would appear that he is closer to the people.

Only in America can it be that the guy who worked his butt off to go from poverty to success is labeled the “elitist,” Is Obama wrong?

No, he is 100% right. I spent 4 years in a rural area as a teenager due to may parents being in the Military. The base bought a lot of jobs and upward mobility. However, those who weren’t taking advantage of the opportunities that the base provided found no progression in their lives and no improvement of the quality of their life. Most of the youth, upon graduating high school ether did nothing with themselves, or left the town in search of a better life. When your opportunities are limited due to economic downturns, or your own lack of ambition, it’s natural to be resentful and fall back on what makes you feel comfortable. In contrast, people in small towns are not inherently racist, gun lugging, bible beating, obtuse people. Additionally for Oboma to  say that people “cling to religion and guns” was a very wrong move on his part.

Overall I took his statement as a way of relating and offering empathy. I believe that Oboma was simply speaking (his perception of) how rural Americans see the world and empathizing with why they see the world the way they do. You can’t fix what you don’t acknowledge. He identified ( his perception of) the causes of problems instead of just blaming people for their symptoms, and hopefully he can focus on finding real solutions for them.

While I do believe that there is some truth in his statement, I do believe that he could have phrased it better.
So much for being an eloquent speaker.