That is the exact point - well said. Many average citizens WILL understand what Barack is talking about.
Oh and I love how Hillary is shooting [scuse the pun] herself in the foot by saying how her ol’grandad taught her how to shoot behind the old cabin they had near scranton. That was rich…Hillary the shot-taking-beer-guzzeling hunter !
I used to watch him more than I have lately, so I’m not current on his perceived biases on the pro- side. He doesn’t like Hillary, Bush or the neocons, though. And he definitely hates Cheney. That much I do remember.
No it’s not absurd. After hearing his explanation it should be fairly obvious that both Clinton and McCain are blowing things way out of proportion in an attempt to use another sound bite rather than deal with the issues that are so much more important. Isn’t it insulting to the average citizen’s intelligence for them to do that so blatantly? Let’s chant elitism over and over and drown out everything else. So they’re accusing him of intellectual elitism while assuming that the average person is dumb enough to not see through their ploy. It’s bullshit.
I would expect anyone running for president to have a pretty healthy ego. Barack is smarter than the average bear and I would hope my president would be. I think I get what he was trying to say and I agree with him that he phrased it poorly. So freaking what? Let’s keep our eyes on the bigger picture and the bigger issues and not let the sound bite hounds screw get away with their bs. We should voice our distaste to the news stations for focusing on it too much and to the politicians who want to use it as a diversion. They are the ones calling Americans dumb asses.
I hope Barack doesn’t dwell on it too much. Mention it, get a laugh, and then move on and keep talking about the issues that matter. I believe he will win more votes by being consistent in a new approach. He our next president and we, the citizens will not let the sound bite hounds and the insulting dumb down tactics of politics divert us any longer.
I’ve seen him make a few comments lately that are making fun of Hillary. I’d like to see him stay away from that kind of thing. I think she’s doing herself damage by being so disingenuous lately with the whole elitism crap and now this gun thing.
Her criticism of Barack’s comments and crying elitism really pisses me off. I would expect it from McCain but for her to join in the phony chorus in a desperate attempt to discredit a fellow democrat who may be running for president is really awful. She deserves to lose more support for that.
I agree - and I think Obama’s firing back will stop, she can continue to do whatever it is she thinks she has to, but it’s not going to make much of a difference. This morning I read an article about antiabortion senator’s unexpected endorsement of Obama. This is a growing trend we are seeing big endorsements, and unions backing Barack. This silliness we are seeing from the soundbyte mongers won’t change the fact that he’s going to take the nom.
Just because McCain and Clinton overreact to it doesn’t mean there’s nothing worth discussing.
As wolfman in the pit thread put it:
It may not have been an out of context soundbyte, a faux pas. It may be an indication on how he feels on the issues and towards certain people, which if that is the case it’s certainly worth something exploring because it’s relevant to his beliefs and how he would run the presidency.
You make it sound as if the only people who can be concerned about this are idiots who are fooled by the sound byte machine. Just because the mainstream media tends to be devoid of substance doesn’t mean that the issues they cover never have substance on their own.
Nitpick: it’s a sound bite. A ‘byte’ is eight bits, e.g. 10011101. I doubt that what Obama said can be encoded in a single byte.
You’re right. Why the hell did I do that? That’s generally not the sort of thing I screw up. I think I was re-reading the post I was replying to as I typed. I blame them!
Me too! I always blame them! 
No prob. I’ve started to see this one everywhere lately, and for some reason it really gets under my skin. It’s as if everybody, newspapers and such included, have decided that ‘byte’ is a preferred alternate spelling of ‘bite.’
Elitist 
It’s “newsiness”, as compared with Colbert’s “truthiness”. The cable news guys are raking it in this season, due to the phenomenal intensity of interest this campaign season. Like everything it politics, this positive development has an ugly side: the intense desire for news. Something must happen every day, there must be a dramatic development every day. And the only thing with any impact, on a daily basis, is the Dem side of things, the Pubbies have already chosen.
When the Apathy Party was still running things, this would have been little more than a blip-blop. And its impact will likely be muffled by the next Action McNews.
Don’t forget that it’s a new game with the internet. The “cling to religion and guns” thing wouldn’t even be in the press at all if that blogger at Huffington hadn’t written about it.
I kinda like “soundbyte” as a new phrase for stuff that only gets heard because of blog postings. Subconsciously you meant to do that!
Yep - that’s why I posted it…Can I take credit for coinage?
I can name that sound in one byte.
But I really need to think about it for a byte.
Oh, byte me!
The answer is: of course they are both elitists. He went to Harvard. She went to Wellesley. Neither of them has had a job in the private sector in years.
I am sure his comments were an accurate reflection of his mindset and the mindset of the bien pensant San Francisco crowd to which he was speaking. In his mind (or hers), because there is no legitimate reason for being a gun enthusiast, or drawing political opinions from religious beliefs, or opposing immigration, these viewpoints must be explained away as an artifact, a side effect of some external cause.
This is a prime example of the Genetic Fallacy (attacking a belief by calling into question the source or motivation that ostensibly gave rise to it), and thus is not irrelevant to whether a candidate’s judgment can be trusted.
[Wiki]The fallacy therefore fails to assess the claim on its merit. The first criterion of a good argument is that the premises must have bearing on the truth or falsity of the claim in question. Genetic accounts of an issue may be true, and they may help illuminate the reasons why the issue has assumed its present form, but they are irrelevant to its merits.[/wiki]
I am quite sure that if either Obama or HRC made a list of 1000 things to do, shooting a gun, or owning one, or caring about the Second Amendment, would not be on it – just as it would not be on the list of those in their liberal, political elite circles. Thus, I am sure that Obama’s belief is genuinely that support for gun rights MUST be chimerical and motivated by something other than a genuine belief that gun ownership is constitutionally protected, and desirable. Presumably he also believes that if you could cure people’s “bitterness,” they would realize that they never really cared or should have cared about the issues in question.
As HRC was quoted as saying she never really heard much complaining about immigration when the economy was good (say what?), they’re both guilty of it. It’s relevant both because it shows their (respective) disconnection from reality (viz., that people have sincere, well reasoned grounds for supporting gun rights, or opposing immigration, or letting faith influence their votes, and that these beliefs can’t and shouldn’t be explained away as side effects). It’s also not irrelevant to whether voters choose to trust, respect, like a candidate. When have you ever won points or increased peaceful relations with someone by telling them “you’re just saying that because you’re a Jew” or “wow, you’re complaining a lot, must be because you’re on the rag?”
I agree that both have elitist tendancies-- does anyone in the Senate not?
But I also think both are smart enough to know that people have legitimate reasons to want to own guns, to care about their religion, or to be concerned about immigration (especially of the illegal variety).
I respectfully disagree with you as to the extent to which a deeply-felt, internalized stance on an issue can affect a person’s ability to assess objectively and consider as legitimate the contrary viewpoint. For either Obama or HRC, their own minds (and the minds of those around them) are so made up on the issue of whether guns are good (no), whether immigration is good (yes, it can only help their party, and besides, the only reason for opposing it is racism) that it necessarily impairs their ability to consider alternate explanations or viewpoints as serious or legitimate.
I find it completely unsurprising that in what he thought was a friendly atmosphere, Obama would let his hair down and express what must be very real frustration that he, a big-city, urbane professional, has to spend so much time and effort battling against perceptions that his viewpoints aren’t supportive of Pennsylvanians’ political priorities on issues that he considers so non-legitimate that they need to be explained as psychological crutches or artifacts.
Can smart people really be this out of touch? It seems that they can, and it may be an affliction to which liberals are more prone. The below article is just amazing for its shallow tone of wonderment that any thinking person could be a Republican, in a country in which objective fact tells us that approximately half of her fellow citizens have made this choice.
(I suppose such tendencies aren’t exclusive to the Left. I’ve had conversations with my super-anti-abortion acquaintances in which I’ve been frustrated by their inability (and that is the right word) to consider that anyone could consider having an abortion or supporting abortion rights for any reason other than a hatred of fertility or a desire to kill babies).