The American Spectator

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Audacious Elitism

4.15.08 @ 12:01AM

BITTER, INDEED
Re: Philip Klein's The Obama States of America:

If Barack Obama is a uniter, then Bill Clinton is an honest man and one who never cheated on his wife.
-- C. Kenna Amos
Princeton, West Virginia

All Obama is doing is repeating the scuttlebutt that has gone around liberal circles for decades. The people in flyover country don't have their own minds. They're all frustrated and jealous of the sophisticated people who go to Harvard and Stanford. Religion is just a crutch. Guns are a release of latent psychopathy. Every network newscaster thinks the same thing. My all-time favorite was Katie Couric on the morning of John Kerry's defeat, turning to her co-host and saying, "Who are these voters??" She still doesn't know -- and neither does Obama.
-- William Tucker
Nyack, New York

Having grown up in a western Pennsylvania small town, I don't think that many of my friends and neighbors were bitter except when the government in Harrisburg took more of their money for the infrastructures of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh and let our roads continue to decay. And yes I'm sure that there may be more guns than people in that town. And yes, most everyone attends a church on Sunday. But they are churches that fly an American flag on the altar. With the news now that Mr. Obama's pastor will receive some type of achievement award from the NAACP, he is clearly defined as the "black candidate." Just Jesse Jackson with a Harvard Law degree.
-- Tom McGonnell
Alexandria, Virginia

It is interesting to note that both Democrats speak with great compassion to us about the tough economic times. That we the people work so hard and yet fall further behind in each year of a Republican administration. They tell us we can't afford gas; housing, medical care and education for our children.

Their solution? Take more of our money away from us by hugely increased taxes. Is there some new economic theory in there somewhere?
-- Jay Molyneaux
Denver, North Carolina

It is as if Senator Obama stood on the edge of the canyon that divides Americans and shouted to all that those having a beef with America should join him on his side of the canyon and those whom had no deep rooted dislike of America were intellectually challenged, clinging to false ideas like religion and the Constitution as substitutes for hidden disaffection. It is time for all Americans to wake up to the threat of elite out of touch Democrats.
-- Howard Lohmuller
Seabrook,Texas

"The reformer is always right about what is wrong. He is generally wrong about what is right." So goes one of my favorite quotes from G.K. Chesterton, Mr. Klein. I think I'd like to modify it, though, to reflect current political discourse, especially given the publication of Jonah Goldberg's book, Liberal Fascism, and his review of the history of progressives. "The progressive is adept at identifying the imperfections of a fallen world, but, holding a nihilistic world view, is generally clueless about how to respond, apart from exercising absolute power over others," which is pretty much, I think, what Chesterton meant.

Listen to any Democrat, especially the Presidential candidates, and you'll hear a litany of the ills and suffering of mankind to fill the Library of Congress, always followed by a statement of confidence in the state as remedy. Most Republicans understand the pernicious threat to freedom, which emanates from this simplistic viewpoint. Most Democrats do not. And so, we are berated by bombast, constantly cajoled, pressured with pontifications, and manipulated by misappropriated entreaties to entrust high political office to those consumed by faith in the unattainable and an insatiable lust for power to coerce unbelievers.

If Barack Obama is elected President of the United States, the antics of Bill Clinton will be but a fond memory. May he continue exhibiting his talent for tongue tripping in his pursuit thereof.
-- Mike Showalter
Austin, Texas

People are wasting their energy telling Obama that he's an "elitist." He already knows that, believes it, and is proud to be one. He is a U.S. Senator, you know -- one of the 100 most powerful people in the world, by gosh.

Rather, identify his remarks as what they are -- prejudice -- 99.9% fine prejudice, as befits an elitist.

It is curious that commentators, when quoting him, either pussy-foot around and write without comment the words "antipathy to people who aren't like them," or simply delete it without comment.

Contrary to Obama's opinion, we STP's are not racial bigots. The truth is that we grew up and live in a genuinely multi-ethnic state and recognize that everyone is not like us, and no-one is not like us. I'm sure that's waaaay beyond what Obama's prejudice will allow him to understand.

Obama's problem appears to be primarily that he does not know us because he never lived among us, never shared -- or even saw -- our struggles and our joys, and has not the faintest knowledge of our history. Nor has he tried to understand, instead falling back on his preconceived -- and erroneous -- notion of what we feel, why we feel it, and how we think.

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