John Nichols from The Nation, reports that Barack Obama continues his reversal from his popular campaign positions.  This time he has back-tracked on NAFTA.

The once and future President was a candidate that the Republicans feared.  His integrity and honesty had a popular appeal that the discredited Republicans could never match.

Now that Barack Obama has shown brazen contempt for liberals and progressives, the Republicans are cheering over the fact that Obama becomes an easier target to attack each day.

Here is an excerpt from John Nichols article:

Republican John McCain is a militantly pro-free trade presidential candidate. That fact alone should guarantee his defeat in Ohio and other industrial states where his strategists entertain hopes of surfing a “Reagan Democrat” crossover of working-class Democratic voters to the GOP column this fall.

All that would be required would be for Democrat Barack Obama to campaign as a critic of the North American Free Trade Agreement and other deals that have battered workers, farmers, communities and the environment in the United States and abroad.

Unfortunately, Obama, who sent so many smart signals on trade issues when he was competing with Hillary Clinton for his party’s presidential nomination, appears to now be backtracking toward the insider territory occupied by McCain.

Obama’s interview with Fortune magazine — headlined “Obama: NAFTA Not So Bad After All” — is the best news the McCain camp has received since Mike Huckabee folded his run for the Republican nomination.

If Obama takes the economic issue that white working-class voters best understand off the table, he creates a huge opening for McCain in states such as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.