Elitism, is NOT about belonging to the elite. ALL politicians belong to the elite, Obama included. So it's not about what class you belong to.

It's not about where you come from either. Saying that you come from humble origin but somehow made it through hard work etc... is REPUBLICAN talking points. It has a feel of, "it's your fault if you are poor", "you are not working hard enough". This is not a progressive message.

Elitism is about whether you care or not. Elitism is saying "the jobs are not coming back". The opposite is saying "I will fight to bring those jobs back" (whether you think it is possible is beyond the point, you have to try).
Democrats would be well served remembering that.

Many economists oppose the plan and Clinton, during an interview on ABC's "This Week," demurred when asked to name one who supports it. "I'm not going to put my lot in with economists because I know if we did it right ... it would be implemented effectively," she said.

I initially followed this up with snark, but have since decided that this is too serious for that. I am really bothered by this style of argument. Writing off "experts" wholesale is scary. She is essentially saying, "Despite evidence, despite analysis, I know that I am right." Check out both videos beyond the fold for a discomforting comparison.

I'm sorry if this has been addressed, specifically in relation to truck drivers.  

One of my best friends is about to marry a man who for years drove those big rigs for a living, full-time.  He owned his own truck; essentially, he worked for himself.  A few months ago, he decided to sell his truck and go back to school, because the price of gas made his line of work impossible.  

I asked him, on average, how many miles a week he averaged.  His best guess was about 2,100.  

I just went to a website where you could calculate your savings if the federal tax were suspended for the summer.  Figuring in diesel (which has a tax rate of 0.292), my friend would have saved $1,439.15 over the summer.

So, Senator Obama, even though you voted for such relief 3 times for the state of Illinois, why are you so disconnected from the pain and suffering of ordinary people?  Why are the people of Illinois so much more worthy of relief than people of Massachusetts or North Carolina or anywhere else in this struggling country?

Enough of the increasingly lack-luster speeches.  

Shame. On. You!!!  

Calculate your savings at Jabberwonk.com
www.jabberwonk.com/flinker.cfm?cliid=13l kzo

by Bud White

The Democratic Party consists of two warring factions, and the precarious coalition that forms the Party is on the verge of splitting apart. Working class whites are not naive to Obama's shenanigans. They've watched as the Obama team has smeared perhaps the most racially progressive president in our history as a racist, and they've seen Obama ridicule their concerns, faith, and culture.

The Obama campaign would like the superdelegates to believe that African Americans will revolt if Obama is not given the nomination. The more likely outcome-and this has actually been quantified, is that working-class whites will go with McCain if Hillary is not the nominee.

This is not because working class whites are racist but because Obama represents a wing of the party which encourages the trashing of poor white people, lacks an economic focus for their needs, and excuses the racist and America-hating rants of Reverend Wright.

Obama's cold-hearted tacticians aren't using these tactics because they are concerned about the plight of African Americans. They are trying to scare superdelegates about racial issues and smear the Clintons.

READ THE WHOLE ARTICLE HERE

This is rather rich of John McCain -- calling Barack Obama insensitive to poor people because of the Democrat's opposition to McCain's proposal to suspend the 18.4 cent per gallon federal gas tax, which goes directly to keeping up vital parts of the nation's infrastructure (and in doing so ensures thousands upon thousands upon thousands of American jobs), this summer. No mention, of course, that this would be bad policy, particularly at a time when the country is already having difficulty providing work for those who want it and when disasters -- Hurricane Katrina, the bridge collapse in Minnesota -- underscore the need to maintain our infrastructure; policy that would barely account for the massive increase in the price of gasoline under the watch of the current Republican administration.

While we're on the subject of elitism and insensitivity to hardworking Americans by presidential candidates, perhaps it would be worth it to look directly at McCain himself. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee tapped into his wife's immense wealth -- estimated at $100 million -- to enable him to traipse around the country in an opulent corporate jet, at the same time as refusing to disclose information on his spouse's income (as did every other presidential candidate in the race). Not only has McCain relied on his heiress wife to finance his campaign's travel expenses, the Arizona Republican has also raided the public till in a way not clearly allowed by Senate ethics regulations to help pay for his trip to a campaign fundraiser in London, of all places. What's more, McCain reaped the benefits of the public financing system, which he had opted into, only to unilaterally pull out of the program in a way, again, not clearly allowed by federal campaign finance law -- a body of law he helped shape. Remind me again which candidate is elitist? Which one looks down on the hardworking American man and woman paying their fair share in taxes?

And, by the way, there's little indication that this is a line of attack that Obama is susceptible to. According to Gallup polling released just this past week, the American people simply do not believe that Obama looks down upon them -- a result found with two separate wordings of the question.

So in the case of an election between McCain -- a candidate who dips into his wife's immense fortune or governmental coffers to subsidize his campaign activities; a candidate who is fighting on behalf of tax cuts for the extremely wealthy that will eventually have to be paid for on the backs of hard working Americans; a candidate who is advocating on behalf of a policy that could potentially put tens if not hundreds of thousands of Americans out of work (not to mention help undermine American infrastructure -- and Obama, a conversation about which candidate and which party is insensitive to the needs, hopes and aspirations of working Americans is one that I'd love to see had.

On April 21, 2008, Bill Clinton gave an interview with WHYY reporter Susan Phillips and I can't believe after the Bosnia Sniper lie they would be bold enough to lie again.

I am so sick of the rec list being dominated by the divisive, Republcan talking points of the Clinton supporters in re the "Bittergate" story. There are so many levels on which their take on this non-story is wrong and damaging to our chances of winning the election.

Lets start with the statements themselves. Obama, in his original discussion in SF, was making a point that generations of Democratic candidates (including Bill Clinton--see link http://politicalwire.com/archives/2008/0 4/13/historical_quote_of_the_day.html) have been making for years, namely that Republicans have managed to control the voting patterns of a majority of working class white voters with appeals to their religion, to their appreciation for the right to bear arms, to their fear of illegal immigration, all the while passing legislation on trade and taxation that makes them poorer by the day.

Try to make something of it if you will but the man was speaking a well regarded truth. For Hillary to try to paint this as condescending or elitist shows that she truly is willing to do or say anything to get elected, including adopting and propogating manipulative Republican methods to tar her opponent. I am having none of it and I call bullshit.

In fact, if this is the level in which Democratic politics has sunk to then neither candidate has a chance of winning in November because it is a certainty that the republicans will try to paint Hillary with the same kinds of things (remember the "Stand By Your Man" episode in 1992 for instance). I feel certain that Hillary Clinton has a similar analysis of the dynamics of working class white voters and is merely too chicken shit to make the same kind of statement. For her to get the nomination on the back of this kind of parroting of right wing thinking would be the death knell of our chances in the fall.

Please Obama supporters, lets get this or something like it onto the Rec list to show the outside world that this site has degenerated completely into a swamp of right wing talking points.

in their clear exasperation over the haughty words about bitter little people, the obamites cling to hillary having shot a gun.

yea haw, this here must be the ticket from this here connundrum we obamites are in, attack hillary.

it has worked before, why not now?