Did Obama get it wrong?

In today's NYTs Paul Krugman says Obama got it wrong in his "bitter... cling" remarks and goes on to say that that the "crucial word here isn't 'bitter,' it's 'cling'." Aside from the fact that Obama's remarks were speculative and off the cuff and the addition of a "may be" (bitter) and "may" cling would have made it clear that he was not positing known facts, Krugman attempts to disprove the thesis (even though the remarks did not constitute a theses). He uses state-level statistics on income and poverty levels as one correlate and state level statistics on churchgoing as the other (BTW using self reports of church attendance is a notoriously useless way to operationalize religiousity). So much for trying to prove Obama wrong. I propose a way of seeing why Krugman fails to make his case. What if we were to posit a hypothesis, say, "personal financial distress combined with an accompanying high level (to be defined) of emotional stress increases susceptability to and acceptance of political arguments supporting the right to bear and own arms (including AK-47s), prohibitions against gay marriage, and criminalizing abortions and susceptability to and involvement (preferably operationalized as % of income tithed) in fundamentalist sects and "prosperity" preachers. Or if you prefer, the latter variable could be indifference to economic policy issues. A study like this would not prove or disprove Obama's comments because he was not promulgating some "truth." He was likely pondering--as many of us do--why so many people in this country are willing to vote for presidents who refuse to act on their behalf to relieve and prevent financial distress and restore communities.