The Gun Counter

Obama faces struggle wooing working-class voters

Candidate's 'background' worries some

Sheldon Alberts, Canwest News Service Published: Friday, October 24, 2008

IRONTON, OHIO - President Barack Hussein Obama -- the very thought makes Lynn Dearfield wince.

As she stands inside the local Republican Party headquarters, pinning a McCain-Palin button on her blouse, the 45-year-old nurse recites a litany of reasons she won't be voting for the Democratic candidate on Nov. 4: more liberal judges on the Supreme Court, fewer restrictions on abortion, a persistent skepticism about the man himself.

"His middle name worries me. That's the truth. He was named that for a reason. He was not raised Christian," she said. "I am not prejudiced. I have nothing against his race. I have problems with his background."

Such sentiments are heard frequently from Obama critics in this former iron-producing city in southeastern Ohio, a place that fell on hard times after the Great Depression and has never fully recovered.

Despite a U. S. economic climate that favours the Democrats, Mr. Obama continues to struggle for support among the white working-class voters who could determine the election's outcome in Ohio and other key battleground states.

His uphill challenge is evident in Ironton, an Ohio River town of 12,000 bordering Kentucky and West Virginia.

In the Democratic primary, Hillary Clinton won 78% of the vote-- and Mr. Obama 20% -- in Ironton and surrounding Lawrence County. The pattern was repeated among Democrats along the spine of the Appalachian mountains, from western Pennsylvania to Kentucky and West Virginia.

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