Some More Reactions to the "Bitter" Comments

First locally -

From the Huffington Post:

The Clinton and Obama campaigns clearly have one thing in common in the wake of Barack Obama's "bitter" remarks: both sides believe the incident provides their candidates with the means to go on the offensive, with Clinton working to paint Obama as "elitist" and Obama seeking to demonstrate that he is "in touch" with the needs of working-class America. It is, of course, too early to assess what lasting impact this story is going to have on the race, but the way the audience at the Alliance For American Manufacturing forum in Pittsburgh received the candidates, and reacted to the issue, will be heartening for the Obama camp. Obama, who greeted the crowd at 8:45am, raised the issue and received applause. Clinton, addressing the same crowd later in the morning, brought up the remarks and received mostly silence, with a few audible impatient jeers.[emphasis added.]

The Huffington Post has video.

The story made it onto the Washington Post website, too:

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!"Obama had spoken earlier to this audience, and the loud applause he received suggested some of the people who didn't like Clinton's tone supported the Illinois senator. But Obama had not been jeered earlier in the day when he slammed Clinton, and the New York senator was applauded loudly for much of her speech, as she laid out her agenda to protect manufacturing jobs.

The AP runs down the issue, too:

Yes, some Democrats in Pennsylvania's Rust Belt communities were upset by Barack Obama's suggestion that voters there "cling to guns or religion" because of bitterness about their economic lot. But many more seem to think it was no big deal _ and if there's a problem it's with the political slapfest that has followed.

Then, writing of more broader issues, there's John Nichols of The Nation, in a blog-piece called "Obama 'Get's It' on Trade":

After taking hits from Democratic primary foe Hillary Clinton and presumptive Republican presidential nominee John McCain for suggesting, somewhat clumsily, that Americans who are suffering economically may turn "bitter," Barack Obama has come back with a speech that goes to the heart of the current crisis.

Speaking on trade policy to the Alliance for American Manufacturing today in Pittsburgh this morning, the Illinois senator said what he has been needing to say for more than a month: He understands that America needs a new approach to trade -- an approach that breaks with those of the Bush and Clinton administrations -- if this country is going to begin to address its many economic challenges.

Nichols writes:

The rhetoric -- especially Clinton's remake of herself as a populist champion of fair-trade responses that she opposed as the first lady, a senate candidate and a senator -- is designed to suggest that Obama is not in tune with workers who have seen their jobs, their industries and their communities devastated by trade policies that favored Wall Street over Main Street.

Meanwhile, John McCain is still a conservative:

The independent label sticks to John McCain because he antagonizes fellow Republicans and likes to work with Democrats.

But a different label applies to his actual record: conservative.

The likely Republican presidential nominee is much more conservative than voters appear to realize. McCain leans to the right on issue after issue, not just on the Iraq war but also on abortion, gay rights, gun control and other issues that matter to his party's social conservatives.

Morning, Pittsburgh