Posted on 12/28/2006 10:51:11 AM PST by kingattax
Amid Iraq Talk, White House Hopeful Sticks to '04 Issue in '08 Run
For the roughly two dozen candidates considering a run for the White House, it is perhaps the jackpot question: What might be the winning message in a contest whose first nominating vote is still more than a year away?
Today, former Sen. John Edwards begins testing his hunch that Americans, though focused now on the war in Iraq, can be won over to a campaign built on what he calls "the great moral issue of our time" -- fighting poverty at home. He plans to do so with an unorthodox announcement of his candidacy, not standing on a flag-draped stage, but volunteering his labor in New Orleans's Lower Ninth Ward, which is still struggling to recover from Hurricane Katrina.
The North Carolina Democrat's theme of ending the "Two Americas" of haves and have-nots dates to his 2004 presidential bid. Mr. Edwards didn't win his party's nomination then, but his strong reception among voters helped him to secure a place as Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry's running mate. Mr. Edwards argues that the disparity between the richest Americans and the working class has widened since then.
"When I talked about poverty in the 2004 campaign, political types said it was futile," he said in a speech this year. "They said nobody cares about poverty except for the poor. Not true, and we saw it with Katrina."
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Yesterday's NYT editorial written by Paul Dufus Krugman also focused on "Poverty" and how England is doing so much better than the USA in that regard. Was Dregs Krugman setting the table for his buddy Edwards? It's an interesting coincidence, otherwise. I hope more Dims jump on that band wagon 'cause I think the poverty issue is headed towards the cliff. I just love it when the enemy is so completely out of touch with the electorate.
Yes, the ol' wealth-redistribution mantra...the poverty he's talkin' about will be those of us who will have our incomes appropriated "for the common good".
Using the simpleton method, one can look at the issue as since 10% of the population holds 90% of the wealth, then 90% don't and with their votes for giving the money to them, I can get elected!
Edwards hasn't said how he would fund all this unearned prosperity, but the math says that anyone doing well in this country should be very afraid.
Try 40.
"has there ever been a bigger execise in futility ?"
This crap just never stops! It's the same thing every time the Dems think they're in power. Poverty/Racism/Guns/The environment.......
I'm hungry now. It's lunch time and I left my wallet at home :(
Today's "poor" are middle-class by the standards of my youth. Almost all of them have color TV, most have a microwave oven, a majority have a car and air-conditioning, and many own their own homes.
Democrats are obsessed with the "gap" between the so-called poor and the so-called rich. It's the wrong question. The real question is how many people in America lack the necessities of life. Edwards doesn't want to face that answer.
Onward Shyster Soldiers, Marching Off to Sue!
Most of those in "poverty" as the Breck Girl defines it have more TVs, more cell phones/blackberries, nicer tennis shoes and more bling than I'll ever have.
SOCIALISTS believe all is lost UNTIL every person in the nation has equal assets, with only people in POWER [him] deciding what level of equality is correct for all!!
He is the nation's new poverty pimp!!
The worst part is that lots of Americans will fall for this line of crap
Perhaps Rosie O'Donnelll trying to get into a size 6 of any fashion?
The Great Society has turned America into a Great Quagmire.
Black folk have a 50% drop our rate from school; fatherhood has become a varsity sport and abortion on demand kills, and the District of Columbia has an HIV positive rate among adult citizens that is higher than 24 sub-Saharan countries.
Yup. What we need are more poverty programs to keep folks poor.
Mr. Edwards is a raging megalomaniac with no ideas about anything but how to pander to poor people - who don't vote.
God, he's stupid.
Oh, that's what we should call Edwards! A poverty pimp. I like it.
One of the most popular gifts this year were large screen HDTV's. As someone once said in India: "I want to live in America where even the poor are fat."
Absolutely. Recently, Rush Limbaugh cited a study by a scholar from AEI (Nicholas Eberstadt) who demonstrated that today's "poverty" standards are equivalent to US middle class living standards of the 1960s.
Transfer payments aren't included in calculating "poverty income," etc....
Hey - thanks for that link. I've saved it in a file.
War against subtraction going on for 39 - 4 = 15 posts. :-).
Of course a rich, ambulance-chasing trial lawyer knows EVERYTHING about poverty, doesn't he?
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