Can Obama win Appalachia?

By Linda B. Blackford lblackford@herald-leader.com It’s hard to imagine now, says Charlie Peters, but back in 1960, the Catholicism of John F. Kennedy was every bit as big a problem for Appalachian voters as Barack Obama’s race appears to be today. When Peters, Kennedy’s Kanawha County campaign chairman, first took him around Charleston, W.Va, at least 20 percent of the people refused to shake his hand. So Kennedy spent 16 of the 30 days before the primary showing West Virginians “he wasn’t we