"Bitter" Pill to Swallow

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton accused her rival, Barack Obama, of repeating the mistakes made by their party's last two losing nominees when he described some U.S. voters as being ``bitter.'' Obama's recent suggestion that voters ``cling'' to guns or religion because they are bitter about their economic conditions was ``elitist and out of touch,'' Clinton said tonight during a forum on faith in Pennsylvania.

There would seem to be  four distinct, major problems with Obama's "cling" gaffe .

In the wake of a weekend back-and-forth between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton regarding comments he made at a San Francisco fund-raiser last week, John McCain weighed in for the first time this morning at a journalists' roundtable. "I think those comments are elitist,” he said, referring to Obama's comment that some small-town voters are bitter over the economy and, because of that, they "cling to guns and religion."

Presumptive Republican nominee Sen. John McCain's (Ariz.) campaign continued to pile on Democratic Sen. Barack Obama's (Ill.) "small-town" gaffe Monday by using the flashpoint remarks in a fundraising e-mail. Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager, urged supporters to contribute to McCain to help stop Obama and his "elitist" views from getting elected.

Criticizing Barack Obama for the fourth straight day over comments he made about Americans who live in small towns, Hillary Clinton finally encountered some resistance in person. At a forum on manufacturing attended by members of the steelworkers union here, Clinton's comment that "many of you like me were disappointed by recent remarks he made," was met by loud shouts of "No!" When she suggested Pennsylvanians might find Obama's remarks "offensive," again there were loud cries of "No!"

Bill Clinton, doing his wife no favors, again, in North Carolina:Over seven stops in North Carolina, Clinton said "Everywhere I go there are all these people with signs, saying I'm not bitter - I'm not bitter."[snip]During Clinton's seven stops in North Carolina on Saturday there were no "I'm not bitter" signs. There was a small assortment of people at his later events wearing stickers with the slogan, but many of those sporting the stickers weren't even sure what they meant.

For the third straight day, Sen. Hillary Clinton hammered Sen. Barack Obama over his comments about the frustrations of Americans who live in small towns, this time saying he reinforced negative stereotypes people have about Democrats.

A Clinton comeback was looking far-fetched. But operatives in both parties were buzzing about that possibility Saturday following the revelation that Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) told wealthy San Franciscans that small-town Pennsylvanians and Midwesterners “cling to guns or religion” because they are “bitter” about their economic status.

Here is what Sen. Obama said:"You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them...And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."What...