John Edwards for 2008

Let's just forget about Irish politics for a moment, especially in view of the latest poll.  If I lived in the United States I would be an enthusiastic campaigner for the former Senator for North Carolina, John Edwards.  Forget about cautious Hilary and the Obama phenomenon, Edwards is the the one candidate that any European social democrat would support.  I also believe that as a southerner and a man of humble origins, notwithstanding the trial lawyer tag, he is highly electable. He is a conviction-driven populist who has made poverty his number one issue.  When in the Senate he voted for the war in Iraq but now admits he was wrong.

Were it not for the quirks and irregularities in Ohio in 2004 he would be Vice-President.  Al Gore had Edwards on a shortlist of candidates to be his running mate in 2000 but he chose the awful Lieberman instead.  Edwards has been carrying on a grass roots campaign since the 2004 defeat and is probably better placed among registered Democrats likely to vote in primaries or turn up to caucuses than some of the more prominent candidates. 

I would be happy for any Democrat to win next year but I'd love Edwards to be the candidate because it would be the first time that I would have witnessed an insurgent Democrat campaigning on issues that wouldn't look out of place in the Labour Party's manifesto, mutatis mutandis of course.  There's a very good profile of Edwards here and there's a very well made point about the mistake people can make about failing to distinguish between sincerity and spontaneity. 

Comments

[Greg]

Gerry,

Do you still feel that way, now that you know that Edwards is in bed with the atheists-the atheists that spew anti-papish propaganda. I'm done with him and his anti-papish movement.