Oh, me. Rather than being a discussion about the enormous problems facing the country, the 2008 presidential campaign continues to be dominated by arguments about words.

Unquestionably, Barack Obama made a huge mistake in what is now known as the "bitter" remark. Asked at a San Francisco fundraiser why he wasn't getting more support from white, working-class Americans, he launched into a discussion about those working-class Americans. They're bitter, he said, and they "cling" to things like guns and religion.

Nothing Obama has said in the campaign indicates that he has that simplistic, misguided view. In his poignant speech on race, in fact, he indicated just the opposite. But in the "bitter" remark, he said what he said. And now he's left trying to explain himself and put it behind him.

(In his column in the New York Times today, Bob Herbert says Obama trapped himself because he wasn't willing to say what he really thinks: that many working-class Americans still find it hard to vote for a black man. "He danced all around the truth," writes Herbert. "Unless you're Fred Astaire, if your dance steps get too intricate you're bound to make a misstep. This was a big one.")

To me, the saddest part of this episode is the reaction from Hillary Clinton, who has jumped on Obama's statement like a cat on a mouse. She had been losing her big lead in polls in Pennsylvania. Now she is positively relishing the chance to portray Obama as elitist, something this former inner-city community worker clearly is not.

Clinton has also been jumping on board with the Republicans' campaign tactics, saying that it was the perception of elitism that cost Al Gore and John Kerry the election. Al Gore won the election. And Kerry, a highly qualified candidate, lost because Republicans were able to portray him as an elitist - something Clinton herself is now trying to do to Obama.

John Kerry lost because in the Karl Rove style of politics, you do whatever you need to do to win. That, obviously, is a Hillary Clinton style of politics as well.