LilyRose wrote: "People voted for George W. b/c he felt their pain, they could imagine having a beer with him, and he looked NASCAR-y in his jeans and t-shirt. HOW DID THAT VOTE WORK OUT FOR THOSE LOVELY PEOPLE?"

LilyRose, you most likely never read Joe McGinnis' exceptional 1968 book "The Selling Of A President". You should; it might assuage some of that whining you're doing.

>>"Did that beer and empathy pave the way wonderfully for a chance to pay $4.00 for gas, have 4,800 soldiers dead, 1,000,0000 Iraqis dead and displaced, etc.?"

George W, Bush will have to answer for himself for his blunders, mistakes, missteps and errors; how you're trying to corrolate any of that to either Barack or Hillary escapes me, though.

>>"Bill Clinton was a LOUSY president. His disastrous foreign policy led directly to 9/11. He failed to intervene in Afghanistan after Kabul fell; he failed to intervene in East Africa after the embassy bombings there; he failed to intervene when there were credible intelligence about cells in America. HE WAS A LAME DUCK PRESIDENT FOR MOST OF HIS SECOND TERM."

>>sigh<< Nice reads from the "Karl Rove Playbook" there, LilyRose. Sorry you missed the boom economic times under Bill Clinton that I and millions of others enjoyed. He left office with a huge surplus in place and America not embroiled in a false war. Dubya was apprised of Bin Laden's imminent plans...and did absolutely nothing to prevent it. Again, place the blame where it belongs: at Dubya's dirty little paws. As for being a "lame duck Prez during his second term", your hero Republican henchmen were the proximate cause of making a federal case out of nothing against Bill Clinton. Those same Republicans were more interested in taking Clinton down than lifting America and her people up.

>>"His wife is a opportunist, a neo-con sympathizer (Bill Clinton worked with neo-cons in 2000 to force Arafat to accept a joke of a peace treaty, which resulted in the 2nd Intifada), and one of the most corrupt politicians in the U.S. history."

Your ignorance is exceded only by your hubris. Being able to work with all sides is a sign of a true diplomat; being unable to compromise and work for detente...as you espouse...makes you dogmatic and inflexible. Bush and the Republicans never learned to work with Democrats; they only will accept their version and view of things. I certainly prefer a President and Senator who can and will work with Republicans to the benefit of the American people; Bill and Hillary have done so and continue to do so.

>>"But of course if Bill says that he feels people's pain and speaks with a Southern accent, then he must be the great president material."

Save your snide, derogatory and racist remarks about Southerners; we all can read between the lines of your original screed to see your prejudice.

Dee Davis makes a good point in saying that the Democratic party has neglected populations like Appalachian blue collar workers. But it seems to me there are some gaps in the logic. If the cause of the disaffection is neglect from the Dem party and economic distress that has been ignored, it doesn't explain the differential between Clinton and Obama. The Clintons are the more obvious authors of the Democratic neglect in recent decades.

The mistake made is thinking that the gun issue is black and white - pro or anti gun.

Now, I am pro gun control. I believe anyone who is buying a gun needs to be vetted in much the same way that anybody who buys a car needs vetting.

Responsible gun ownership is not a problem and not really much of an issue, about 90% of America's gun ownership is perfectly fine and should be allowed to own guns.

The issue comes in with those 10% who are insane or just plain dumbasses. Some movement towards making sure they don't get their hands on guns is not unwelcome.

Operation chaos much?

Bill was a fairly good president with a solid foreign policy, his economy was strong enough to withstand eight years of America being run by a monkey and America's standing under Clinton improved. He is still welcomed as a statesman in the rest of the world.

It would be a mistake to write Bill's ability off simply because of the recent campaign, where he has been cast as a villain.

Note that I am not saying vote Hillary because of this, Bill and Hillary are very different people with very different views. A vote for one is not a vote for the other and Hillary is a strong character in her own right - if she were to win the primary Bill would offer advice, but Hillary would be the president.

The thinly veiled, veiled . . . but thinly, elitism of this article was barely tolerable, until, that is, I read the reference to Appalachian people described as "Hairy Ainu." If the author does not perceive her piece to be elitist, then the author is all the more so and thus not qualified to comment on such matters.

Some definitions: Ainu are an aboriginal Japanese group, and perhaps we could forgive the author for finding another way to refer to these mountain folk as having been there a very long time. But "hairy" is just plain tacky rudeness and indicative of the failure of the new Democrats to grasp their own roots. Calling people names is just weak (even if it's feebly disguised as something someone else might say).

The writer is no different from the people she references (but fails to adequately critique) who, in the rush to find excuses for why Hillary performed better, malign the personal worth of the voters who voted against Obama. How profoundly undemocratic and un-liberal and un-gracious. A true shame.

There are two policy areas where Obama is much better than McCain. One is the export of manufacturing jobs and the other is energy policy, spelled 'lower gas prices' .

There are good reasons to give tax breaks to companies that keep manufacturing plants here in America. Millions of those $12-$15 per hour jobs are being shipped overseas. Barack Obama and most Democrats support this policy. Most Republicans do not.

On energy policy Barack Obama is black and white (parents) and green all over. He wants to develope solar and wind power in big ways. He wants much more fuel-efficient cars than most Republicans. He is well aware that global warming is a real threat to this planet. McCain is just waking up to this fact and the Republican party is snoring.

There is one sleeper issue in this election. It is silver spoon versus wooden spoon.

Obama grew up with a measure of poverty when compared to the privileged McCain. When a child of poverty gets his chance at the American dream as Obama did, he applies himself. Obama was elected by his peers to President of the Harvard Law Review. When McCain was appointed to the United States Naval Academy through the influence of four star Admiral father, he graduated 894th out of 898 midshipmen.

We are told that people can change. But McCain is still 'weak' in economics. He could be informed on economics if he cared about the economy's impact on others.

FDR reached out to these mountain people with programs that directly affected them. Barack Obama is cut from this same cloth of caring and of doing for others.