it's just the beginning of Obama's campaign.

Note to McSame and GOP rethugs, swiftboaters:  Obama is one tough candidate. You'll have a high wall to climb..in the end you'll accept defeat.

Note to wavering Dems super-delegates: this Obama 'small town' flap should end your timidity. Obama has proved himself the strongest candidate. Just view the standing ovation he received in Indiana.

People are angry, and bitter. He's in touch.

Well, "You can't vote for war and disown the results"

If a weird partial post shows up it's because I have a heckuva time typing on this laptop.  I'm always hitting something I didn't mean to!

Anyway, this reminds me of the way Dean's comment about Confederate flags and pickup trucks was twisted.  What Dean meant was that we all want the same basic things, and we can't ignore people who don't live as we do.

Obama was only expressing his understanding of how people got so disenchanted with the political process.  As usual  his opponents and the MSM (and Lou Dobbs) cherry-picked the parts of his comments that they could turn against him.

I wasn't at all surprised that Hillary jumped on it.  She's desperate, and especially so since Bill reanimated the Bosnia flap.

I'm really happy to see that the verdict from everybody on CNN -- the obvious exception being uber-xenophobe Lou Dobbs -- was that Obama was 100% correct.  If he can get allies like Cafferty and Toobin on this, this has the potential to be turned into a big positive.  He needs to slam McCain and Clinton the way he did in that clip, over and over again.

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to you country.

Didn't he read the handbook? He's required to call people "single-issue" voters and say that all Americans are happy at all times.

I like the 100 million dollar woman and John "I have 7 houses" McCain claiming a guy who worked with folks on the southeast side  of Chicago (a place where the mills and plants were shut down) is out of touch.

Marrying money and working for Walmart are clearly better ways of getting to know people.

That the Clinton campaign and her allies in the media (yes, her allies in the media) have called this a gaffe is only a show of how pitifully but willfully out of touch Clinton is out of touch. Will she get any mileage out of this? The true believers who already celebrate Clinton will latch onto this, but who else does this kind of bizarro world claim that everybody's happy in Pennsylvania reminds me of that old Buzzcocks song, and not in a nice way, either.

OT: I seem not to be able to get any of the comments sections over at TalkLeft. (I go there to keep my eye on when the mass suicides will begin.) This all seemed to have happened when I countered Jeralyn's claim that there was proof of Obama's anti-semitism because a fundraiser for Obama was held by a Muslim with all that money Bill Clinton just got for that oil deal he "brokered." Then again, maybe it's my computer. Last week The Left Coaster just disappeared on me for a few days.

Watching this unfold on MSNBC last night, Hubby and I rolled our eyes at each other wondering why Obama was being attacked for speaking the truth. We're bitter and pissed off and we don't even live in PA. Later, when HRC did her little speech about how optimistic people are, we burst out laughing.

OT but worth a look.

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-trade12apr12,0,5178534.story

This is an MSM look at Hillary's amazing shift away from Free Trade in the last little while. This is worth reading and even more spreading around. It's Clinton's and McCain's shared Achilles Heel. As for the small town stuff, Obama will use it to connect with these people. Watch, he's already started.

Of course Johnny Assrocket thinks Obama is done.  He thinks everyone in the world is entitled to his own opinion.

After all, those guys at Powerline have been so terribly right on the electorate since 2006.

Thanks, NYT for burying the voices of PA in defense of Obama; these come at the end of the second page of Clinton Seizes on Obama Remarks to Question His Appeal to Working Class:

 But J. Richard Gray, the mayor of Lancaster and an Obama supporter, said that this is not what Mr. Obama meant. In his view, Mr. Obama was trying to say that Republicans take emotional matters like guns and religion and try to use them to divide people.

"I don't think he's demeaning religion or guns," Mr. Gray said. "He's saying the use of those issues as wedge issues plays on the bitterness that people have and diverts attention from the real economic issues, like the disparity between the wage earner and the rich."

Mr. Gray also said Mr. Obama was right that voters are bitter, although he said he would have used the word angry. He pointed to a recent poll that found 81 percent of voters believe the country is on the wrong track. He said that Mrs. Clinton sounded like "a Pollyanna" in saying that workers were optimistic. "I don't know who she's been talking to," Mr. Gray said.

Ed Mitchell, a Democratic consultant in Wilkes-Barre who supports Mr. Obama, said that while he did not agree with the comments, he still supported Mr. Obama because of his vision.

"I'm a Pennsylvanian and an Obama supporter, but I don't share those sentiments," Mr. Mitchell said. "I think he's right that voters are frustrated, but I don't think they seek refuge in anything so much as they want leadership and change. That's why I support him. I think he offers that best."

Justin Taylor, 30, the mayor of Carbondale, Pa., has not declared a preference for president. But he said he was leaning toward Mr. Obama and his remarks about small-town voters would not dissuade him. "People are bitter and at the end of their rope," he said. Referring to Mr. Obama's comments, he said, "I don't believe it is a problem."