Title Match

Everybody on TV is talking about the showdown between Elizabeth Edwards and Ann Coulter on MSNBC last night. I think Elizabeth did a great job while showing that you can have class and still participate in the political process. For years, I have been waiting for someone to tell Ann Coulter that what she does is not called for or journalistic. Hopefully, the message will get across this time.

The whole thing got me thinking about the role of political spouses. The Democratic spouses seem to be more and more involved every cycle. This year the big spouse stories have been: Elizabeth Edwards' cancer, Michelle Obama giving up her high-powered job, and of course, the possibility of a first gentleman. The question for me is how much should/does a political spouse affect the voters' decisions?

As an aside, Ann Coulter was in Charlotte just a few months ago for the Southern Evangelical Seminary program. I cannot imagine what she added to the spiritual discussion.

Cross posted at BlueNC.

Editor's note: I changed the post time on this for editorial reasons.

A class act

Hearing Thursday’s news about Elizabeth Edwards immediately took me back to November 2003 when I learned firsthand what a wonderful person she is.

With two vanloads of volunteers, mostly from Western NC, we were enroute to New Hampshire to spend a week knocking doors and phoning voters in advance of the nation’s first primary. We stopped overnight in Arlington, VA and got up early to hand out Edwards literature to Virginians before continuing on our way. It was snowing hard.

We knew it was a longshot, but we had requested that Elizabeth Edwards meet us bright and early outside a subway stop to join us for two hours greeting commuters (and potential voters in the February Virginia primary). We got an aide’s call that the Senator’s wife was stuck in their snowy driveway and might or might not make it.

But sure enough, a half hour later there she was, having apparently shoveled her car out herself. “I wasn’t going to miss a group of North Carolinians up here for a visit,” she said, “especially on their way to New Hampshire.” She spent the next hour and a half as cold as we were, greeting with a smile the often-surly subway riders.

When we ran low on literature, I distinctly remember her digging into a nearby trashcan, where lots of people had immediately ditched the fliers. “I don’t normally rummage through trashcans,” she said, “but these are still perfectly good.” Then she handed the same fliers out again, to more surly commuters.

Elizabeth Edwards is a class act, with a huge heart, tremendous intelligence, and lots of moxie. In my current role with the Party I can’t favor candidates in primaries. But I’ve seen nothing about favoring their spouses. I vote for Elizabeth Edwards and always will.

Photos by Pat Crawford.

Letter from Senator Edwards

Elizabeth and I are so grateful for your prayers and wishes. Your support means a great deal to us during this difficult time.

As you may have heard, yesterday we found out that Elizabeth's breast cancer is back, but confined mainly to her bones. Although this isn't the news we wanted to hear, we are very optimistic. Having been through many struggles together in the past, we know that the key is to keep your head up, keep moving and be strong. And that's exactly what we intend to do.

Elizabeth and I have been married for nearly 30 years and we will be in this every step of the way together. We will keep a positive attitude and always look for the silver lining—that's what we do.

Although the cancer is no longer curable, it is treatable, and many patients in similar circumstances have lived full, energetic lives. We expect nothing less for Elizabeth. She expects to do all the things next week that she did last week.

Our campaign goes on and it goes on strongly. We are so proud of the campaign we are running—a campaign based on ideas and reaching out to people. This campaign is not about me or Elizabeth—it's about all the people we have met these past few years and people like them all across America and the world—people worried about feeding and clothing their kids; people without health care; people facing hardships overseas.

Both of us are committed to this campaign. We're committed to this cause and we're committed to changing this country we love so much.

Thank you again for your support and for standing with us.

John Edwards