Oh please, we all know IQ is directly proportional to population density. You're too sheltered and naive to understand; all that clean air and open space is impacting your ability to reason! Now here's your "not bitter" sticker and the line to vote forms up over there. Don't worry, we've already checked the box for you -- like you know how you'll vote more than we do, ha ha!

Hillary Clinton still has....supporters? Wha?

I'm confused... surely any creature with a nonzero number of sensory input organs and even the most rudimentary cognition and reasoning capabilities would be tangibly repelled by her foul candidacy... unless perhaps they have been living far underground and are latecomers to the scene... but then again, the mole-people cannot vote, so I'm not sure they could be considered "supporters" per se...

I stay because they are at the ABSOLUTE BLEEDING EDGE of progress and social justice in my community. To hear a church that has done so much for so many progressive issues demonized by Democrats is astonishing, but that's a subject for another post. )

They are - they are in Dallas, too. They have a huge church in Oak Cliff with a very active Social Justice group. They have organized most of the peace rallys around here and were helpful in getting the Peace House in Crawford, Texas, established.

I'm not an atheist but I'm pretty anti-organized religion - and I even considered for a moment joining that church. It is one church that I know of in this country that tries to live the teachings of the New Testament.

liam - do you believe this shit? I expect this from the Republicans, but my god!

And Bill Clinton had a ghetto pass, too. I know it's been revoked by now.

Nate,

I am glad to hear that you belong to the UCC. I live in a conservative city in a red state and the UCC here is just as you described it: warm,welcoming,open, tolerant, and socially progressive. It's ministers are leaders in the ecumenical organizations here. I almost joined it myself, but decided on the Unitarian Church (the UUC) instead. Knowing what the UCC represents, though, makes the scurrilous attacks on Wright even more repulsive to me.

Thank you for your post.

Please don't shoot the magic cows!

brian

Slouch, as a FORMER "everything you said" (I was raised Fundamentalist Baptist in rural Ohio) reader who now lives the latte-drinking (ok, coffee) elitist lifestyle out in Brooklyn, all I have to say is GREAT POST. I am also BAFFLED by this entire conversation that's going on. Absolutely nothing about it makes sense to me at all. Great context and thanks for writing this.

Recommend recommend recommend.

Nate -

I am another one - rural, Pennsylvanian, white male gun owner, hunter, etc. etc. I not only don't work in a mine, I work for a small college, but as a single parent, I'm not exactly coasting these days.
I probably have significantly more education than many of my neighbors, but I'm from here, my neighbors are my friends and the people I count on, and even when I disagree with many of them I know where they're coming from.
I'm a big Obama supporter - as are many other ridgerunners I know - and Hillary can kiss my *ss.

Also stop putting words in Senator Obama's mouth. Here, in his own words, is what he actually meant.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHodpyhXFSg&feature=user

Balogna costs sixty cents a slice.

I guess I'm the last American who cares!

One of the funny things about this story, the whole "small town" thing...is that whenever some politician, or story breaks about black americans in general, or someone attempts to peg black americans in one swoop, its mums-the-word from all other communities.

I mean, I go and read a story on News Week, or CNN about "Being Black in America", or a expose into inner city communities and some of the injustices that have gone on(Sean Bell shot at 20+ times the day before his wedding..and killed.....for nothing) and nobody has a damn thing to say.

Now alot of folks got there feelings hurt in "small towns" over a comment made by Barack Obama and all hell is breaking loose.
I dont think this story deserves all the time some folks are making it out to be. *shrug*

Now that bittergate is past, I suggest a wager on when Hillary throws in the towel.

I pick right after IN & NC -- oh heck, I'll take May 13, certainly no earlier. That cuts three weeks off the contest. Whoopee.

Any takers?

Here's a nice summary by Somerby.

Did some one say elitist?

This guy has bragged about how Barbara Bush now calls him son, and we all know how in touch Barbara is with the downtrodden working class. Her visit to the displaced people in the AstroDome brought tears to my eyes.

Since Bill Clinton is now over sixty, and by his own admission, subject to becoming tired and forgetful, I though that I would help him out by putting this helpful reminder in print for him:

The Boston Globe
NATIONAL PERSPECTIVE
Clinton finds his surrogate family
Growing friendship with Bush clan pays political dividend to all

By Peter S. Canellos | April 12, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Born after his father's death, Bill Clinton has spent his life searching for connection. His need for approval was, arguably, the yearning that propelled him all the way to the White House.

Now it appears Clinton has found his surrogate family. He is part of a sprawling clan, legendary for its warmth and unity. It is a clan that is so accustomed to acquiring surrogate sons and daughters that adoption has become a part of its strength.

Clinton has become a member of the Bush clan.

Last week in Rome for the pope's funeral, the clan sat lined up in a pew: Laura, W., Dad, surrogate daughter Condoleezza, and Bill, all seeming more at ease than most families on Christmas Eve. Clinton may have looked a little out of place, like a Great Dane who thinks he belongs to a family of dachshunds, but his contented expression suggested he was exactly where he wanted to be.

Like many relationships in public life, the friendship between Bill Clinton and the Bush family is both genuine and opportunistic. At the highest levels of power, personal and political desires tend to merge: The person and the job become one.

Clinton's need to be accepted led him to speak movingly to all segments of society. Skeptics insisted that it was a ruse, intended to convince people he was someone he was not: a pure liberal to liberals, a moderate to moderates, a budget-balancing conservative to conservatives. And, politically, he was all of those things and none of them. But he was true to himself: He genuinely wanted to be respected by everyone.

Likewise, the two Bush presidents replayed their family roles on the national stage. George H. W. Bush was the genial patriarch and polite host, inviting celebrities from all walks of life to join him at the White House, at Kennebunkport, on his cigarette boat. If his friendliness seemed artificial at times, more a function of noblesse oblige than true empathy, it was all genuine to Bush: The good manners his mother taught him proved to be more deeply embedded than his politics.

George W. Bush, the family enforcer in his father's administration, relies more on loyalty than charm. He offers uncommon backing to his underlings: Bush recently draped a Presidential Medal of Freedom on the shoulders of a smiling George Tenet, the former CIA director whose overhyped intelligence briefings led the president astray. In return, Bush's underlings stay loyal to him: No presidential team has stayed as free of damaging leaks as the current one.

The with-us-or-against-us ethos carries down to the current president's supporters, a rock-solid base that lifted him to reelection in a difficult year.

Clinton's friendship with the Bushes connects with all their personal and political desires. The friendship began with Clinton and the elder Bush, two famously nice guys who happened to have been at odds in the 1992 election. Clinton's need to be forgiven for ousting the older man, and Bush's classy urge to let bygones be bygones, led them each to be very considerate of the other. Their friendship blossomed on their trip last winter to raise funds for Asian tsunami relief. They became so close that former president Bush suggested to the Houston Chronicle that ''maybe I'm the father he never had."

The current President Bush won over Clinton with demonstrations of his loyalty to the presidential club, praising his predecessor effusively while unveiling his White House portrait and helping dedicate Clinton's presidential library. Clinton repaid the debt by telling people how much he liked the president, even while many Democrats were trying to demonize him.

Now, as tends to happen in politics, the personal friendship is paying political dividends for all parties. President Bush's failure to express immediate concern for tsunami victims and his modest initial offer of aid could have been devastating to his image. But Clinton, who remains deeply popular around the world, stepped in to defend Bush and join the relief effort.

Since last year's election, Bush has made a concerted effort to woo European allies. Having Clinton in his pew at the pope's funeral in Rome did more to boost Bush's reputation overseas than a hundred bows to Jacques Chirac.

Clinton, who may be seeking to return to the White House as the president's spouse, probably senses that any viable Democrat must distance himself or herself from the Bush-hating left. What better way to demonstrate that distance than by embracing those very same Bushes?

The hug is sincere, but so is the ambition.

Peter S. Canellos is the Globe's Washington bureau chief. National Perspective is his weekly analysis of events in the capital and beyond.

Her belittling it makes it much harder for Democrats to address this problem.

Her belittling it. Is it Opposite Day?

I could kill her for that.

Like Obama, you've chosen an infelicitous way of expressing yourself. Some friendly advice: I wouldn't use that particular expression if I were you. I know it feels very cozy here at TPM, but more people read this site than comment in the threads, and they are not all your friends.

Senator Obama speaking honestly:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHodpyhXFSg&feature=user

Nate (Slouch)-- Been gone for a few days, but nice post.

And about that thread where we were talking military service, thanks for the time you did with the National Guard.