Obama aims for pro-gun vote By CARRIE BUDOFF BROWN | 4/5/08 4:42 PM EST
PBarack Obama did not hunt or fish as a child. He lives in a big city. And as an Illinois state legislator and a U.S. senator, he consistently backed gun control legislation.
But he is nevertheless making a play for pro-gun voters in rural Pennsylvania.
By highlighting his background in constitutional law and downplaying his voting record, Obama is engaging in a quiet but targeted drive to win over an important constituency that on the surface might seem hostile to his views.
The need to craft a strategy aimed at pro-gun voters underscores the potency of the issue in Pennsylvania, which claims one of the nation’s highest per capita membership rates in the National Rifle Association.
It also could provide clues as to whether Obama, as one of the Senate’s more liberal members, can position himself as an acceptable choice to a conservative-minded demographic in later primary contests and in the general election.
“Guns are a cultural lens through which they view candidates,” said Jim Kessler, vice president for policy at Third Way, a progressive think tank. “If you are seen as way off on that issue, then you seem way off on everything. If you are seen as OK, if the lens is clearer, then they continue to look at you and size you up on other things.”
“For Obama, who is less known and is from Chicago, a city guy and an African American, the feeling is that he is anti-gun,” Kessler continued. “By handling the Second Amendment correctly, he starts to get a hearing among these folks.”
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rickrack Location: Sullivan, Sullivan Party: Independent Reply #1 Date: Apr. 5, 2008 - 4:52 PM EST
I'll tell this SOB one thing. He can take his Sharia Laws, his America Hating Wife, his so called Church and Preacher, Farrakhan and the Black panthers and go to Africa. He or they are not welcome in our Country. If he held the Gun to my head, I would die before Voting or even shaking his hand. He must think every white man is a coward. Some of you had better wake up. You heard, you saw, and now you want him for President?
hd rider