Edwards, friend of the worker
Edwards, Sounding Like a Candidate, Calls for Fighting Poverty
By Roger Simon
June 23 (Bloomberg) — Former Democratic vice presidential nominee
John Edwards says he will do “anything” to get ordinary Americans
to pay attention to poverty — even at the risk of sounding like a
2008 presidential candidate.
Edwards, who ran for the Democratic nomination in 2004 before joining
Massachusetts Senator John Kerry on the ticket, has focused on the
issue since he left the Senate last year, as director of the Center
on Poverty, Work and Opportunity at the University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill.
While the job has given him the opportunity to raise the visibility
of poverty in the U.S., it has also given him plenty of opportunities
to keep himself visible. One came yesterday, when Edwards, 53,
visited Washington for a speech at the National Press Club.
“Anything I can do to get poverty on the national radar screen, I am
going to do,” Edwards said in an interview before his speech, which
he said was the first of several on issues he considers important,
including energy costs and education.
“Edwards really found his voice and calling after the last
election,” said Anna Burger, international secretary-treasurer of
the Service Employees International Union. “He talks about
rebuilding the middle class; he talks about his poverty-center work.
And he is out and around the states taking up the cause of working
people.”
Labor’s Candidate
If Edwards does run for president, he intends to be the candidate of
organized labor. He has walked picket lines with International
Brotherhood of Teamsters President James P. Hoffa, spoke at the
United Mine Workers convention in Las Vegas in April, championed the
cause of hotel and restaurant workers and met with small gatherings
of workers and union leaders around the country.
”I think that he is out working to win the hearts and minds of
working people and union activists,” said Burger, whose union
represents 1.8 million workers. `And he is not shy about saying he is
interested in running for president.”
Bob Kerrey, a former governor and senator from Nebraska who ran for
president in 1992, recruited Edwards to run for the Senate from North
Carolina when Kerrey was chairman of the Democratic Senatorial
Campaign Committee. Kerrey said that as the presidential campaign
heats up in the fall of 2007, “I think Edwards could open up a
strong second; he might even be the front-runner. It is not
impossible. He will be labor’s favorite Democrat.”
Strong in Iowa
Another Edwards advantage in a presidential run is a strong
organization in Iowa, whose caucuses begin the primary season.
Edwards came in a strong second to John Kerry in Iowa in 2004 by
campaigning hard in rural areas. He also carried Polk County, the
most populous county in the state.
Edwards visited Iowa four times in 2005 and five times so far this
year, the most visits of any 2008 Democratic hopeful. Senator Hillary
Clinton of New York, who is campaigning for re- election to the
Senate this year, hasn’t been to Iowa since 2003.
Two weeks ago, Edwards came in first in a Des Moines Register poll of
Iowans who say they are likely to vote in the caucuses. He received
30 percent in the poll to Clinton’s 26 percent, one of the rare times
that Clinton hasn’t come in first in a presidential poll.
The poll also found Clinton’s “very unfavorable” rating was 11
percent, nearly four times that of Edwards’ rating of 3 percent.
`He’s Running’
“If he wins the Iowa caucus, he will be No. 1 in New Hampshire, and
the people in New Hampshire are very smart when it comes to
presidential politics,” said Bob Kerrey, who is now president of New
School University in New York City. “They want a winner.”
Gordon Fischer, former chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party, who
isn’t aligned with any presidential campaign, says Edwards has
“great support” in Iowa. “He has phoned folks here and e-mailed
folks here and done guest editorials in the Des Moines Register,”
Fischer said. “He is working it. That pays off.”
Fischer said the Iraq war is very important to the Democratic
activists who dominate the Iowa caucuses, and “Edwards’ apology made
a big difference to Democrats here.”
Fischer was referring to a Nov. 13, 2005, opinion piece Edwards wrote
for the Washington Post that began, “I was wrong.” He went on to
say that his 2002 Senate vote authorizing President George W. Bush to
use force in Iraq was a mistake, and “I take responsibility for that
mistake.”
Withdraw From Iraq
Yesterday, Edwards called for the immediate withdrawal of 40,000 U.S.
troops from Iraq. “We need to be getting out,” Edwards said in the
interview. He said all combat troops should be withdrawn “within 12
to 18 months.”
In his Press Club speech, Edwards also addressed energy policy,
saying “I want to live in an America free from dependence on fossil
fuel” and that “sacrifice, conservation and innovation will be
required.”
In the interview, Edwards touched on immigration, saying those
workers already in the country illegally should be placed on a “path
to citizenship” as long as they pay their taxes, pay a fine and
learn English. He said he also favors improved border security.
He called the possibility of Iran gaining a nuclear weapon “the most
serious threat the world has seen since the Cuban missile crisis.”
Chief Issue
In both his speech and interview, he returned repeatedly to the issue
of domestic poverty. He proposed that the number of poor Americans be
cut by a third in the next 10 years and poverty be eliminated in the
next 30 years. In his speech, Edwards also stressed concern for the
“forgotten middle class.”
Edwards said America must build a “working society” that would
create “new opportunities for work,” plus “affordable housing near
good jobs” and a million “last-chance” jobs “for people who
cannot find work on their own.”
As Bill Clinton did when he ran for president in 1992, Edwards also
emphasized the importance of individual responsibility, saying “we
would expect everyone who can work to work” and that it is time to
finish the job of welfare reform by giving low-income men the
opportunity to work and “challenging them to take responsibility for
doing so.”
“If they don’t work, they don’t get paid,” Edwards said. “If they
owe child support, their children will get paid first, because women
shouldn’t have to raise children on their own.”
Populist Message
In 2004, Edwards stressed a populist message of two Americas, “one
America that is struggling to get by, another America that can buy
anything it wants, even Congress and a president.”
Independent political analyst Charles Cook, editor of the Cook
Political Report in Washington, said Edwards has honed his message
since that campaign, and that now “it is less class- warfare
oriented.”
Cook said that among Edwards’ Democratic rivals, former Governor Mark
Warner of Virginia and Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana “are competing
for the cautious middle,” while John Kerry is an “old-style
populist.”
“Edwards is now offering a hybrid of populism and liberalism that
works,” Cook said.