A new Rasmussen Reports survey looked at fallout from Obama's "bitter" comments and found that while a majority of voters disagree with what Obama said, a plurality of liberal voters agree with him.
A plurality of politically liberal voters--46%--agree with Obama's statement while 33% disagree. Moderate voters take the opposite view and disagree by a 51% to 27% margin. Seventy-four percent (74%) of conservatives disagree with Obama's statement, only 12% agree.Democrats are fairly evenly divided--34% agree with Obama and 43% disagree. Generally, Obama supporters agree with him while Hillary Clinton's supporters disagree.
Leading Rasmussen to conclude:
Partisan and ideological differences suggest that the comments are more likely to be a factor in the General Election than in the Primaries.
Which would explain why calling Barack Obama "elitist" and "out of touch" is only half of Clinton's strategy in the wake of Obama's comments. The other half, and potentially a more effective argument in the primary, is one of electability, to both voters and superdelegates alike.
First, Evan Bayh to reporters on Saturday:
"I think it's a real potential political problem and it's something for superdelegates and voters to think about," said Bayh, who was made available to reporters by the Clinton campaign to speak about the controversy."The far right wing has a very good track record of using things like this relentlessly against our candidates, whether its Al Gore or John Kerry," Bayh said, "I'm afraid this is the kind of fodder they might use to harm him."
And then Hillary Clinton herself during last night's Compassion Forum:
"The Democratic party has been viewed as a party that didn't understand and respect the values and way of life of so many of our fellow Americans," Clinton said, adding that the debate wasn't over whether or not Obama was a man of faith but rather whether his comments made him easily caricatured by Republicans ala Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004."Large segments of the electorate concluded that [Gore and Kerry] did not really understand or relate to or respect their ways of life," Clinton said. "That is an issue for voters."
Obama had a short and sweet comeback to Clinton's remarks in the second half of the forum:
By the way, I have to say I think Al Gore won.
Although, I will say he probably doesn't want to start framing "winning" as a popular vote formulation. But be that as it may, there is some evidence that despite Obama's pushback on Clinton's attacks, that the firestorm over his remarks has hurt Obama in Pennsylvania. According to the latest ARG poll (600 LVs, April 11-13, MOE +/- 4%,) which was in the field the day the story broke and the two subsequent days, Hillary Clinton has seen a remarkable turnaround in the state.
| Candidate | April 11-13 | April 5-6 |
| Clinton | 57 | 45 |
| Obama | 37 | 45 |
ARG has been rather unreliable this cycle and certainly the volatility of ARG's PA numbers does not exactly inspire confidence, so we'll have to see if Clinton sees an uptick in subsequent polls, but it's hard not to conclude that the 20 point shift to Hillary in less than a week is due at least in part to the "bitter" controversy.
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