You decide: Were Obama's words about folks in small towns controversial?

Here's what Obama said to contributors in California last weekend that is now getting some attention:
"You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."

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http://blogs.usatoday.com/onpolitics/2008/04/you-decide-were.html?loc=interstitialskip