Obama's Working Class Credibility: Bridging the Gaps between 'Us' and 'Them' Politics in the United States

Barack Obama crossed another threshold in his quest for the presidency this evening, scoring a significant victory in Oregon and officially securing the majority of pledged delegates up for grabs in what has been an epic primary contest.

Still, voters in Kentucky's primary election sent the Illinois senator a sound defeat, as Hillary Clinton took the contest by more than a two-to-one margin. Pundits were quick to argue that Clinton's victory in the Bluegrass state further vindicates her argument that Obama simply has trouble appealing to, and identifying with, working-class voters. In my piece this evening, however, I hope to debunk this claim by showing that Obama is well aware of, and has devoted a great portion of his personal and professional life to, becoming more familiar with the cause of low- and middle-income families from across the country.

With this said, let's move into the piece.

Obama v. McCain on Middle-Class Credentials:

Straight Talk Gone Awry

The purpose of this briefing is not so much to stress the superiority, and superiorly authentic, working-class credentials of Barack Obama relative to John McCain, his opponent in the upcoming U.S. presidential election. Instead, it is to debunk the notion that Obama is, somehow, out of touch with the worries, hopes, and dreams of ordinary Americans. Indeed, it seems less than helpful, and perhaps a bit contradictory, to advocate against the utility of measuring candidates fitness to serve based on their socioeconomical background by arguing that one candidate’s closer connections with middle- and low-income citizens better prepares him for taking office as president.

Still, demonstrating clearly that Senator Obama comes from a background that is entirely more rooted in middle-class, middle-income America than his GOP opponent does provide a powerful rebuke to criticisms levied by the McCain Campaign that Obama is unable to relate to ordinary Americans. And therein lies this paper’s objective. I hope to show, through a clear analysis of the economic and social backgrounds of Senators McCain and Obama, that the latter is at least as in touch and has more experience with the experiences of middle-class citizens than the former. In doing so, I seek to mute, or at least invalidate, suggestions that Obama will struggle to win over moderate and socially conservative blue-collar voters due to a fundamental and irreparable disconnect in background.

I’ve grown a little perturbed, and more than a bit confused, by suggestions made with increasing strength in recent weeks that Senator Obama runs the risk of losing out on the votes of working class Americans due to an ability to connect with, or relate to, the concerns, worries, and hopes they face. Such criticisms have come both within the context of Obama’s protracted battle with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton for the Democratic nomination, as well as in speculation as to what an electoral contest might look like against presumptive GOP nominee, John McCain.

First off, let’s be clear: none of the three remaining candidates for president is hurting for income. Senator Obama, along with the salary of a United States Senator, served as a tenured professor at the University of Chicago’s law school, and his wife, Michelle, earns a six-figure salary working in the university’s community outreach department. Recently, it was reported that since Clinton’s husband, Bill, left the presidency seven years ago, the power couple has earned nearly $100 million, hardly leaving them pressed for cash. For his part, Senator McCain married the heiress to a beer fortune and has an estate worth upwards of $50 million. Clearly, no one is going hungry here.

Still, when one takes into account the candidates’ backgrounds, it quickly becomes clear that, at least for one candidate, things have not always been quite so cushy. Let’s begin with McCain. The senior senator from Arizona and former war hero was born into a powerful military family and lived on Capitol Hill for a good portion of his childhood, spending time with high power political and military officials.

Clinton is the daughter of a successful textile factory owner and grew up in suburban Chicago. Her father was, if anything, a traditionalist and ardent anti-communist. Indeed, so direct were his conservative teachings that Hillary Rodham entered the political world as a full-fledged Republican, campaigning for Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential election and, later, serving as a so-called ‘Goldwater Girl’ for, ironically, the last Arizona Senator to run for president, Barry Goldwater, whom some call the father of modern conservatism.

In her first year at Wellesley College, Hillary Rodham was elected president of the school’s freshman Republicans and continued to advocate the right-of-center values forged by her traditional upbringing. It was not until Clinton became more aware of, and concerned with, the battle being waged in the late 1960s through the Civil Rights Movement that Rodham’s political views began to shirt leftward. After attending a speech by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in her native Chicago, Rodham shifted her allegiance to the Democratic Party, a path from which she has not since retreated.

Barack Obama’s story, however, is unique. The son a of a single mother (his father, a Kenyan immigrant to the United States, died when he was two), Obama spent most of his childhood hopping from home to home, living abroad for several years in Indonesia before returning to the U.S. To make ends meet, Obama’s mother often relied upon food stamps, an experience surely shared by neither of his presidential opponents. Moreover, after graduating from Columbia University, Obama ventured to Southside Chicago in order to do community organization in one of the most afflicted ghettoes in the country. Following his successful four-year stint on the Southside, Obama attended Harvard Law School in 1988, where he became the first African American editor of the Harvard Law Review. After graduating from law school, Obama turned down lucrative offers from law firms in order to return to inner-city Chicago and lead a voter-registration drive amongst low-income and minority communities. Bear in mind that, at this time, Obama was struggling to repay college loans he’d taken out in order to finance his college and graduate education.

Moving against the wind, Obama fought inertia and an altogether unhelpful political climate to turn large pieces of the Southside around and move them on the course to a brighter future. It was in these days of grassroots organizing that Obama solidified himself as a capable, results-oriented progressive leader. However, it was also in these days when the future senator and presidential candidate also experienced first-hand the significant and, at times, overwhelming financial restraints that challenge hard-working families across the United States.

As for his opponents, noble service was the norm, and they are to be congratulated for it. McCain endured intense torture at the hands of the North Vietnamese after having been shot down over the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi, during one of his numerous bombing raids. McCain went on to decline an offer of early release from Vietcong imprisonment, insisting that all POWs who’d come before him must also be released if he were to accept. Brave, honorable, and, to most, inconceivable, McCain’s patriotism and service of his country remains in the forefront of his mind today, as he campaigns for president.

Hillary Clinton spent her immediate post-undergraduate years pursuing graduate work at Yale Law School. As a student, she quickly became interested in issues related to early childhood development, poverty, and migratory labor rights. She volunteered to give legal advice to low-income families and received a grant to research the struggles of migrant workers under the auspices of the Senate’s Subcommittee on Migrant Labor, which was chaired by Minnesota Senator Walter Mondale (who went on to become Jimmy Carter’s Vice President and the Democratic candidate for president in 1984).

After agreeing to marry Bill Clinton, Rodham moved to Arkansas, her husband’s home state, foregoing her immediate political future. In Arkansas, she served as one of the youngest members ever of the University of Arkansas’s School of Law and later took on a role in the prominent Arkansas law firm, the Rose Firm. In 1978, Bill was elected attorney general, and the young couple became one of the most prominent duos in state politics. In 1982, when Bill was elected governor, it became the most prominent.

What is clear from this analysis is that, while both John McCain and Hillary Clinton served their country valiantly immediately after college, neither faced the type of financial hurdles faced by Barack Obama. This is in no way intended to downgrade the importance of the work done by McCain or Clinton. Quite the contrary, risking his life and enduring years of torture in order to implement the U.S. military strategy speaks volumes about the type of selfless leadership Senator McCain has employed throughout his military and political. Moreover, Clinton’s impassioned service to, and defense of, the rights of children and migrant workers make her a paragon of virtue in terms of identifying and pursuing noble causes.

Still, Senator Obama knows what it’s like to struggle economically. He and his mother know the insecurity and anxiety that accompany living paycheck to paycheck. He identifies with the cause of financial constraint because he’s lived it. He is devoted to helping folks attain a more stable way of living because he’s done it. And, in the final analysis, there is no one for whom President Obama would work more diligently than the same common folks who’ve built the backbone of America because, well, he is them.