Words Matter

You'd think that Barack Obama would get it by now.

He's running for president with a limited political record. He's acknowledged his limitation in experience and he's tried to counter that by claiming to have better judgment than his rival.

But there are certainly times when that "judgment" is questionable.

We've had his wife's ill-chosen comment about being proud of her country for the first time. We've had Obama's comments about not wearing an American flag lapel pin. We've had video footage ad nauseum of his pastor snarling his hate-filled message in the pulpit of his former church -- and no explanation from the candidate as to why he remained in that church, listening to that message and exposing his wife and children to it for two decades.

Now we have his comments about voters being "bitter" because of economic strife. And he managed to link "bitter" to two hot-button issues, like guns and religion -- almost as if such people were virtually certain to open fire at their former workplaces -- or houses of worship.

Obama tried to backtrack from his original comments. Originally, he told a San Francisco audience that people who are affected by a bad economy "get bitter, they cling to guns or religion" in self-defense.

But, as Mike Allen points out in The Politico, "bitter" was a bad choice of words. So Obama backtracked, trying to explain that "people who have seen their way of life upended because of economic distress are frustrated and rightfully so."

"Bitter" is more extreme than "frustrated."

And, as Allen points out, the underlying tone of the word seems elitist to blue-collar types.

"Some people actually use guns to hunt -- not to compensate for a salary that’s less than a U.S. senator’s," Allen writes. "Some people cling to religion not because they are bitter but because they believe it, and because faith in God gives them purpose and comfort. "

The original comments ignored a basic fact about the roles of guns and religion in America. The revision never addressed them, even to apologize for making that connection.

"Some hard-working Americans find it insulting when rich elites explain away things dear to their hearts as desperation," Allen says. "It would be like a white politician telling blacks they cling to charismatic churches to compensate for their plight. And it vindicates centrist Democrats who have been arguing for a decade that their party has allowed itself to look culturally out of touch with the American mainstream."

Ultimately, the comments could pose a serious problem for Obama in a general election campaign, if not in the remaining primaries.

"It provides a handy excuse for people who were looking for a reason not to vote for Obama but don’t want to think of themselves as bigoted," says Allen. "It hurts Obama especially with the former Reagan Democrats, the culturally conservative, blue-collar workers who could be a promising voter group for him. It also antagonizes people who were concerned about his minister but might have given him the benefit of the doubt after his eloquent speech on race."

And, in my opinion, the most damaging aspects of the comments, in Allen's own words ...

(1) "The comments play directly into an already-established narrative about his candidacy. Clinton supporters have been arguing that Obama has limited appeal beyond upscale Democrats -- the so-called latte liberals. You can’t win red states if people there don’t like you."

(2) "It helps Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) frame a potential race against Obama, even though both of them have found support among independents. Now Republicans have a simple, easily repeated line of attack to use against Obama as an out-of-touch snob, as they had with Sen. John F. Kerry after he blundered by commenting about military funding, 'I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.'"

If you're going to claim that your judgment makes you the best choice to be president, it would be helpful to demonstrate it more convincingly on the campaign trail.