Liberal Values Defending Liberty and Enlightened Thought

Walter Shapiro has a favorable look at John Edwards in Salon. While I do not agree with many of Shapiro’s favorable comments on Edwards, at least he understands how many of us feel (ignoring how he writes this off as “elite opinion”).

As someone who has been covering Edwards since his first foray into New Hampshire during the summer of 2002, I have long been stunned by the animus toward him that lurks just beneath the surface of elite opinion. In conversations with Washington political consultants, major Democratic donors, former Senate colleagues and big-time reporters, I have repeatedly heard the vague, but damning, refrain that Edwards is a shallow phony and his commitment to fighting poverty is mostly a political pose.

While I disagree with many of Shapiro’s defenses of Edwards, there is one factual error which I cannot ignore in the discussion of the limitations which Edwards would face by accepting matching funds:

Asked about this problem in the interview, Edwards argued, “I think it’s classic Washington think … It ignores the extraordinary free media that exists for a Democratic nominee for president.” Deputy Edwards campaign manager Jonathan Prince also pointed out that in 2004 John Kerry did not face any fundraising limits, but still was upended by the Swift boat ads, which were nominally sponsored by an independent group.

Contrary to the claim that Kerry didn’t face any fundraising limits, the Swift Boat ads appeared in August when Kerry was forced to limit spending because of the Republican advantage in having a later convention date. Both parties had an equivalent amount of money to spend in the period between their convention and the general election, but Kerry was forced to spread this money out over a longer period. As the Edwards campaign has raised this point, it is also worth noting that the Kerry campaign had wanted Edwards to fulfill the traditional role of the Vice Presidential candidate and go on the offensive in response to such Republican attacks. Edwards refused, presumably to preserve his “nice guy” image for his own future run.

A Republican campaign against Edwards would have a much easier job than they had against Kerry as they wouldn’t even need to invent charges, including some of those noted here. Shapiro wrote, “As a highly successful medical malpractice trial lawyer before his 1998 election to the Senate, Edwards labors under the odd political burden of being too glib and convincing in his public appearances.” It won’t be hard to convince voters to be wary of anything said by a candidate who made his fortune from glib talk before juries to convince them that problems caused by fetal brain injury long before the onset of labor were due to alleged malpractice at the time of delivery.