Since we commonly ascribe Obama’s troubles with working class Catholics to his positions on abortion or his perceived “elitism” (how can you vote for a guy with a sub-80 bowling score???) it was useful to be reminded by a recent New York Times’ piece that sometimes substantive issues are excuses to cloak other factors:

One parishioner ruled out voting for Mr. Obama explicitly because he is black. “Are they going to make it the Black House?” Ray McCormick asked, to embarrassed hushing from a half dozen others gathered around the rectory kitchen. (Five of the six, all lifelong Democrats who supported Mrs. Clinton in the primary, said they now lean toward Mr. McCain.) Mr. Madonna, the political scientist, said of the Catholic vote in white, working-class Scranton, “This is a tough area for Obama and some of it is race.”

Of course it was the Daily Show that provided the funniest analysis of the race factor: