Obama's Latest Gaffe

There seems to be universal agreement that Obama made a mistake talking at a San Francisco fundraiser. What gets constantly quoted is this "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."

The problem is that's really out of context. I have a lot of respect for Obama who refuses to condescend to voters by speaking in sound bites. This morning This Week quoted just the one paragraph, Meet the Press had several of the preceding paragraphs. The Volokh Conspiracy has the text of Obama in San Francisco on Pennsylvanians as well as his response to the criticism.

Obama was saying that people don't believe it when politicians talk about the government helping them. They've heard about tax cuts and health care for 20 years and it never comes. That there's so much skepticism that more concrete issues like gun control, gay marriage, and immigration have become more important. "But the truth is, is that, our challenge is to get people persuaded that we can make progress when there's not evidence of that in their daily lives." Maybe I"m an elitist white liberal, but I don't see anything wrong with that. I do think we'd all be better off if we weren't starting wars in the wrong country, committing war crimes, spending ourselves into ridiculous debt on military things instead of investments like infrastructure, alternative fuels, and preventative healthcare.

Unfortunately he blew the ending with you can't predict where the supporters are so "The important thing is that you show up and you're doing what you're doing." Kinda of a letdown for all that build up.

I'm getting tried of election coverate as gaffe of the week followed by the inevitable insincere pouncing by the other candidates. At least Obama called Clinton and McCain on it. Election coverage was quiet for a few days before this. What did we have before this? Bowling, Clinton's sniper story and before that McCain's repeated comments that al Qaeda is Shiite. I'd really like to get back to issues and policy or even personality.