politics makes strange matfellows
New York Daily News - July 26, 2006
Lloyd Grove
Edwards’ drive heads into the stretch run
Just how much does former Sen. John Edwards want to be President?
So much, apparently, that to get a meeting Monday night with hip-hop
mogul Russell Simmons, a go-to guy for Democratic presidential
candidates courting the African-American vote, Edwards let Simmons
drag him to his regular 6:15 p.m. class at the Jivamukti Yoga School.
“He had never seen or done it before. He was a yoga virgin,” yoga
fanatic Simmons told me yesterday. “The entire practice, he was
sweating. The guy runs 5 miles a day, but I promise you he is in pain
today. At one point, I looked over at him, and he looked like he was
going to die.”
The 53-year-old Edwards didn’t return a phone call seeking
verification of his painful condition.
Simmons said the former North Carolina senator (who today runs the
One America Committee, an anti-poverty group) had been trying to
arrange a get-together for weeks.
But Simmons denied that he made yoga a requirement for an agreement
to meet with the 2004 vice presidential nominee.
“It wasn’t like that,” Simmons said. “Yoga was on my schedule. I go
to yoga every day, and I don’t like to change that schedule.”
Afterward, Edwards accompanied Simmons and his posse — including
former NAACP head Ben Chavez and activist Glen Friedman — to dinner
at Downtown Cipriani, where they discussed spirituality, how to end
poverty, the higher self and other inspirational topics.
“It showed that Edwards is flexible and has an open mind,” Simmons
pronounced. He added that the evening has sent the would-be White
House occupant to the top of his list — and far above Sens. John
Kerry and Hillary Clinton. “But I’m happy to go to yoga with anybody
who wants to.”