Rick Davis, McCain's campaign chairman, is accusing Obama of being an elitist because he drinks a certain kind of tea and goes to the gym every day. (He's actually accusing him of going to the gym three times a day, but that only happened one day and some speculate that was a ruse for meeting with a possible vice presidential candidate.) Other reasons the McCain camp wants you to see Obama as an elitist: he went to Harvard Law School, he speaks with lofty rhetoric, he holds his head at a certain angle, and he's lived in other countries. Oh yes, and he talks about arugula.
Well, no one could be more of an elitist than grandpa McCain, the son and grandson of admirals, who went to the Naval Academy, hangs out with wealthy lobbyists, owns seven homes, gives big barbecue parties for the press, and is married to an heiress. I have no idea what he eats, other than barbecue, but I don't imagine it's inexpensive food. In fact, I imagine he employs a cook when he's at one of his seven homes. And the condescending way he talks about Obama makes him sound like the worst kind of elitist.
George W. Bush, for all his phony good old boy mannerisms, is also an elitist, coming from a wealthy family, with wealth on both sides of the family, and going to prep schools as well as Yale, insisting he has regular talks with god, wearing $5000 suits, going on long bicycle rides with the Secret Service and working out daily, and having to take his favorite pillow with him whenever he travels. (I bet Obama doesn't take a pillow.)
These Republicans are brilliant. The elitist of the elite, born into wealthy and/or famous families somehow manage to convince enough voters they are just regular guys, ordinary Joes, who understand the comman man, while their opponents, who grew up in middle or lower middle class households, often headed by a single parent, and rose to excellence not because they are of the elite, but because they worked hard, are portrayed as arrogant and out of touch.
Why do we let them get away with that?
