Intellectual Property Law

The hoax e-mails that paint Democratic presidential front-runner Barack Obama as unpatriotic and as a clandestine Muslim are still having an impact on voters' perception of the Illinois senator, reports a Wednesday story the New York Daily News.

The Daily News' Thomas M. Defrank quotes a couple of Indiana voters' fears, based on their perception that Obama is really an anti-American Muslim.

Here's the relevant graph:

"I'm kind of still up in the air between McCain and Hillary," said Jason Jenkins, 32, who cited information from a hoax e-mail as a reason to spurn Obama.

"I'll be honest with you. Barack scares the hell out of me,"he said. "He swore on the Koran."

Obama did manage to pull in many white voters, but still encountered similar sentiments from a man who refused to shake his hand at a diner in Greenwood, Indiana.

"I can't stand him," the man said. "He's a Muslim. He's not even pro-American as far as I'm concerned."

The story then goes on to note that those white, working class voters' sentiments play into the Clinton campaign's decision to plough on in this difficult environment.

The story's notable since the anti-patriotic perception seems to have jumped from e-mail in-boxes to some media outlets, perhaps fueling some voters' ongoing uneasiness. Additionally, both senators' campaigns are trying to convince  superdelegates of their electability.  Clinton's meeting with superdelegates this afternoon on Capitol Hill. The Obama campaign announced Wednesday that it has received an additional three superdelegate endorsements. Yet this kind of sentiment  expressed  through voter interviews -- however remote -- could play a factor.

Some on the internet note how absurd that perception of Obama really is.

"How can Barack Obama be a radical Christian, a Muslim, and a Marxist at the same time?" asks Adam J. Blust on Twitter.

A quick check on the Google Trends charts show that anecdotally, at least, it's questions about Obama's associations with the Reverend Jeremiah Wright that's of top-most interest to the public, not the worry that he's an anti-American Muslim.

See Also:

• North Carolina Radio Host Reports Anti-Obama Chain E-Mail ...
• Clinton Volunteer Forwards Nasty Obama Email, Asked to Leave
• Obama Asked About E-Mail Smears