I currently live in Pennsylvania, and have for many years. I have also lived in other states, so I share the understanding of how Pennsylvania could be misperceived by those who have never visited or lived in this state. Someone here on I-Report asked me today how I could vote for Obama if he said that bitter Pennsylvanians "cling to gun and religion"?
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The answer is that, there are people like that who exist in this state, and I do not take offense to Obama's statement. Obama was not speaking about all of the residents of Pennsylvania. He was speaking about the people who may choose to vote for a candidate based on only one or two issues, such as guns and religion (and they do exist here and other states as well in my opinion). Obama I believe was trying to make the point that people should vote for a candidate on the big picture. Take everything into account. Regarding religion, Sarah Palin says she goes to church regularly and you may like the church she goes to, but how do you feel about her proving to be a blatant liar during this campaign? (This of course can be debated.) Regarding guns, I know of someone (to be fair: not from this state) who said they are voting for McCain because of his stances on gun rights. I can't make this person care about more issues, but my point is that these people do exist who base their vote on just a couple of issues instead of everything collectively.
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Anyone can vote for their own reasons - for valid reasons based on the issues or for invalid reasons because you don't like the color of one of the candidate's shoes. I don't think it was wrong for Obama to suggest voters to think more open-mindedly about their votes by taking everything into account-not just "guns" or "religion" as it does exist here and other places. My vote is going to Obama because he best reflects my stances on the issues (I could write forever on that specific topic), and I think he will be a better candidate to help move America in the right direction. At the same time, I do respect people who are voting for McCain if they believe he best reflects their stances on the issues and think he would move America in the right direction. It would be foolish of me to expect all humans to be the same in thoughts and opinions-if that was the case then why would we have elections? If you think everyone should have the same stances on the issues, then you might want to look up the definition of "egocentric"...
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Another commenter quoted someone as saying: "Pennsylvania is Philadelphia and Pittsburgh with Alabama in between". It is an extremely generalized (and insulting to some) statement, but it is true to say that Pennsylvania is drastically different in its ideologies across the state as it is in most states. Whether people in larger towns are more open-minded is debatable. During this election, I have unfortunately found out that some of my friends here in a suburb of a city in PA have been closet-racists, and this is not me assuming-it is from discussions we've had. (Unfortunately, these friendships are coming to an end because to me racism is a hang-up and racism should not be tolerated, in my humble opinion.) Point to be made: close-mindedness and/or ignorance is not restricted to just one region of a state or even a part of the country. Just as there are many open-minded people in smaller towns, there people who are close-minded also do exist in larger towns and cities.
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What actually DID annoy me was Sarah Palin implying some parts of the country were more pro-American than others. (Yes, later she tried to correct it but was an unsuccessful attempt to me.) With news cycles being 24-hours, this of course is already "old news" but not "forgotten news" for voters. Is Eastern PA more pro-American than Western-PA just because the polls show more McCain support in Easter PA? Do McCain and Palin consider small towns "pro-American" and larger towns and cities as "elitist"? If McCain and Palin were to win this election, should I expect them to focus more on the needs of people in small towns and not in larger cities? I want a President who will represent all of America's needs and who will not try to divide America, instead unify America.
