A number of commentators have attributed Obamas’s gaffe about small town white working class voters to a well known book from 2004 called What’s the Matter With Kansas ? that postulates a theory that middle class voters act against their own best interests by voting Republican. David Frum has an excellent column on the problems with that theory. It looks more and more that this book has led Obama and many other Democrats astray. It has also confirmed a bunch of rather obnoxious prejudices about small town working class whites. Part of their problem is that they don’t know why anyone else is upset at these characterizations. They think this stuff is really true.