If that video shows up in an ad.  Or gets emailed around to a broad audience, it could be devastating.

His argument was that people were voting for HRC over him because they are bitter and clinging to God, guns, xenophobia and racism.

This may be the turning point and I suggest all Talk Left Hillary supporters keep drumming the word "elitist" and quoting Obama's arrogant contempt for 'small town America".

Why does Obama hate decent gun-owning, small town, Church-attending, people so much?

Is it because the good jobs have fled and he just doesn't like poor people?

Anyway, this issue is a win-win for Hillary and she may get the NRA endorsement.

Her list of people who love their guns, collectors, hunters, and target shooting enthusiasts is so complete, one wonders why sometimes Police Chiefs favor restrictions on guns and gun shows.

But maybe the key is: Small town residents should have NO restrictions. And cities should have some, but just those who do not say they want to target practice or hunt or shoot for pleasure.

I am not surprised that Talk Left is so enthusiastically anti-Obama's and his eltism. Especially when Hillary ties the issue so closely to our great and abiding love of guns, which has brought so much pure good to America.

I am pro small town, and cannot understand how anyone who was once a factory based economy well-paid worker could be described as frustrated over 25 years of low wage jobs.

Let's remember what he actually told that audience of privileged supporters -- not simply that Americans experiencing hard times "cling" to religion, guns, and protectionist economic policy, but, of much more consequence in the long run, that such hard times have turned them into "bitter" bigots and xenophobes -- who distrust "people who don't look like" and are typically anti-immigrant.

But is that the truth? Or simply a lefty truism? What is the reality? Has the last 40 years of economic transformation -- that has caused great suffering in many parts of the country -- really led to more bigotry and greater intolerance?

The evidence seems to indicated the opposite. In fact, there are plenty of reasons to believe that the country has become MORE tolerant, not less so.

Furthermore -- and this is VERY important -- working class people know something that more affluent Americans, because they live lives increasingly isolated from the rest of us, often don't realize; that working class people today most often live and work in MUCH MORE diverse, in terms of race and ethnicity, environments than more affluent, privileged Americans -- including the denizens of high tech enclaves on the West Coast who were undoubtedly among some of those Sen. Obama was pandering to with his remarks.

To put it more succinctly; if you are a member of a craft trade union, work on the line in manufacturing, on the docks, in construction (union or non-union), retail, food service, transportation, hospitality, etc., etc., you are MUCH more likely to have co-workers, acquaintances and friends who are African Americans and/or members of other minority groups than if you are hanging out on the Microsoft campus, in a law firm or ad agency, in publishing, in the financial services industry, or on the business side of the communications and entertainment industry.

But as a native Midwesterner now living in NYC, it doesn't surprise me in the least.  I know how an awful lot of coastal liberals feel about the heartland and small-town America.

I really thought Anglachel had the definitive take on this whole controversy:

Obama's statements today are paradigmatic of the wine-track attitude and are particularly shocking coming on the heels of his own plea that the nation not judge him harshly for his associations and pastimes, that he be allowed a complex identity that could encompass both his grandmother and his pastor. Fair enough, and an argument that elicits a certain sympathy from me on his personal behalf, though it fell far short of explaining why we should not question his political judgment based on the company he keeps. What he requires we do for him he refuses to do for others, preferring to dismiss an entire class of people in a high-handed manner. Graciously excusing them from racism and then turning around and denigrating their lives in an even more fundamental way is not going to win over a lot of hearts and minds, Barry...

They have guns because they like shooting stuff. They hold to their religion because it provides them with something they value. I may be a secular humanist myself, but as the child of a very devout father, this dismissal of faith went down sideways with me. (It also makes me want to ask, so what the f*** keeps your skinny ass in the pew of your church, given how you characterize the faith of those who do not support you?) Their identities are every bit as complex as Obama's, and as grounded in the dense fabric of their lives as what he claims for himself. It is not epiphenomenal, something to be shed when the scales fall from their eyes and they understand their role in his march to greatness.

If you go to some rural areas, where "crime" (other than spousal assault, public drunkeness, and the like) is a rarity, you will find deeply fearful people, scared out of their wits that some person (in their minds, usually one with skin darker than theirs) who is going to kick in their door in the middle of the night, take all their stuff and leave them for dead.  They'll be sleeping with a gun under their pillow, stickers on the door "Protected by Smith & Wesson" or the like, and so on.  This is taking place in areas where they roll up what sidewalks they have before 8 PM, where the loudest noise at night is either a startled dog or a train whistle, and where the kids can leave all their toys in the front yard so long that they get overgrown in weeds.  These same folks will believe that one, to live in the city, would have to be in a constant state of fear, cowering behind multiple locks and barred doors, never venturing out for longer than it takes to buy food and return.

I live in a large city.  This morning I walked the dog at 4:30 am.  I had the sidewalks to myself.  I actually have to worry far more about crossing the street around people who think stop signs are optional. I often forget to lock my front door - I haven't been broken into in well over 15 years - and that was before gentrification set in.  

The fact is, people in rural - and not so rural - communities have been sold a bill of goods by the national media, all of which was designed to put them into a quivering state of fear where the daddy state would protect them from harm in exchange for a few of their liberties.  It was "disease of the week" movies in the 70s, urban nightmare stories in the 70s and 80s, crazed crackheads and meth addicts in the 80s, rappers, darker people, immigrants and then terrorists.

All the while, the Republicans were decrying the protections the law gave ordinary people and in the next breath demanding more power for law enforcement. Driven sheeplike into quivering fear, the average person was more than willing to buy into the program.  The program was Rove-like before there was Rove - the Republicans attacked the strengths of communities by claiming those strengths were weaknesses, and their weaknesses strengths.  Intolerance and racism became "good ideas", because it was always someone who didn't look, think, act or worship like you who might do you wrong.  Seeking common ground and understanding became bad things, because the terrorists hated us for our freedoms and would use them to kill us.  Reliance on law and the legal process became a bad thing, because the Constitution only protected the guilty from "justice", "justice" of course, being synonymous with Dirty Harry wasting some DFH with his .44 mag.  Violence as a first resort became a good thing, because that way you could make sure The Other didn't get you.

This insular, closed-minded small town mindset is exacerbated in places like rural Pennsylvania (though it's not exclusive to there), where (as I've said before) the demographic is such that it is entirely possible the only A-A persons kids might see through graduating high school are being chased, tackled and cuffed, on "Cops".

And, when someone tells them they've been sold a bill of goods, how would you expect them to react?

How would you react?

And he is condescending. Does he really think the only reason people "cling" to their guns is because of bitterness? I have my guns because the Constitution gives me the right to have them and protect my family in good times and in bad times. His remarks suggest he does not appreciate the extent to which Americans will go to keep their guns or why they believe they should have them. -- It is not so they can knock over a gas station. The only reasonable conclusion anyone should take from this is Obama is reflecting a feeling that he has and some Blacks may have about "clinging" to guns and it has little to do with the Second Amendment. He never mentioned hunting because it isn't about hunting, it is about hurting people. It is about taking what they want and think they deserve. And that is why some of the rest of us keep guns, not because we're bitter, but because someone may try to harm our families and take what is ours.

He also insults Americans in "small towns" and elsewhere, who may "cling to religion." Does this tell us something about his own attitude toward religion? It raises and unmasks the question on a lot of people's minds. Is he really a Christian or did some of the Islam taught to him as a child by his father (and stepfather), during his most formidable years influence his current religious views?

And it raises another question. Does he really think people are anti-immigrant only because they are bitter about the economy or concerned more about undocumented immigrants having access to resources denied to "small town Americans," as well as all naturalized and born Americans, unfairly?

Obama has made misstatements which he is now defending. He says he knows why people are bitter. I'm annoyed at his elitism and his condescension and skewed dysfunctional understanding about Americans because the media has never adequately vetted him. Now the truth is being revealed quite by accident and it may be too late. If Obama becomes the nominee, we will all be in a lot of trouble. The real Obama has an anti-progressive-regressive-admiration for Republican governance and an elitist and privileged perspective which is not shared with most Americans. It is true Obama would be transformative - though the transformation would be in the wrong direction.

Obama defends "bitter" remarks as McCain attacks

He is implying insincerity on Hillary's part.

I disagree that Obama's only job is get votes. (Down this path lies the accusation so often aimed at Clinton, that she will do or say anything to get elected, an accusation that can be fairly -and pointlessly- aimed at any pol.) I think the underlying purpose of his campaign (of any Democrat's campaign) should be to raise the most difficult political and ethical questions and to address them in a way that creates fruitful dialogue. And, despite his occasional blunders, this is what he's doing.

Finally people are looking at this fake and calling him out.... ofcourse the msm was waiting for him to win the dem nomination and then deliver the knockout barrage, but this beat them to it.

The way this turkey speaks to his crowds of parishoners, I am not surprised on his real attitude.