‘I’m Going to Speak the Truth’
John Edwards has 'bold ideas,' but not much time to get them across.
This is it. John Edwards, who has all but lived in Iowa since 2004, is now in his final push in the Hawkeye State. Last week, aboard his campaign bus on a trip from Grinnell to Des Moines, Edwards talked to NEWSWEEK's Arian Campo-Flores about honing his message to voters. Excerpts:
Campo-Flores: You've been here campaigning, on and off, for four years. But polls show you still in third. What are you going to do?
Edwards: My responsibility is to close this campaign in Iowa with a very specific set of ideas about how we give all Americans the chances I've had … It's what I've been able to do, and we can do it again … both the specific policy ideas and also the heartfelt passion behind it, which is real, and they need to see it.
When you were a trial lawyer, you tested your arguments before mock juries. You've been testing your messages now as a campaigner—
—but there is no "mock" now. This is for real. Every time I speak, I'm speaking to people who actually go to caucuses.
But you have been focus-grouping your message?
I don't want to talk about what other people do on my behalf. My best feedback is what I feel in these events, what I hear and see in these events, which are real. People who are choosing—not just people who support me, but people who are choosing—I think they see a strength and a passion that is driven by my own life experience, and that's what they respond to.
There's been some tinkering, though, with the message, how you convey the message.
You mean more positive.
Yeah.
It's my responsibility to give them the specific reasons why I should be president, both from my own life experience and what drives me to what it is I want to do for the country and the world.
Were you getting any negative feedback on the period when you were more combative with Hillary Clinton?
Not really, no. I thought it was important for people to understand the differences, the substantive policy differences between us, and now I think we're at the stage where it's time to focus on why I want to be president.
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Member Comments
Posted By: Irishone1006 @ 01/17/2008 11:17:03 AM
Comment: Comment: I am in a state of shock that we have not heard any comments on John Edward's past as a lawyer. Can anyone explain how a personal injusry attorney can sue the Red Cross three times, live ina 30,000 square foot mansion and clain the he is working for the common man?
Posted By: dieder345HC @ 12/26/2007 4:09:43 PM
Comment: For the nay sayers. give Edwards his due. He is as straightforward as any candidate in either party, re: convictions on the major issues. Particularly impressive is how his wife Elizabeth has strongly campaigned for Edwards, notwithstanding her on-going health issues. He may not have all the answers or even the right answers on some issues, but then again, what other candidate does? I find myself much more inclined to support Edwards than I do any of the current crop of Republican candidates. After seven years of an administration that fesd at the trough of corporate interests, his populist-centered message resonates with many.
I am not sure that any one candidate will provide an answer to illegal immigration that will please all. Illegal immigration will be effectively addressed only when both parties commit to addressing the challenge in a bipartisan way - not in the interest of any one party but in the transcendent, best interests of our nation..
Posted By: InNM07 @ 12/20/2007 12:25:18 AM
Comment: like John Edwards. I think he is the most honest of the Dems. I did like Obama and I wrote him to be agressive on border security and stopping illegal immigration. What did Obama do? The fool is for comprehensive immigration reform (amnesty) buckling to all the Latino activist groups who think the US belongs to them and speaks against Lou Dobbs on CNN.
Now I say to the Edwards group, STOP this invasion, speak up about illegal immigration, say you will BUILD the fence on the border (funding just gutted by the Dems in a sneak bill), PUNISH employers of illegals. The US is not responsible to support Mexico and we need to tell Calderon to Shut up and fix his own country. Mr. Edwards, you have to speak up as the other democratic candidates are hiding their agenda of amnesty.