Or as he calls it, "bittergate":
1. As one Democrat who opposes Obama points out, "elitist comments like these are like catnip for the GOP." It's not reality that drives these characterizations, it's perceptions. Without putting too fine a point on it, nothing energizes the conservative political machine more than the scent of liberal elitism. Think of John Kerry and windsurfing; John Kerry and dirty jokes at his fundraisers; and then the pivots to simplistic morality plays by Republicans.
2. But Obama is not John Kerry; he is not Michael Dukakis. 2008 is not 2004. Obama is certainly much more comfortable in his skin, more confident, more "agile," as one observer put it. "Let's see him fight his way out of this one."3. It's going to be a helluva fight. The onus is on Obama to figure out how to explain his elitist-sounding comments, stand by them, and not come off as condescending, elitist-sounding, Dukakis-esque or patronizing. His campaign faces its biggest political test since Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Can he pass it?
4. Is this the moment where 80% of the remaining superdelegates switch to HRC? I doubt it.... but once again, this controversy is not one ginned up by Clinton. So you can't blame her for it.
I'm in the tank for Obama, but let me go out on a limb and make a prediction anyway: this "controversy" is going to allow him to close the gap with Clinton in Pennsylvania between now and election day. This is the pivot point that reframes the debate in a way that dramatically favors his campaign. If the Wright controversy didn't convince the Supers that Obama can push back attacks coming from the combined forces of Clinton and McCain, this certainly will. Looking back on this a month from now, this will be the moment people declared "game, set, match."
Meanwhile, for some perspective, Ezra:
It's worth saying that I'm not defending Obama here. I see nothing that he needs defense from. There's no actual attack being levied that anyone can rebut, or ideas being tossed out that anyone can argue. Instead, Obama has said something Politically Damaging. And it will Damage him. And we'll all watch to see how badly.
But let's be clear: It's not damaging because we think it foretells him doing something harmful to the country. It's not damaging because it suggests his policy agenda is poorly conceived, or his priorities are awry. If you think of policy and politics as two circles in a Venn diagram, this is damage that only exists in the politics circle, and doesn't even come close to the area of intersection. We reporters have to cover it, of course, because it's Really Important, and matters more than the housing plans of all the candidates put together. But it matters in a completely self-referential way, it matters only because it matters, not because it means anything about Obama, or illuminates anything about his potential presidency. It's a hollow scandal. Those housing plans, by contrast, don't "matter" in a way that convinces the media to cover them, or to relentlessly hound McCain about the inadequacy of his proposal. They don't "matter," but they are meaningful. And this is why I don't like writing about the campaign. It's full of hollow scandals and ignored travesties. But you have to cover the hollow scandals, because they're are blown up until they're definitional in the campaign. And that leaves me writing about high-profile non-events in a way that helps cement their importance, even if I'm writing to deride their legitimacy.If you're ever interested in really getting to the bottom of what's wrong with political journalism, incidentally, spend some time thinking about the fact that most of its leading practitioners came up through campaign reporting, and writing about verbal gaffes and off-the-cuff comments is what they trained to do. The tone of political journalism is set by people who are thrilled -- on a professional level -- that Obama said this thing, and now we can cover this story.
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