At Least Obama's an Honest Elitist

The Democratic presidential contest in Pennsylvania is coming down to this question: Who's the elitist -- Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton?

Obama, having weathered the racist rantings of his preacher, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, now is taking fire for posing the theory that small town Americans cling to their guns and churches out of frustration with their miserable lives.

Clinton pounced, as you would expect her to, saying the remarks confirm that Obama is out of touch with the common man.

She's right. There's something effete about Obama -- did you see him try to bowl? -- and despite his experience as a neighborhood organizer in Chicago, you get the feeling that the Harvard-trained lawyer never got his hands dirty in that job or any other.

But Clinton is as much an elitist as Obama. She just workers harder to hide it.

The New York senator has seldom looked more ridiculous than she did throwing back a whiskey shot in a lunch bucket bar to emphasize the differences between her and Obama.

Or as she recalled fondly for her drinking buddies how her father took her behind the family's summer cottage -- the one her grandfather built by hand; the one that didn't have heat or hot water -- to teach her how to shoot a gun.

That sounded like another Clinton fairy tale. Does the Wellesley feminist really make a habit of belting back cheap hooch with the boys before firing off a few rounds?

Was she channeling John Kerry trying to buy himself a hunting license?

Neither Clinton nor Obama have any idea what it's like to be an average American. The breed is a curiosity to both of them.

But at least Obama isn't trying to reinvent himself into the common man.

And that may give him an edge on Clinton. Voters are looking for candidates who are genuine, not necessarily ones who pull on flannel shirts and work boots and belly up to the bar.

Obama is an elitist who doesn't pretend otherwise. Clinton is an elitist who has pretended to be so many different things that even she can't tell which one's the real deal.

Posted by Nolan Finley on Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 4:06 PM