If a segment of our society chooses to isolate itself and retain a mode of living and thought that refelects an earlier century rather than joining the 21st, theirs is the "rural" problem, not the candidate's.

Now if the candidate makes false promises or feigns to mimic the habits and preferences of the rural folks, that candidate may "earn" a few votes, but his/hers pandering will not likely make the difference in an election, and the rurals will not change nor gain any benefit anyway even if the clever candidate wins the election.

Hillary's campaign appeals relatively more to the folks in West Virginia and Kentucky because Obama seems so much like a foreigner to them. Obama can do very little about that. He can not turn himself into a follower of fundamentalist "Christian" fanatics, nor acquire an arsenal of guns, nor act like an uneducated "rube" in faking an imitation of the rurals, nor certainly change the color of his skin if he is to avoid an obvious fakery in the election.

Check out John McCain. He is acting like a loose cannon

saying anything to anybody and committing multiple reverses and outrageous panderings to appeal to anyone who happens to be standing in front of his face. It's a disaster that only a neocon convinced of his invulnerability would try.

Worse, observe the failure of the Republican Party since the election of Ronald Reagan, with its fake appeals to racism and resorting to bottom feeding in order to "win the south". They have had a temporary victory, true, but the south has finally begun to join the 21st century as the older post-slavery generation has died off, and the population mix has changed with time.

So don't lay the "rural" problem at the feet of Obama. His integrity means far more than a few votes.

He is as foreign to these isolated and insular people as a kazhak tribesman in robes riding on a camel would be if one should dare show his face in that region. He's not one of "us"; the obvious, but maybe whispered fact that he's Black, and he's a Muslim, ye know? And what kind of American doesn't hold his hand over his heart when he's saying the pledge and he doesn't wear a flag pin to boot. And was sworn in on the Koran.

Why are you going over the obvious again. It has been hashed and rehashed...enough already.

This article, like so many others, is trying to convince us that this small portion of the voting public will determine the outcome of the election. I hate to be the one to break this to you, but no. Demographics show that Barack can (and likely will) win without significant support from blue-collar, lower-educated whites. (I find the term "uneducated" offensive, everyone knows something even if they didn't learn it from books.)

The one group being left out here is the Hispanic vote. Now Mexicans are likely not to vote for Obama, for much the same reason as poor whites (prejudice). But South Americans, Puerto Ricans, and Dominicans will probably flock to him in droves (populist, everyman message). Cubans are up in the air, but if they move to him, Barack wins FL, poor whites be damned.

Now I don't know what Hispanics will do, but in the last few weeks Hispanic leaders have been making pro-Barack comments. And that can only bode well.

At the end of the day, what poor whites are finding hard to believe is that their voice may not matter on election day. Fortunately for them, Barack does not appear to be as ruthless as the Clintons when it comes to payback.

Word.

I was born and raised in Prestonsburg, Ky--a true native Appalachian--and can say that I have seen the same fate meted out to fellow Appalachians that has been meted out to Kerry and Obama based solely on educational level.

It's not held against you that you go to school, get a degree or even an advanced degree, but you must go out believing exactly as you did going in, or else you've committed the sin of "getting above your raising" and obviously have a weak spine and no sense of self.

Obama speaks from a place of education, and Clinton speaks from the gut. She speaks in terms of conventional wisdom, while Obama is brimming with statistics and the psychology of American classes.

Having grown up in Arkansas, Clinton instinctively knows how to put forth an educated opinion that still resonates with her roots, while Obama, having grown up all over the world, is essentially rootless--a thing of utmost suspicion to any Appalachian.

It is a fine, fine line--and one that is poorly understood unless you are from a rural area. The Democratic candidate fails to see how the Appalachian can't see that helping across socioeconomic lines brings everyone up, but the clannishness of your average Appalachian instinctively refuses that argument.

Until you can look at the area and understand the self-defeating ways that we have been availed to so much welfare, but remained so impoverished, you'll never understand how to sell a candidate here.

This is an area of fatalism, and you can't sow the seeds of hope like you can elsewhere.

I really don't care why poor whites don't like Barack, but I am sick and tired of these people in rural areas forcing their value system on me via national elections. I am throughly sick and tired of welfare and job benefits that go to these areas (because they are among the most poor in the country) out of my paycheck. And then these same people get on tv and call me all sorts of names because I believe in a woman's right to choose, gays should be allowed to marry and guns should be registered and controlled.

If rural America wants respect, it might start giving some and not assuming that they have the direct pipeling to heaven and God's will which makes them morally superior. Poor white people are not better than me because they have "simple" lifestyles. They are just poorer than me.

This is not a rant against individuals, but it is a rant against the groupthink mentality that poor whites seem to have that makes them the center of the universe. You are really not that important to me and my life and I wish you would stop trying to be. I don't care what you do in your corner of the world, but when that spills onto the national scene and i end up with 8 years of an idiot because poor whites wanted someone who reflected their values, then it's time to pull the plug on you.

Poor whites will be marginalized this election cycle because the rest of us have seen what happens when they get their "man". And if this offended you in some way, too bad. I'm tired of the bitching and moaning.