John Edwards was a candidate of the Democrats in the primaries. In 2004, he was John Kerry's running mate. In 2006, he had an affair. Until Friday 8, 2008, he lied about it to the American people.
This is what defines John Edwards today.
Before Friday, John Edwards was a successful lawyer and a hopeful presidential candidate. A rather populist one, for sure, but he had helped focus the campaign on social issues that the other candidates tended to neglect. He was morally respectful.
John Edwards has been a competent and dedicated senator and could have been some day a competent and dedicated president of the US (he is still young). Unfortunately, he lied to the American people about a very private affair that he had admitted to his wife as early as 2006, and that should have been the end of the story, and it should not even have been a story at all.
The problem, really, does not seem to be that he cheated on his wife, but that he cheated on the American people.
On Friday, he admitted to the affair, acknowledging he had made a mistake, that he had been "disloyal" to his wife and family, that he had become "egocentric" and "narcissistic" under the public light.
His wife, Elizabeth, declared that she knew, she had forgiven, and she hinted at the fact that she should not have to make that declaration.
The focus of the media now -- not only Fox News but also CNN, MSNBC and all others -- is on the "Edwards scandal." Forget the campaign for a while.
The candidates have even been asked to react to the scandal. Hillary, Barack and John have all been intelligent enough not to comment. I felt a bit relieved.
I sense I have a mission now. I need to tell Americans that one of our recent Presidents in France, a very competent and respectful man, had a hidden love child who now is on the public stage as a writer and that a recent presidential candidate concealed for years the end of her relationship with the father of her four children and leader of her party. That our current president also pretended to be happily married during the campaign, divorced within months after the campaign, remarried in a If-you-come-back-I-cancel-everything way within weeks, and is now the proud cover of low-brow magazines because his new wife is a former model turned wannabe singer and, as Paris would say, is totally hot.
And the best in all this is that we don't give a crap.
If we hate our president, it is because he enforces inhuman immigration policies and destroys social measures that America envies.
Let Edwards be forgiven by his wife and continue being the competent politician he is. It is not going to take away the fact he was a bastard to his wife but that, really, is none of anyone's business.
Ironically, if people were not so darn morally hypocritical, Edwards would not have had to lie. Edwards could have been Obama's running mate. A few months ago, though, he declared that he was not interested in the position. He had been interested in the position four years ago and he was respected by a lot of Democratic voters. He had been running for President. REally, it was surprising that he was not interested in running for VP. At the time, I dismissed the declaration as a way not to look too eager. But now, it makes perfect sense. Edwards knew that this scandal would come up, and he knew that he could not allow this to come up as a Vice Presidential candidate.
How sadly ridiculous!
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3 comments:
Lionel...unlike the French, not only do we want our public servants to be honest, we expect our family, friends, and co-workers to also be honest. I agree that this is a private matter between John and his wife, but it is now a public matter when you are a public servant. Elected officals have to answer to those who elects them and we expect honest answers. How can you trust someone who cheats on the one person they should share everything in their life with?
Dear reader, thanks for reading. I understand what you are saying. However, I think that the guy can be a ass... to his wife and yet be competent in politics. I do not know if that is the case of Edwards, but that's not the point. He might well be, although he cheated on his wife.
Besides: 1) it is not because we do not know about the others that they did not cheat on their wives/husbands; 2) the fact they did not cheat on their wives or husbands does not make them competent in politics.
It's looking (to me) like Biden will be VP. I'm waiting on my text message from Barack to confirm it. haha, what a crazy time this is, where political candidates email and text people like they're friends.
For what it's worth, the Edwards "scandal" was hardly scandalous to me. What I found offensive was that he was pressured into admitting publicly what he had already worked through personally with his wife. I never want to be famous.
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