Sounds About Right to Me
I'll admit it: I don't think what Barack Obama said was so bad. In fact, I think he's right. I would pray a lot harder—or at least more frequently—if I were out of job. And at least one statewide politician—Bob Corker—has told the Scene that anti-immigrant sentiment tends to be more pronounced in communities where unemployment and uncertainty are high.
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.
Meanwhile, Bill Hobbs is still quoting himself. And he says he's not bitter. The latest bloviating GOP press release after the jump:
WE'RE NOT BITTER
Obama's bigoted statement puts down people of faith
NASHVILLE, TN - When Barack Obama looks at small-town America, he sees a land of angry, racist, gun-totin' Bible-thumpers who, in his words, "cling to guns and religion" only because the economy isn't booming.
We the people of the Tennessee Republican Party beg to differ. We know different.
"The people of small-town Pennsylvania whom Obama directly insulted in his now-infamous remarks to a group of wealthy latte liberals in San Francisco are just like the people of small-town Tennessee ˆ good, salt-of-the-earth folks who don't 'cling to religion' because the government has failed them, but rather worship God out of a deep, real and abiding faith in both good times and bad," said Robin Smith, chairman of the Tennessee Republican Party.
Sen. Obama's comments indicate an elitist's condescension toward some of the most basic and fundamental freedoms guaranteed to all Americans by the Bill of Rights ˆ a document authored, ironically, by Thomas Jefferson, considered a patron political saint of Obama's Democrat political party. Jefferson's 256th birthday is today.
The First Amendment of the Bill of Rights guarantees people of faith the right to their religious views and practices unmolested by government, and the Declaration of Independence declares that our rights come from God, not from government - yet Sen. Obama seems to view religion the way Karl Marx did, as the opiate of the masses, something people cling to only because the secular state has let them down.
"Sen. Obama's assertion that people turn to God only after government has failed them is an insult to people of faith everywhere," said Smith.
Perhaps Sen. Obama's bitter view of religion flows from the 20 years he spent soaking up the racist, hateful bigotry of his pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, a narrow religious experience which blinded him to the grace and love that is the more common faith experience in churches across small-town America.
As for guns, the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights guarantees to all Americans to the right to keep and bear firearms, yet Sen. Obama has expressed that he believes Americans only turn to guns because the economy is bad and government hasn't fixed it. The truth is that millions of Americans own guns for hunting and millions own them for self-defense ˆ the latter necessary because the government in which Obama places his faith has failed its basic duty to keep the people safe.
In his remarks, Sen. Obama also portrayed people who object to illegal immigration as racist, blaming the people when it is the state which has failed to secure the borders and stanch the flow of illegals, who put downward pressure on wages and cost taxpayers hundreds of billions of dollars for added healthcare, education, law enforcement and other services.
"The Tennessee Republican Party rejects Sen. Obama's bitter bigotry toward people of faith, toward Americans who still believe in the Constitution's Second Amendment, and toward people who believe we ought to secure our borders ˆ and we urge voters to take a deeper look at the 'change' that Sen. Obama is offering," said Bill Hobbs, communications director for the Tennessee Republican party. "Obama's idea of change is for you not to rest your faith in God and your rights on the Constitution, but to put your faith in secular government run by elitists like Obama who look down on you."
Comments
William Howard is just still bitter that he got bitch slapped by ever major Republican in the country over his last press release.
Posted 04/14/2008 at 02:22:38 PMI just can't help but wonder why it's wrong for Obama to be bitterly bigoted towards people of faith, but if the head flack for the TNGOP wants to be bitterly bigoted to a different group of people of faith, that's somehow different.
I mean, seriously, you wonder how he can even write stuff like this without ripping some kind of hole in the fabric of space.
Posted 04/14/2008 at 03:57:57 PMI must have missed this... just as an aside.
Long before Reverend Wright entered the national stage, Ryan Lizza of The New Republic, in the March 19, 2007 issue, dropped this little gem:
"Wright was a former Muslim and black nationalist who had studied at Howard and Chicago, and Trinity’s guiding principles–what the church calls the “Black Value System”[Emphasis added].
Posted 04/14/2008 at 04:03:29 PMI voted for Obama and I have issue with what he said. First it was the verb "cling," in relation to religion. As if someone in a different social situation wouldn't "cling" to religion, or the only reason poor people do is because of their social standing. Very clumsy and un-Obama-like.
Posted 04/14/2008 at 07:40:51 PMIt was also his audience that made the comment condescending. It sounded like something the zany-liberal sociology professor would say, not a candidate for president.
I think Obama is headed for big losses in Indiana and Pennsylvania.
It sounded like something the zany-liberal sociology professor would say, not a candidate for president.
On behalf of zany-liberal sociology professors everywhere, I resent the implication that we can't be candidates for president.
Posted 04/15/2008 at 09:07:11 AMbb, of course you can run for president. You would have been right at home out there in SF talking to the rich elite .
In fact you could replace Obama who seems to have screwed the pooch as the commoners say.
Posted 04/15/2008 at 10:23:17 AMYeah, that HUSSEIN (which sounds to me like he might be MUSLIM) Obama really has no chance now, I say as a totally unbiased observer.
And it's obviously only acceptable to be rich if you're Republican. If you're not, then you're a dastardly "rich elite." Nothing worse than that.
Posted 04/15/2008 at 10:40:15 AMWell, yes there is. You could be a commoner clinging to your relgion and guns.
Posted 04/15/2008 at 01:02:16 PMNot just rich, but elite. Yet I thought elite was a good thing, like elite commandos. Or do you prefer your commandos to be "salt of the earth, commoner" types?
Posted 04/15/2008 at 03:50:07 PMYep, you can be an elite commoner who is a special forces type. This board looks down on them all would agree. But, we know that Obama, while hob-nobbing with rich SF rogressives, sounded like an elitist. Anyway, you must be rich to live in SF.
I don't think we should quibble over what is meant by an elitist, especially from SF. All know what is meant by Obamas patronizing. He just did not realize he was being taped.
This board is crowded with elitists, most probably not rich, but leftish elitists nevertheless.
Posted 04/15/2008 at 05:27:49 PMObama was speaking in a closed door meeting to a group of far leftists who think just like he does so he let is guard down and said what he really thinks.
And Obama is a far left liberal despite his attempts to craft an image of being some transcendent figure above partisan politics and a "uniter". He has the most liberal voting record in the Senate.
Arrogance and condescension are the hallmark of the mindset of liberals like Obama - and the group he was addressing.
They view themselves as the enlightened ones who not only know what is best for themselves but for everyone else as well.
In their view, the ignorant rubes let themselves be distracted by non-economic issues like guns and/or religion instead of supporting socialist policies favored by the liberal elite that are (in the liberal's mind's) what is really in these people's best interest.
Of course the fact that these liberals have never actually accomplished anything that proves they know what anyone else's self interests are better than the other person does himself and have never actually proven that any of the socialist policies they favor have ever been a success in any way never enters their conciousness.
Posted 04/16/2008 at 07:09:54 AMThey view themselves as the enlightened ones who not only know what is best for themselves but for everyone else as well.>>
Hmmmm. Sounds like the religious right, fixing things so I can't buy wine in a grocery store or on "God's day"
Posted 04/16/2008 at 10:43:20 AM"Hmmmm. Sounds like the religious right, fixing things so I can't buy wine in a grocery store "
It was the liquor lobby that fixed that.
The "religious right" had nothing to do with it.
Posted 04/16/2008 at 11:49:12 AMI'm not sure it will matter, but I'll offer this. As someone who grew up in a community that's suffered many economic challenges, where people love God, guns and revile illegal immigrants -- yes, even clinging to these notions.
I think Obama was a. right and b. did not mean to be condescending. Instead, my belief is that he was attempting to explain -- inartfully -- the political landscape of large parts of this country, to a group that's far removed from such mundane worries as how to fill their gas tanks.
In the absence of tangible assistance from neighbors, government, wherever, you cling to the things you can. It doesn't mean those things are invaluable to you in times of prosperity. It does mean, in hard times, that's all these people feel they have left. Because the rest of us have left them behind without a second glance.
Posted 04/17/2008 at 09:45:54 AMAs much as I hate to admit it, I agree totally with Liz on this one.
Any one who says rural voters aren't bitter has obviously never been to Wilson County.
I don't think anything Obama said is all that offensive. It's not like he posted a cartoon featuring a Muslim wearing a hat shaped like a bomb or anything.....
Posted 04/18/2008 at 09:41:06 AM