Spinning for Obama at the ...

NY Times:

How big a problem does Senator Barack Obama really have among white working-class voters? And what —if anything — can he do about it as he heads into the general election?

Those were the questions that emerged from his defeat by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton in the West Virginia Democratic primary on Tuesday, an electoral shellacking where more than half of the overwhelming white Democratic electorate said they would be unhappy if Mr. Obama was their presidential candidate this fall.

Mr. Obama took a step toward dealing with the challenge on Wednesday, as he headed out to campaign in front of working-class audiences in Macomb County, Mich., a Detroit suburb that has been identified for more than a decade with Reagan Democrats, the classic swing voter. (First stop: A Chrysler plant in Sterling Heights).

He has taken to wearing an American flag pin on his lapel and sprinkling his speeches with references to God and country, gestures to reassure Democratic voters about his values.

Mr. Obama’s advisers downplayed the West Virginia loss, describing the state as demographically unfriendly territory — the primary electorate was 95 percent white; 70 percent did not attend college — and pointing to national polls showing him in a strong position.

Mr. Obama did not spend nearly as much time campaign in West Virginia as Mrs. Clinton. And just because Democrats voted against Mr. Obama in a primary does not mean that they will flock to Senator John McCain, the likely Republican nominee, in November.

“You just can’t abstract from primary voters to general election voters — and all of her voters are going to vote for him,” said Jim Jordan, a Democratic consultant who is supporting Mr. Obama. Mr. Jordan pointed to a Washington Post/ABC News Poll published this week that showed Mr. Obama with a lead over Mr. McCain in a hypothetical fall match-up, and being competitive with him among these same working-class voters.

Still, there is a pattern of weakness that has shadowed Mr. Obama as he has marched his way toward winning his party’s nomination. Even accounting for the fact that West Virginia may have been the toughest state he has faced, the contours of Mr. Obama’s defeat were daunting: more than half of the Democrats said Mr. Obama did not share their values, and 47 percent said they would not vote for him if he were their nominee.

It is debatable just how big a problem it will be come the fall. West Virginia is hardly reflective of the nation, and the political atmosphere is tough for Republicans, as they were reminded again Tuesday night when Travis Childers, a Democrat, won Congressional election in a deeply Republican Mississippi district.

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Adam Nagourney does his best to excuse the rout of Obama, and the Mississippi defeat for the GOP is a cause of concern. But these problems are making McCain competitive in a year that he otherwise would not be. The Republicans are going to have to do a better job of making the case for the success of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. If they do not, these wars will be the Democrats' wars to lose and they are just to guys to lose them.