By Pamela Gentry, Senior Political Producer

Posted April 14, 2008 – Would you call someone “elitist” who was raised by his single mother and maternal grandparents, financed his education with student loans and earned less than a plumber, carpenter or machinist, despite having a law degree?
 
Well, that’s the label that multi-millionaire Sen. Hillary Clinton has slapped on her challenger, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), following his untimely comments on the campaign trail about the “bitter” feelings that many small-town Americans have because of the failings of government. Truth is, Clinton’s upbringing – former president of the Rockefeller Republican-oriented Wellesley College Young Republicans and a partner with the prestigious Rose Law Firm of Arkansas – is closer to that of an elitist than Obama’s. But after throwing back a shot of whiskey and chugging a beer, she’s attempting to convince Pennsylvania blue-collar voters that she’s their candidate.
 
Will working-class folks in the upcoming primary states fall for this? 
 
Obama’s misstep may be just the opening the Clinton camp needs to slow Obama’s roll.   Clinton understands that she needs controversies such as this to keep her bid for the nomination alive.  
 
Obama has acknowledged that his words, delivered to a group at a San Francisco fundraiser, were poorly chosen when he said that Americans in small towns cling to “guns, religion or antipathy or to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustration.” The comments were first reported and published by The Huffington Post.

During a rally in Indiana on Saturday, Obama acknowledged that he did not “say it as well as I should have.” He also stuck by the intent of his comments at Messiah College in Grahthan, Pa., which hosted the “Compassion Forum,” Sunday.  Obama said that what has left people bitter is the absence of “any confidence that the government is listening to them.”  That goes for small towns as well as in urban areas and other states, including his home state of Illinois, he said.