"I wasn't persuaded: Barack Obama does have an affluent, educated, Ivy League sense of self-righteousness and entitlement that my Irish Catholic working class side occasionally chafes at. So does Michelle Obama. So does Jeffrey Toobin. So do some of our Obama supporting readers. So sue me."

I don't want to sue you, Joan, but I would ask for some clarification here.

Why do you pour on these epithets as if you were Rush Limbaugh? And why not throw in "latte-drinking" or "volvo-driving?"

Seriously, what gives here?

What do you actually mean by self-righteousness and entitlement?

I appreciate that you're honest about this and that you attribute it to your "Irish Catholic working class side," but I think it bears some serious analysis.

Could you elaborate for us, please? I might be helpful.

"Come the general election he'll be massacred by John McCain, who has already pulled even with him in the polls. "

Why should we believe you, of all people, are some sort of seer?

Not just you, but anyone offering such profoundly unsubstantiated predictions.

Who are you people and what sort of "entitlement" leads you to believe that you can just spout assertion as fact, as if you know something the rest of us don't?

Seriously, who are you people?

Would you care to offer some evidence to support your soothsaying, Klooster?

What's your methodology?

"It's Obama's then attributing religious faith and belief in guns rights or concern about an out-of-control immigration policy -- all legitimate things regardless of economic conditions -- to this bitterness."

You raise a good point, but I think you're misunderstanding Obama. As far as I can tell, he's not attributing faith to bitterness, not at all. He's attributing patterns of voting based on faith, etc., to this bitterness.

He's not saying that these issues are not legitimate, he's saying that the figure disproportionately into electoral politics due to the fact that people don't expect politicians to fight as hard for economic justice as they do for these other "social" issues. So they vote for those things they feel they are more likely to see real results in, even if these issues aren't "objectively" of the highest priority.

Something like that.

Can you see that?

Sometimes I have trouble expressing myself as clearly as I would like, so let me try again.

The point is that the people who vote on "social issues" do so because they have lost all faith that any political parties/candidates will redress their legitimate grievances regarding economic justice.

They have given up hope in economic justice as a political goal but retain confidence in politics to reflect their "social agenda."

"I don't need a gun because I'm bitter. I've been hunting since I was 17."

Who says you need a gun because you're bitter?

Really, who the hell is saying this?

"I don't need God because I'm bitter. My family has always taught respect for the Lord and how to find peace through God."

That's great! What's that have to do with anything? No one's saying you need God because you're bitter.

Fair enough.

"In one slip of the tongue Obama just completely blew any prospect of even picking up five or six states. And his prospects were pretty slim anyway."

Evidence?

May I invite anyone who uses this word to explain to me what it means?

Or does it just mean someone who prefers orange juice to coffee, or prefers latte to coffee or drives a volvo or not only acquires an education, but doesn't go about pretending otherwise?

Really, I just can't believe that after the long history of Republicans bashing intellectuals and elitists, etc., that anyone even remotely liberal or progressive would hurl around "elitist" in such an uncritical way.

It's rather reprehensible, actually.

After all we've been through with good ol' blue collar, let's-have-a-beer-together GWB and Cheney and anyone has the stones to call Obama an elitist?

Fucking Opposite Day, man.

What's the difference between bitter and disaffected?

Sorry, I see you discuss it...

Because it's her MO. She's seen how effective the tactics of Rove and Atwater have been and she's just cynical enough to appropriate them herself.

This is what Power meant when she said she was a monster and would stoop to anything.

If Clinton believed she could score political points by referring to "welfare queens," believe me, she would.

She's amoral.

From wiki: "After the war, he began what was to prove to be a very successful career in the textile supply industry, starting with Rodrik Fabrics, a drapery fabric business located in Chicago's famous Merchandise Mart building.[2] He later opened a fabric print plant building on the North Side.[2]

The Rodhams had three children: Hillary (born 1947), Hugh (born 1950), and Tony (born 1954). In 1950, they moved to the more affluent Chicago suburb of Park Ridge, Illinois.[2] The family still maintained ties to Scranton; all three children were christened there, and they spent summers at a cottage overlooking Lake Winola located in Overfield Township, Pennsylvania in the nearby Pocono Mountains,[4][2] that he and his father had built themselves in 1921.[5]"

Is this what you call a "modest" background?

"Think of the most depressed day you every had. How would you feel if someone came along and told you that you were just being bitter and that they things you were clinging to were not really valid or were like a life raft losing air in a choppy sea?"

Obama didn't say "just being bitter." Where do you get this dismissive condescension? He's offering an explanation. You may or may not agree with that explanation, but I don't see where you're getting that he's trying to say anything is invalid.

He even said that it's perfectly understandable and in fact, human to respond thus.

Perhaps you should take a step back?