The strongest argument for John Edwards for veep is that he is by far the best campaigner we've seen this election cycle. For one thing, he can put together sentences in a language voters can understand. Here's the key paragraph from his "Two Americas" stump speech:
"Today, under George W. Bush, there are two Americas, not one: One America that does the work, another America that reaps the reward. One America that pays the taxes, another America that gets the tax breaks. One America that will do anything to leave its children a better life, another America that never has to do a thing because its children are already set for life. One America -- middle-class America -- whose needs Washington has long forgotten, another America -- narrow-interest America -- whose very wish is Washington's command. One America that is struggling to get by, another America that can buy anything it wants, even Congress and a president."
(If that last sentence sounds over the top, consider the latest break for those that don't need one: The House of Representatives probably will pass a bill that requires companies to list stock options as a business expense only for the top five company executives. Even those would be undervalued because businesses would be allowed to assume that the stock in question would have a permanently fixed value. Warren Buffet, the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and the investor by whom others are measured, writes in The Washington Post (free site registration may be required) that, "The only reason for making such an Alice-in-Wonderland assumption is to significantly understate the value of the few options that the House wants counted. This undervaluation, in turn, enables chief executives to lie about what they are truly being paid and to overstate the earnings of the companies they run.")
While campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination last year, Edwards made some of the same points even more forcefully. The Bush economic policy, he said, "the most radical and dangerous economic theory to hit our shores since socialism a century ago." Here's an excerpt from that speech (I can't link to the whole thing because the Edwards site became defunct overnight except for his statement in March withdrawing from the presidential contest ):
"… the true cost of the administration’s approach isn’t what they’ve done with our money, it’s what they want to do to our way of life. Their economic vision has one goal: to get rid of taxes on unearned income and shift the tax burden onto people who work. This crowd wants a world where the only people who have to pay taxes are the ones who do the work.
"Make no mistake: this is the most radical and dangerous economic theory to hit our shores since socialism a century ago. Like socialism, it corrupts the very nature of our democracy and our free enterprise tradition. It is not a plan to grow the American economy. It is a plan to corrupt the American economy and shrink the winners’ circle.
"This is a question of values, not taxes. We should cut taxes, but we shouldn’t cut and run from our values when we do. John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan argued for tax cuts as an incentive for people to work harder: Americans work hard, and the government shouldn’t punish them when they do.
"This crowd is making a radically different argument. They don’t believe work matters most. They don’t believe in helping working people build wealth. They genuinely believe that the wealth of the wealthy matters most. They are determined to cut taxes on that wealth, year after year, and heap more and more of the burden on people who work.
"How do we know this? Because they don’t even try to hide it. The Bush budget proposed tax-free tax shelters for millionaires that are bigger than most Americans’ paychecks for an entire year. And just last week, Bush’s tax guru, Grover Norquist, said their goal is to abolish the capital gains tax, abolish the dividend tax, and let the wealthiest shelter as much as they want tax-free."
And they say Edwards is no attack dog. Well, I can hardly wait for the Cheney-Edwards debates (or, more likely, the Bush-Cheney explanation for why there won't be any).
Edwards doesn't wash well with the right, of course. Earlier this year, Jonah Goldberg at National Review Online took on Edwards, Kerry, Dean et al, in a piece in which he said, "In all seriousness, there is no constitutionally or morally acceptable program that could possibly eliminate the elemental social fact that some people will be better off than others. Sure, the divide between the haves and the have-nots can be narrowed, and you can certainly change how the system rewards people (not that a trial lawyer has much interest in that)." This is a totally bogus response, in that what Edwards is arguing for is equal treatment not equal outcome. But never mind. You can read Goldberg here.
Over the months, Edwards also has attracted considerable attention from late-night comics. Here's a round up of Edwards jokes.
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