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Barack Obama, working-class hero?
On a bus tour through Pennsylvania, Obama tries to impress blue-collar white voters. He'll need them to keep the state close in April -- or to win it in November.
By Mike Madden [2008-03-31]

  • About the working class

    Are any of the presidential candidates working class? No.

    There was at least one in the starting field that did grow up working class and had actual issues paying for college (Edwards) but most people didn't believe that he cared about the working class because he became a trial attorney, made lots of money and, oh, yeah, had good hair and a nice smile. Therefore, he had to be a phoney. But, the people who grew up in more comfortable circumstances, they might actually care. Look, all of them are politicians. Perhaps we should just drop the pretence. People like who they like and they will believe what they want to believe. And disparage the candidate they are not supporting.

    Also, the comment about going to Wellesley and Yale and being working class, well, yes, Hillary wasn't and isn't working class. But, I went to Wellesley. I met lots of different people there. I'm sorry to break it to you, but I actually did run into people who were - shock, horror, - working class - at Wellesley. Certainly, people who are not middle class or wealthy are not as well-represented as they should be, because it's damned expensive. But, to decide that the working class just doesn't ever go there...ridiculous.

    The bus tour that Obama is on is no different than what other candidates do. So far, he seems to be doing OK. Certainly, there's no major gaffe on the level of the GHW Bush going into the grocery store and not knowing that scanners existed. What people ask is that the candidates attempt to see what their lives are like and that they listen to them talk about their problems. They don't ask that the candidates actually become one of them - although there is the dangerous idea that we should want to have a beer with our president. I like to think the problem has been that they felt that the last two Democratic candidates were SO unapproachable that they didn't even feel that Gore or Kerry could attempt to understand, because they could not unbend, at all. Gore can, now, but he's not running for anything.

    -- SueNJ97
    [Read SueNJ97's other letters]
    Monday, March 31, 2008 09:34 AM
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