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The presidential candidacy of Hillary Clinton has unleashed something new upon the political landscape: the wives. More than any previous presidential campaign, the candidates' wives -- especially on the Democratic side -- are stepping forward, speaking out and strutting their own stuff. Outspokenness is suddenly a virtue. Hillary is, in fact, running not only against front-runners Barack Obama and John Edwards, but against their equally powerful and ambitious wives. Ironically, the trend of first lady as co-contender began with Hillary when husband Bill introduced a twofer presidency. Elect me and you get my smart wife, too, he told voters. That...

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Elizabeth Edwards Responds to Attack Over Parenting Skills August 28, 2007 7:36 PM ABC News Sunlen Miller Reports: Elizabeth Edwards is taking some heat about her parenting skills from the mom-friendly website "Silicon Valley Moms Blog." Blogger "Rebecca" wrote a fiery tirade on the site Monday morning attacking Mrs. Edwards choice to bring her two small children, Jack and Emma Claire, on the campaign trail with her while her husband, John Edwards runs for president. "…. you are being a terrible mother, forcing your young children, who should be in SCHOOL, to ride in buses and talk to the press...

Elizabeth Edwards assails Obama, Clinton By BETH FOUHY, Associated Press Writer 24 minutes ago Elizabeth Edwards, wife of Democratic candidate John Edwards, lambastes his rival Barack Obama as "holier than thou" on the Iraq war and accuses Hillary Rodham Clinton of failing to show leadership on health care and Iraq. As her husband trails Clinton and Obama in national polls, Elizabeth Edwards has been an outspoken critic of his opponents. Last month, she said her husband would be a better champion for women as president than Clinton and more recently said, "We can't make John black, we can't make him...

ABC News' Sunlen Miller Reports: In an interview in August's edition of The Progressive magazine, Elizabeth Edwards, wife of former Senator John Edwards, D-N.C., takes candid shots at the other candidates battling for the Democratic nomination against her husband. "The problem for me with the other candidates is I don't know what it is that drives them," she explained, "I should think the president has to be somebody who has that kind of vision outside themselves." Mrs. Edwards praised her husband for apologizing for his vote in favor of the Iraq War, and questioned Senator Hillary Clinton's, D-N.Y., for not...

I just got off a conference call with John Edwards' deputy campaign manager Jonathan Prince and two supporters in the LGBT community in which the campaign sought to portray Edwards as the Democratic field's best champion of gay rights ahead of tonight's debate on gay issues in Los Angeles. Predictably, most questions focused on gay marriage. Edwards, like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, does not support gay marriage but backs civil unions. For the most part, Prince ducked the question of why Edwards does not support marriage by emphasizing the candidate's advocacy for civil unions, which he called "an issue...

"That's no first lady, that's my wife!" -- Badabump. -- It's open season apparently on the wives and children of GOP presidential candidates. In a display of judgment worthy of People magazine, Washington Post editors decided the fact that Mrs. Fred Thompson once had a boyfriend when she was single is big news. (Gee, did Michelle Obama? Would Elizabeth Edwards kiss on a first date?) Meanwhile, The New York Times ran a story on the Giulianis' response to Vanity Fair's nasty little gossipy profile of Judith Giuliani, Giuliani's Princess Bride." OK, so the tiara was a bit much. And true,...

Web video and social networks are two of the hottest technologies for Campaign '08. Video is ready for prime time, social networking is a relative unknown. Video arrived in 2006, when George Allen, then a Republican Virginia senator, called a rival staffer the crypto-racist slur "macaca." The clip of the incident helped tip the Senate to the Democrats. The Web can be liberating. "It's about bypassing the sieve of the mainstream media," says Elizabeth Edwards, wife and confidant of Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards. "The idea that you have people standing between you and the voter is diminished, and the...

Web video and social networks are two of the hottest technologies for Campaign '08. Video is ready for prime time, social networking is a relative unknown. Video arrived in 2006, when George Allen, then a Republican Virginia senator, called a rival staffer the crypto-racist slur "macaca." The clip of the incident helped tip the Senate to the Democrats. The Web can be liberating. "It's about bypassing the sieve of the mainstream media," says Elizabeth Edwards, wife and confidant of Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards. "The idea that you have people standing between you and the voter is diminished, and the...

Wife of presidential candidate and former senator John Edwards (D-NC), Elizabeth Edwards asserted that her husband was “more of a woman than Hillary Clinton ever will be. Senator Clinton (D-NY) is more like a man than she is like a woman. John is not like that. He is more sensitive like a woman is. Why, he cried for days after the 2004 election. I doubt that Hillary could squeeze out a tear while peeling onions.” Elizabeth Edwards contended that, based on his sensitivity, her husband would be more like America’s first female president than Hillary Clinton would. This dig was...

No tangerines for you? July 24, 2007 The politics of global warming got very concrete, and oddly difficult, In a meeting with local environmentalists in the coastal town of McClellanville today, where Elizabeth Edwards raised in passing the importance of relying on locally-grown fruit. "We've been moving back to 'buy local,'" Mrs. Edwards said, outlining a trade policy that "acknowledges the carbon footprint" of transporting fruit. "I live in North Carolina. I'll probably never eat a tangerine again," she said, speaking of a time when the fruit is reaches the price that it "needs" to be. Edwards had talked about...

Elizabeth Edwards is dying and knows it. No one who has not battled a dread disease, only to see it recur with a vengeance, can know her emotional state or should presume to judge how she chooses to live the unknowable - but finite - number of days she has left.The Wall Street Journal (subscription required) describes how she’s been spending her "nights and days": Mrs. Edwards's world these days is jam-packed with incongruous experiences. In public, she says she's continuing to campaign for her husband's presidential bid because she doesn't want to let cancer win before it kills her....

Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards included Helena-West Helena in his recent eight-state tour focusing on poverty issues. But local leaders feel somewhat slighted. Mayor James Valley says Edwards' brief visit was disappointing. Valley says he had wanted to hear more about what Edwards envisioned for east Arkansas, and he had hoped to pitch to the former senator from North Carolina reasons why there should be more development in the state's struggling Delta region. The Reverend Julious McGruder of the New Zion Missionary Baptist Church said he was glad to have the chance to see a presidential candidate, but said he...

WASHINGTON (AP) - It's no surprise that a spouse of a Democratic presidential candidate would steal the spotlight. No one expected that person would be Elizabeth Edwards. John Edwards' wife has challenged conservative pundit Ann Coulter, and recently criticized Democratic front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton. She told an audience in New Hampshire last week that she's for the promotion of women, but not for the promotion of just one woman. This week, Mrs. Edwards told the online magazine Salon that her husband would be a more consistent champion for women if elected president than Clinton, seeking to become the first female...

Quick -- which is Hillary Clinton's bigger liability as a candidate?: A. she's an insufficiently ardent feminist; orB. her personality is cold, calculating and unfeminine. If you've been living on Planet Earth since 1992, surely your answer is 'B.' So when Elizabeth Edwards adds fuel to that fire, accusing Hillary of behaving like a man, that is very newsworthy stuff. Unless you're NBC or ABC, that is. "Today" and "Good Morning America" ran segments this morning on Mrs. Edwards' recent interview with Salon.com in which she made comments critical of Hillary. The networks focused on Elizabeth's relatively benign comment:She's just...

Elizabeth Edwards says her husband would be a better advocate for women as president than his rival Hillary Rodham Clinton. The wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards says keeping a door open to women is more a policy of her husband's than Clinton's. Edwards says she sympathizes with Clinton, who is running to be the first female president. She says she faced challenges early in her career as a female lawyer and says she understands the pressures Clinton must feel. A Clinton spokesman says the campaign will not comment on Elizabeth Edwards' remarks.

Why does the elegant senator from North Carolina continue his run for the presidency? Washington correspondent Geoff Elliott reports: POOR John Edwards. He follows Barack Obama on the podium at a conference of mostly anti-war Democrats and it's like watching air whistle out of a balloon. Obama, a charismatic candidate for change in the mould of Bill Clinton and John F. Kennedy, has just worked the crowd brilliantly. Then Edwards walks in, a little later than scheduled at the Take Back America conference, thanks to an impromptu grab-and-grip show from Obama. Cameras are being pocketed again and seats resumed for...

Elizabeth Edwards told a prominent gay rights group Saturday night that her husband, presidential candidate John Edwards, would help repeal more than a thousand laws that discriminate against same-sex couples. As she campaigns for her husband in California, Elizabeth Edwards has staked out an independent position on gay rights. She appeared last month at a breakfast before San Francisco's gay pride parade, where she announced her support for gay marriage. The next day, her husband, John Edwards, said her position surprised even him. The former North Carolina Sen. opposes gay marriage but supports civil unions. Her speech Saturday to the...

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(AP) SAN FRANCISCO -- Elizabeth Edwards told a prominent gay rights group Saturday night that her husband—presidential candidate John Edwards—would help repeal more than a thousand laws that discriminate against same-sex couples. As she campaigns for her husband in California, Elizabeth Edwards has staked out an independent position on gay rights by announcing her support for gay marriage. John Edwards said her position surprised even him. The former North Carolina Senator opposes gay marriage but supports civil unions. Elizabeth Edwards also called for tougher federal hate crimes legislation, and cited the story of 26-year-old Satendar Singh—who died recently after being...

Three months after Elizabeth Edwards said that her cancer had returned in inoperable form, her role and influence in John Edwards’s presidential campaign is undiminished. She has made a flurry of charged public appearances, become a regular presence advising Mr. Edwards on the campaign trail, and wields behind-the-scenes influence in many internal campaign decisions, aides said. Mrs. Edwards has also become a free operator on behalf of her husband of 29 years, a development that her friends suggest reflects the clarity and perspective that come from her cancer diagnosis, and her increasingly confident political instincts as she advises Mr. Edwards,...

After getting hammered for years by the conservative takeover of talk radio, Democrats are fighting back on several fronts — from challenging their foes on air to endorsing the revival of the Fairness Doctrine, the abandoned federal regulation that once obligated broadcasters to balance the political opinion they air. Elizabeth Edwards, wife of Democratic presidential contender John Edwards, raised the roof on this emerging campaign against conservative punditry by phoning in to MSNBC’s “Hardball” on Tuesday to debate right-wing icon Ann Coulter. Behind the scenes, prominent Democratic lawmakers are exploring the idea of more regulation. While some of this is...

Elizabeth Edwards, the wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, has been making the media rounds this week attacking conservative author Ann Coulter for 'hate speech.' However, just two months ago Edwards launched an unprovoked attacked on her private citizen neighbor in an interview with the Associated Press.Edwards initiated her assault on Coulter with a phoned in confrontation with Coulter on MSNBC's Hardball show on Tuesday.Edwards was upset that Coulter has criticized her husband and other Democratic presidential candidates for using the deaths of their siblings and children to score political points, as well as Coulter's well publicized but mischaracterized...

WHY ISN’T THE PRESS CHALLENGING ELIZABETH EDWARDS TO CONDEMN THE EDWARDS PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN FOR HIRING AND DEFENDING HATEFUL BLOGGERS? ALEXANDRIA, VA --- Elizabeth Edwards, wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, has called on Americans to stop conservative Ann Coulter’s “hate words.” But when that campaign hired two hateful, anti-Christian bigots as “official” bloggers, Mrs. Edwards did not object and the campaign decided to give them a “fair shake,” as John Edwards said. The bloggers resigned in February only after their bigoted writings were exposed by other bloggers and conservative talk radio, causing a huge embarrassment. ABC, CBS, and NBC...

RALEIGH, N.C. (June 27) - Elizabeth Edwards pleaded Tuesday with Ann Coulter to "stop the personal attacks," a day after the conservative commentator said she wished Edwards' husband, Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, had been killed by terrorists

Chris Matthews should keep his evening job. Appearing on this morning's "Today," the Hardball host was manifestly bleary-eyed [see screencap below] and off his game.Matthews was in, at 7:12 am EDT, to discuss with "Today" co-host Meredith Vieira the dust-up on last night's "Hardball," reported here by NewsBuster Geoffrey Dickens, between Ann Coulter and Elizabeth Edwards. Matthews couldn't keep his names straight. He first referred to Coulter as "Ann Edwards," then recycled the "Ann Edwards" moniker in referring to Elizabeth Edwards. HARDBALL HOST CHRIS MATTHEWS: Well that was a pretty tough crowd, and if you think Ann Edwards is over...

Chris Matthews bushwacks Ann Coulter by setting up a call from Elizabeth Edwards during his full hour with Coulter on Hardball last night.Video Here Mrs. Edwards gets owned by Ann Coulter when it is brought up the sleezy tactics that Edwards (A Democrat candidate for President of the United States of America) has used in his profession as an Attorney that exploits doctors and children for his own enrichment.

Elizabeth Edwards received thunderous applause during a speech in San Francisco as part of Sunday’s Gay Pride celebration. Elizabeth Edwards, wife of 2008 presidential candidate former U.S. Sen. John Edwards, advocated her husband’s democratic campaign and addressed issues pertaining to poverty, the U.S. involvement in the Iraq war and lesbian and gay rights, among other topics. As members of the audience held up John Edwards campaign posters, Elizabeth Edwards conveyed her and her husband’s beliefs regarding one of the most important issues to many San Franciscans: the rights of gay and lesbian American citizens. “Everyone should have the same rights...

Let us say right up front that it's terrific that John Edwards lives in a country where he can lose an election and still land a $480,000 part-time job as a consultant to an investment firm that keeps its hedge funds in the Cayman Islands as a tax shelter for its clients. This truly is the land of opportunity. We're also encouraged to hear that, according to the former Senator's spokesman, "John Edwards is running for President to give every American the opportunities that he's had." While there may not be enough half-a-million-dollar-a-year part-time consulting gigs to go around just...

Democrat John Edwards said Tuesday that he worked for a hedge fund between presidential campaigns to learn about financial markets and their relationship to poverty—and to make money too. In an interview with The Associated Press, the former North Carolina senator said his yearlong, part-time position with Fortress Investment Group helped his understanding of the connection but he has more to learn. Edwards has made eradicating poverty a focus of his second White House bid. Edwards, a multimillionaire after years as a trial lawyer, would not disclose how much he got paid for a year of consulting beginning in October...

It is the haircut that will not die. He can spin it, he can gel it, he can mousse it. But it is not going away. John Edwards' $400 haircuts will live forever. The Smithsonian Institution is probably trying to find the clippings now. They will be put in a glass case so schoolchildren of the future can learn from them. I was willing never to write about the haircuts again. Edwards got two of them for $400 each and charged them to his campaign, which means he charged them to his campaign contributors. When this became public, he said...

Elizabeth Edwards said Monday her husband will do more to help women than any other candidate, including the one hoping to become the nation's first female president. "If you want to make a difference in women's lives by your vote in 2008, vote for John Edwards," she said in a brief interview with The Associated Press between campaign stops. "That is not intended as an anti-Hillary statement of any kind," she added, referring to Sen. Hillary Clinton, the front-runner for the Democratic nomination. Earlier, Elizabeth Edwards told Southern New Hampshire College students that empowering women is about more than seeing...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- When this year's presidential candidates were children, the word cancer — the Big C — was something of a taboo. As adults, these candidates are discussing their various cancer battles with almost matter-of-fact candor, chatting about PSA tests and lymph nodes and the like as they try to frame their health histories as just another part of their political profile. Voters, too, have developed a more nuanced view of what it means to have cancer. But the 2008 elections may help to measure whether there is any lingering fear factor attached to presidential contenders who have had...

Two Americas When Sen. John Edwards ran for president four years ago, the North Carolina Democrat declared that President Bush had divided the nation into "two Americas ... one America that does the work, another America that reaps the reward." Turns out that the other America lives right next door to the 28,000-square-foot, $5.3 million mansion Mr. Edwards has built near Chapel Hill, N.C. The Edwards' neighbor, Monty Johnson, lives on 42 acres that the Johnson family has owned for decades. Mr. Johnson, 55, has been known to brandish firearms to chase away trespassers, which frightens the former senator's wife,...

"CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) - Elizabeth Edwards said Tuesday that she got some good news: She has a type of cancer that is more likely to be controlled by anti-estrogen drugs.Mrs. Edwards, wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, expressed frustration with reports that she's likely to die within five years. She said doctors can't give her a reliable life expectancy and even if they could, the information would be of no comfort to her."

After disclosing that her breast cancer, first diagnosed before the 2004 election, had spread to her bones, Elizabeth Edwards became a symbol of how to cope with recurrence. The wife of Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards, Elizabeth sat down with NEWSWEEK's Jonathan Alter at the Edwardses' new house in Chapel Hill, N.C...

Elizabeth Edwards’ cancer has returned. She and her family must be devastated and angry. Instead of an illness free future, they are now facing many of the same options they’ve had to deal with for years. Are they surprised? I doubt it. Chronic illness has a profound and lasting impact on the afflicted as well as their families. There is a paradigm shift in the way you approach your life. With chronic illness, you live with the pain and plan for it, and you cherish those periods when the pain goes away or just abates for a little while. My...

John and Elizabeth Edwards stood side-by-side in the North Carolina sunshine to announce that her cancer was back and that his run for the presidency would go forward at full speed. It was a sympathetic tableau that drew an immediate outpouring of well wishes from people of all political persuasions. "You can cower in the corner and hide or you can be tough and go out there and stand up for what you believe in," Edwards said. His wife said her illness was a hurdle they would surmount together. That sort of can-do optimism in a grim and unavoidable situation...

WASHINGTON — John Edwards, the North Carolina Democrat making a second bid for the presidency, announced late Wednesday night that he would hold a news conference Thursday, a day after he and his wife, Elizabeth, visited Mrs. Edwards’ doctor to assess her health following her recovery from breast cancer. Mrs. Edwards, in a brief interview from her home in Chapel Hill, said she and Mr. Edwards would discuss her health at the news conference, but she declined to elaborate. “I’m still here,” she said. Jennifer Palmieri, communications director for the Edwards campaign, said that she would not provide any details...

Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards is expected to resume campaign activities Thursday after canceling an Iowa appearance to return home for his wife's medical appointment. Spokeswoman Jennifer Palmieri said Wednesday that Edwards was to join his wife Elizabeth for a follow-up medical visit. Elizabeth Edwards underwent months of treatment for breast cancer, which has been in remission. Palmieri declined to discuss details of Wednesday's appointment, Elizabeth Edwards' condition or even where the visit was to take place. The campaign has said John Edwards accompanied his wife on similar visits in the past, which all resulted in clean bills of health....

The quotation marks in the title of this DUFU edition are intentional. Although loony Edwards blogger, Amanda Marcotte, apparently "quit" the campaign, it is more likely that she was fired AGAIN. Again? But...but didn't John Edwards show backbone by standing by her when her extreme anti-Catholic postings came to light? That was the OFFICIAL story. What I have been hearing is that, according to Salon.Com, the Edwards campaign (meaning the Breck Girl or his wife) FIRED Marcotte only to rehire her back when there was such a large backlash among the nutroots. Of course, Edwards could not risk losing...

In a biting personal and political dig, the wife of John Edwards said yesterday she's "happier" and "more joyful" than Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton - her husband's possible Democratic rival in the 2008 presidential race. "She and I are from the same generation. We both went to law school and married other lawyers, but after that, we made other choices," Elizabeth Edwards said. "I think my choices have made me happier. I think I'm more joyful than she is." Her shocking salvo, made Thursday during a Ladies Home Journal luncheon to promote her new memoir, "Saving Graces," also included a...

Elizabeth Edwards was diagnosed with breast cancer the day after her husband, John Edwards, and John Kerry lost the 2004 presidential election. She spent 16 weeks undergoing chemotherapy, had a lumpectomy, and then had six weeks of radiation. Today, although plagued by lymphedema – numbness in the hands and feet that is a common, often lifelong effect of lymph node removal – she is cancer free. She and John, 53, who now heads an antipoverty center, are settling into their dream home near Chapel Hill, N.C., with Emma Claire, 8, and Jack, 6, their two younger children. Daughter Cate, 24,...

Casey Sheehan was born May 29, 1979, the first born child of Cindy and Pat Sheehan. It was a long labor. Fifty-one days after Casey was born, our first child, Wade was born, also after a long labor. They started school the same year, played the same games, watched the same television shows, loved the same country. On April 4, 1996, three weeks after going to Washington as a winner in a national contest about what America meant to him, Wade died in an automobile accident. On April 4, 2004, eight years later to the day, Casey, who loved his...

Conservative radio host Laura Ingraham, on whose show we've appeared several times, has just had surgery for breast cancer. We wish her the best. So does Elizabeth Edwards, wife of the former North Carolina senator and Democratic vice presidential nominee, who herself has been suffering from breast cancer. Mrs. Edwards is an occasional contributor to the Angry Left Web site DemocraticUnderground.com, where she posted on a thread about Ingraham's ailment: I have been a Democrat for a long time, and part of the Democratic principles that attracted me as a young person and kept me a Democrat all these years...

"Compassionate" liberals? You wouldn't get that impression from the hate spewed from Democratic Underground upon the news of Laura Ingraham being diagnosed with breast cancer. "nonews" posts a thread stating: "Laura Ingraham has breast cancer, Let's keep her in our prayers. "nothingshocksmeanymore" responds: "No. Cancer isn't a good thing, but it's her problem. I fell no obligation to pray for people who make the world worse. Several others post similar comments. Then "ElizabethEdwards" responds to "nothingshocksmeanymore": "Of course we wish the best for her in this fight. I have been a Democrat for a long time, and part of the...

Sen. John Edwards' wife, Elizabeth, is a frequent commenter in the far-left fever swamps of the Democratic Underground discussion forum (see, for example, here and here). Yesterday, Mrs. Edwards surfaced on a DU thread about conservative radio talk show hostess extraordinaire Laura Ingraham, who underwent surgery yesterday for breast cancer. (Hat tip: Reader Eddie.) When the DUers started spewing their usual bile and wishing ill on Ingraham, Mrs. Edwards tried to intervene: I have been a Democrat for a long time, and part of the Democratic principles that attracted me as a young person and kept me a Democrat all...

The DUmmies were all atwitter with their plans to “freep” the Larry King show tonight as you can see in this DUmmie THREAD titled, “Effort to ask Edwards about irregularities on Larry King Live 9pm et.” Some might consider it in poor taste to call in to insert politics in a show that is supposed to be about Elizabeth Edwards’ battle with breast cancer but the DUmmies planned to push forward their tinfoil hat agenda despite this. Unfortunately, for the DUmmies, their plan has once again blown up in their face as you can see in the last Dummie post...

The low-carb craze has passed its prime, as companies report a pickup in the sales of starch-heavy food. General Mills Inc., which makes cereals such as Cheerios, Lucky Charms, Wheaties and Trix, said sales climbed almost 3 percent in the third quarter, to $2.58 billion from $2.51 billion a year ago.

You’ve probably heard of the Democratic Underground , the ultimate liberal cocoon, where Democrats let their darkest, ugliest feelings out into the open. Well, it turns out that Elizabeth Edwards may be an ardent DUer! Here’s a message posted by someone who purports to be her (it seems quite credible): You know that I read DU and have for quite some time, long before any of you knew my name. I really appreciate the support you have given me on this latest hurdle and before. It means a lot to me and to John.Now that I have more time, I...