Full-Blooded American

Obama Loses West Virginia. Such shocking news. Of course this was to be expected. This Financial Times article gives some interesting perspective on SOME West Virginian's beliefs about Senator Obama. I think this one is absolutely the cream of the crop.

Josh Fry, a 24-year-old ambulance driver from Williamson, insisted he was not racist but said he would feel more comfortable with Mr McCain, the 71-year-old Vietnam war hero, in the White House. “I want someone who is a full-blooded American as president.”

Such people seem almost impossible to reach. ABC news had a lady who insisted Obama was a Muslim; the reporter insisted that the Senator had announced he was a Christian, but the old lady said she didn't believe him. How does one deal with people with this.

Despite all this, I wish Obama had campaigned much harder in West Virginia, although I realize he would still have lost and the idea that he campaigned and lost would have been used against him. Still, I think it looks bad to appear to dismiss the state.

Update: Kathleen Parker, in her RCP column amazingly tries to justify the racist statement above as being about values not race even though nothing has been used to describe racial purity so much as "blood."

Update II: Talking Point Memo has an analysis that says Obama's problem is not a Blue Collar Problem but an Appalachian one. Check it out.