Regarding John Edwards: It's not the Message, it's the Hypocrisy.

[SidneyCarton]

Everything Edwards said about our obligations to the poor in this nation was correct. The Party has sadly turned their back on the poor, the less fortunate and the destitute among us. Massive efforts to bring these people up would lift and strengthen the nation as a whole and efforts should be taken to put in place some of the programs he proposed.

The problem comes with Edwards' delivery and the aftermath. Edwards presented his campaign and his ideas as some form of redemptive campaign for the nation, arguing from a position of absolute moral superiority. You cannot do this, then cheat on your wife who is dying of cancer, and expect to be taken seriously in this society. Why? Well there's the puritanical/moralistic element, yes this is hypocritical too, but the electorate's hypocrisy is always overlooked, as it is almost impossible to nail down. But beyond the outrage, there is the sheer hypocrisy of the action. You cannot present yourself as the last moral avenger of the underprivileged, and then admit that you could not keep faith with your spouse, the mother of your children, who is facing an early death from aggressive cancer and then expect people to continue to believe that you will keep faith with them over far less personal issues.

Edwards' ideas were good, his arguments were sound, his message remains essentially correct. However, his actions, his hypocrisy and blind ambition, have made it impossible for him to continue as an effective, credible standard-bearer for them.

[Blue_In_AK]

1. Who would you suggest to take up the torch?

SOMEBODY has to.

[SidneyCarton]

2. Good point, I don't know.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Not Kucinich.

I love Dennis; I love his ideas. I agree with just about everything he has ever done. But I consider him unelectable--not because of his positions, but because of a certain abrasive rigidity that he radiates, a "My way or the Highway" inflexibility that is admirable in certain contexts, including the House of Representatives, but that would make him both unelectable by an electorate still in search of a "nice guy" and unable to bend enough to govern if by some mischance he actually fell into the power.

There. I just had to say it.

[Blue_In_AK]

5. We need someone with Dennis Kucinich's vision

and Barack Obama's charisma. I like President Obama fine, but I guess I feel like he compromises more than I'm comfortable with. I want him to stand by his principles, the ones he ran on, but I see him leaning right on much of that.

[SidneyCarton]

11. I understand what you're saying.

Obama is not a populist, though like all successful candidates he had to take on a populist bent in the campaign in order to win. He is a gradualist, if we have time his policies may yet yield fundamental long-term change for the nation. If we don't have time then he's screwed. Time will tell.

[Jackpine Radical]

32. Yeah. I remember 2004 when I was supporting Dean

and all the Kucinich people, with whom I share a strong philosophical bond, jumping all over me for not supporting the purist. When I tried to tell them I thought DK was unelectable, they gave me all this self-fulfilling prophecy crap. They seemed to think that if all the progressives agreed that Kucinich was electable, he would become electable, but I was trying to tell them he was unelectable because he was DK, not just because everyone had written him off.

[SidneyCarton]

7. Charisma helps.

It's an unfortunate reality in a modern democracy. Dennis has good ideas too, his inability to compromise is his greatest strength and his achilles heel.

[cali]

22. uh, bernie sanders has been a tireless advocate for the poor.

[SidneyCarton]

23. Good choice, I forgot about Bernie.

[lumberjack_jeff]

27. You're asking the wrong group.

I don't think the consensus cares very much.

[JayMusgrove]

28. How about our current President and his Cabinet?

[panader0]

3. And now the sex videos are coming out.

I really liked his championing of the poor, no one did it with as much fervor. But John, how could you?

[Cha]

6. There were videos?

He was caught on tape?!

[SidneyCarton]

9. You've got to be kidding me.

I find it hard to believe that he would allow himself to be taped, (the risk is so great that it would suggest a narcissism bordering on madness) so if these things do exist, Ms. Hunter is truly despicable.

[GreenArrow]

13. "Ms. Hunter is truly despicable"

Certainly no more despicable than Mr. Edwards.

[SidneyCarton]

14. Indeed.

A fair amount of foolishness, insensitivity, and arrogance to go around.

[Adelante]

20. Oh, it's Green Arrow

Long time no see :pals:

(It's me, WesDem)

Anyhow, Hunter isn't releasing the sex tapes. It's Edwards's own guy Andrew Young, now abandoned to his own devices, who has the tape.

[GreenArrow]

35. Howdy, WesDem!

While posting on a different Edwards thread last week, I was just thinking I hadn't seen you for a while. Glad you're still kickin' with a new monicker!

[lindisfarne]

17. Interesting who you choose to blame.n/t

[SidneyCarton]

19. It is, and I apologize for that.

It was both presumptous and misogynistic.

[lindisfarne]

21. Apology accepted.n/t

[lumberjack_jeff]

26. Presumptuous? She IS a videographer, isn't she? n/t

[lindisfarne]

33. How is that relevant?It's not,unless Edwards did not grant permission - and he has not said that.n/t

[lumberjack_jeff]

34. Motive and opportunity are both found with Ms Hunter. nt

[Bluenorthwest]

37. she's despicable?

Wow, this was the first of your OPs I could agree with, then in comes the sexism. Ms Hunter, unlike John Holypants Edwards and his wife, did not take to stages across American and proclaim her deeply seated 'traditional Baptist views of marriage'. She did not rave about 'one, man and one woman, united by God' and all of that crap. She did not oppose the rights of others based on a pack of lies she foisted about herself and about others. She did not use people, he used people, and for that matter, his 'wife' stood there and nodded along with his 'I'm a Deacon's son, and the sacred nature of marriage is just a part of me that I can not change'.
So Ms Hunter never did harm to me. Mr Edwards did. For no reason but his own agenda, to cover his own tracks.
Edwards' behavior was despicable, as was his wife's assistance in that slander of GLBT people to cover their own lack of decency one toward the other.

[Peregrine Took]

8. Oh, THAT "John Edwards" - I thought you meant the psychic dude.

Although, come to think of it, I think he is "John Edward."

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

10. You can't bitch about completely unrelated matters like poverity and personal infidelity...

and expect to be taken seriously in this society.

[SidneyCarton]

12. You can't post in GD:P...

Without expecting to be mocked by HiFructosePronSyrup.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

15. Sure you can.

There are plenty of people posting things in GDP that aren't obsessed about somebody else's personal sex life like Newt Gingrich or Bob Packwood or somebody like that whom I'm not mocking.

[SidneyCarton]

16. It was meant in good humor.

I actually enjoy your skewering of OP's you find insipid, including my own. The forum is often too serious, you keep it interesting. In fairness, this ought to have been a response to one of the other Edwards OP's in the forum today, c'est la vie.

[HamdenRice]

18. Edwards' bigger problem was aiming it at "the poor" rather than working and middle class families

Very few Americans, even the objectively poor, think of themselves as "the poor." I know this from having lots of friends and relatives in the poor sections of Brooklyn.

Those people think of themselves as "struggling middle class" or "working people" or "struggling."

Moreover, the main problems created by repug policies of the last 20 years HAVE targeted not just "the poor" but the working and middle class.

His campaign was doomed to fail. It was telling voters to vote for programs to help people other than themselves, even if Edwards, in his mind, was speaking to those voters.

People vote for programs to help themselves, and a little more public spiritedly to help people like themselves.

It was an insanely bad centerpiece for a campaign.

[karynnj]

24. No one needs to take up John Edwards' Message - we need people to lead on

- fixing the economy
- repairing the security net
- providing opportunity, especially, though not exclusively for the young.

We need someone who has the potential legislative skills and the desire to help those who need help - think a younger, healthier Ted Kennedy.

Looking for another Edwards will lead to trouble - in fact, the media itself loved Edwards in 2004 as Bill Clinton without Bimbo problems. In reality he never had the achievements of Bill Clinton. It is interesting but the same charismatic personality and eloquence is an asset for politicians, trial lawyers, actors, religious leaders, and con men. In Edwards' case, his abilities here were a gift he was born with - he could have used them better - but his actions never met his stated values.

[Cha]

25. Is he back in the news? 'Cause this

is the second thread on him in GDP, but I can't find anything in LBN regarding Edwards.

[SidneyCarton]

29. I was responding to the other thread.

[Cha]

30. Thanks,

Sidney.

[Mass]

31. We have a few people in the Senate who care and do not do that for political gain. We have others in

the House.

Mostly thinking of Sanders, Brown, Harkin, and I am sure a few others in the Senate, and I am sure that others will name people for the House.

So, why bring Edwards back. We need people who genuinely care about these issues, like Barbara Ehrenreich, for example.

[endarkenment]

36. Isn't primary season over?