Something dramatic has happened in the democratic race for the presidency. John Edwards has decided to suspend his campaign. This is sad, John Edwards is a good man, a passionate candidate who ran a clean and classy campaign and a defender of one America. Unfortunately it does seem that his battle against corporate greed turned into a lost cause defending a now distant American dream of having a good paying job with a pension or owning a home. Most Americans have been swindled into stakeholding a part of the greed he fought against and it’s a shame. The stake-holding middle-class probably did him in, unknowing they are much closer to the poverty stricken working-class people he fought for, than the insatiable breed of wealthy profiteers they think they will become. The new American Dream is now in owning stocks even it means ruining the economy. God help us.
Some of the talk in the blogosphere has Edwards lined up for the vice-presidency again or the U.S. Attorney General cabinet post. At this point I have no idea who he will endorse but it will be interesting to see which way he goes.
2 comments:
I think a lot of Dem's realize that Edwards would be president now had he been top-of-the-ticket last time around. Kerry was who he was, not a victim.
That being said, its hard to imagine how Edwards could have won with an anti business agenda like the one he had. The truth is that even most Dems enjoy having a job and realized that Edwards' policies and past record clearly indicate his predatory view of buisness. Edwards might have won justice for a few, but in making himself ultra-rich in the process (which is his right) he loses his stature as defender of the poor. People are just too sophisticated to buy that. We are not a socialist nation, after-all.
And by suspending his campaign rather than dropping out, he demonstrates his continued heed for attention and power. Who will pay-off the kingmaker? Who will pay the man of the people?
I see your first point but also think you're mixing the message of corporate greed's stranglehold on America and equating it with being anti-business. Unfortunately that view has become the new conventional wisdom.
Finishing law school and becoming a lawyer defending against wrongdoings and getting rich while doing it is the American Dream. As a lawyer Edwards won many cases by trial, a sure sign of success.
I would agree with your view about the need for attention and power, but he earned it. Every one of the remaining candidates are on some kind of a power trip. Nothing is free in America, particularly hard fought political leverage and if Edwards just gave it away, he'd not only be doing a disservice to his supporters but to to the country.
But if people want a poor person who lives what he/she says for president of the United States, you'd have to vote for an illegal immigrant or ME.
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