Bitter pills--good medicine, superdelegate moves and polls

Obama stepped in it with our sound-bite fixation and yet as this plays out the bitter pill just might be good medicine. Naturally I am talking about the bitter comment that Obama used to characterize small-town America as to clinging to religion and guns as [wedge issues] in the face of politics, Washington and society passing them by with lost jobs and services. Look, I have lived in small town America, actually Wisconsin where 17 miles of corn and cabbage fields separated Burlington WI from the Interstate. It was some 40 miles from Milwaukee and 40 miles from Chicago's suburban metropolitan area where it was hundred's of miles from those realities. Small town America is full of bias, prejudice, mis-trust, conspiracy theories, superstitions and misinformation and political manipulation. Harsh and often insulting our family was subject to much bias because we came from Illinois, that we also had jobs outside the area, we thought or talked differently, but more than anything else, we didn't come from there and thus we weren't known or trusted. Ironically many of their children with abilities and vision would move away into more cosmopolitan areas, which had a deteriorating effect in that they were usually the best of their lot, leaving behind those who lacked the courage and ability to compete in the big city.

Yes, Obama kicked over the hornet's nest, but it is also good medicine. It takes out the proverbial holster the underlying threat of Clinton and McCain using these wedge issues and forces some in small town America to wake up out of their prejudices and start voting their real interest. Sure there will be many who will vote for their fear, their mistrust, clinging to some idea that burying their collective heads into the past will provide them salvation and relief. But I think both will not only overplay their hands but most will see through this bull hockey pucks and move to Obama's credibility. The elitist thing will not stick, for Obama is not an elitist, nor did he come from class.Well I was away from the blog since Thursday and the superdelegates did move, mostly for Clinton, but then again Obama continued to mass more. As it stands Clinton's hard count is now 249 (picking up a net 4), picking up Sophie Masloff (DNC-PA), Ronald Donatucci (DNC-PA), William Burga (DNC-OH) and Jackie Speier (DNC-CA) from Friday to Sunday. Obama picked up Wayne Holland (DNC-UT) on Friday and Nancy Martin (DNC-MN) today leaving one more from Minnesota's delegation to commit bringing his hard count total to 223. Politico.com has Clinton at 250 and Obama at 226.

Remember, Obama has undeclared superdelegates like President Jimmy Carter who repeated his assertion that all his family and locale support Obama and one can discern how he is going to vote at the convention. Others of note are Senator Harkin who has stated he will support Obama if he wins the pledged delegate count and further there are the 8 NC' delegates who state they are going to declare for Obama.

• The PA polls remain all over the place: ARG has another one of those outliers with Clinton coming out with a 20 point lead while Temple U has the contest tied at 47% and Zogby within 4 points. Pollster's graph of the composite polls has the lines converging one week before the primary.