Keep digging, Barack

Obama entrenches his position:

At a campaign stop last night in Terre Haute, Ind., Mr. Obama addressed the San Francisco remarks, but repeated their essence and tried to turn the furor into a basis for criticizing the other two candidates' stances on economic issues.
"Look, they're frustrated. And for good reason. Because for the last 25 years, they've seen jobs shipped overseas, they've seen their economies collapse," Mr. Obama said.
"Of course they're bitter and of course they're frustrated. You would be too ... the same thing is happening all across the country," he said, noting that people then don't vote on economic issues because they don't expect anybody is going to help them. And so they end up voting on issues like guns ... on issues like gay marriage and they take refuge in their faith."

Translation: "I've got a Harvard Law degree. I can talk my way out of anything."

The Clinton campaign's not buying it:

Spokesman Phil Singer criticized Mr. Obama over the Indiana speech because "instead of apologizing for offending small-town America, Senator Obama chose to repeat and embrace the comments he made earlier this week."

BTW, notice that Obama says that all this economic woe took place during "the last 25 years" -- i.e., during the Reagan administration. In fact, the de-industrialization of the Rust Belt began during the recession-plagued 1970s. But as a Democrat, Obama doesn't want to remind anyone about Jimmy Carter.

UPDATE: Ed Morrisey:

When Barack Obama started his run for the presidency in January 2007 . . . I warned Democrats not to take the risk of placing their bets on a candidate that had not had to fight a national campaign against a real opponent. . . .

What makes this so breathtaking is the mindless, casual way in which Obama reveals his snobbishness and elitism. . . .

At times, we have remarked that Obama only really performs well with a script. Once he has to speak extemporaneously, not only does he fare worse as an orator, but he tends to get lost and make unforced errors. It’s hard to imagine one worse than this. It’s all the worse because it’s not a gaffe in the normal sense, but a revealing moment that shows how Obama really views Americans.

Instapundit says:

"Let's have a national dialogue about egghead condescension!" It's got to work better for Obama than the dialogue about race has . . .

Insty also links that firebrand populist from the Heartland, John Podhoretz:

Barack Obama has done what Democratic candidates for president invariably do -- he has revealed the profound sense of unearned superiority that is the sad and persistent hallmark of contemporary liberalism. . . .

It drips with an attitude so important to the spiritual well-being of the American liberal — the paternalistic attitude that says, “Oh, well, people only do thing differently from me because they are ignorant and superstitious and backward” — that it has survived and thrived despite the suicidal impact it has had on the achievement of liberal political goals and aims.

If any Obama supporter thinks this story is going to disappear harmlessly, think again. The fact that the story broke Friday afternoon guarantees it will continue to generate coverage in Sunday's newspapers, and will be talked about on "Meet the Press" and other Sunday-morning shows. Then it will be discussed Monday on morning drive-time radio, then Rush Limbaugh and other talk-radio hosts get their turn. That means it's at least a three- or four-day story.

Whatever Obama had planned to be his "message" for the weekend just got trashed, and next week's campaign themes will also be buried beneath the media noise caused by this gaffe. Hillary's got to be loving this.

PREVIOUSLY:

4/11: Obama busted by blogs

4/11: Obama trashes small-town America