It's sad and sort of absurd to watch the continued destruction of John Edwards. We're well past the point where there's any doubt about his failures and flaws, nor any sensible chance at a rehabilitated career... yet the one-two punch of Game Change and now Andrew Young's tell-all allow for the laying of a last few shots.
Watching it unfold, it's clear that part of what's driving the anger is betrayal and disappointment. And it's made me realize that I'm starting to feel sympathetic towards Edwards... because I was never so impressed to begin with. Disappointment, to me anyway, seemed built into some of the outsize expectations laid on Edwards from his arrival in the Senate, through his run as VP candidate and his failed run in 2008 against Obama and Clinton.
I had to do some pretty intensive searching to revive a couple of pieces I wrote back in 2008, back in the moments before the race coalesced into Clinton v. Obama, when support was still in flux and smart people were still weighing their options (I'll remain honest... that's when Dennis Kucinich won me over). At the time, my friends and regular readers questioned my being down on Edwards, that I wasn't giving him a chance or critiquing him unfairly. I like to think time has proven me more right than wrong in my assessments.
Moreover, I think the rise, fall, and now complete ruination of Edwards are instructive about what we look for, politically (right or left), and how easily image can overtake substance. I was reminded, watching moments of Andrew Young flog his book, about how much credit Edwards got for a "poverty story" that seemed to suggest a real focus on poverty issues that many found essential going into the 2008 election. And, for someone like Young, how obviously tales of "son of a mill worker" coming from Edwards didn't match up to the fussy, needy millionaire he served.
I'm not making this point to toot some horn about perceptiveness on my part; I was struck, talking with my Mom, at how we both agreed that we'd never really bought Edwards... but I freely admit, he could have won me over if he'd made some different choices (especially on policy issues), and given some more speeches. No, I think the lesson here is cultural, for all of us: as long as American culture deals more in images than substance, falls for pretty faces with earnest messages... we will just be getting ourselves fooled. Over and over. And wondering, in the aftermath, how we could be so betrayed.
I think people looked at John Edwards, so handsome, so earnest, so well spoken... and wanted to believe. Wanted to believe with such energy and such fervor, that even he started to believe he could be what he wasn't. He was bound to let his fans - all of us, really - down. All I can say is... I figured he would.
It's something to remember, say, when we consider the future paths of... oh I don't know... Evan Bayh, maybe? Patrick Kennedy? Or - more obviously to many liberals - Sarah Palin? As a nation we're kind to celebrities... too kind, really. We fall for good looks and charm and family connections and that ... something extra they seem to have... and tell them they're wonderful and fabulous and don't ever change... and then wonder why they don't change, and turn out to have flaws. The mistake we make isn't that we trusted them until they betrayed us... it's that we joined in the game of pretending not to see what was right in front of us, all along. They are going to break your heart; but only if you put it out there to begin with. Which is probably a good, timely Valentine's reminder about many things... including Barack Obama.
Well said (as always).
I never liked John Edwards. He always seemed to be an empty shirt to me. This includes both 2004 and 2008. I could never really put my finger on exactly what it is that made me not like or trust him, but in the unfolding of this mess, I suppose I was sensing this over-arching arrogance and sense of entitlement that seemed to always be relatively close to the surface. I mean really, you'd have to be self-delusional to think that an affair and a love child wouldn't come out in the press eventually!
Evan Bayh unfortunately doesn't even have the political skills of even Edwards. Granted, it was a different time, but when I read the interview with Birch Bayh on MyDD and really got a feel for what he accomplished in 3 terms in the Senate, it just made me sick to see how little Evan Bayh really accomplished. Ugh...I need to stop thinking about him. It's giving me an ulcer. :)
Posted by: Nick | February 17, 2010 at 12:56 AM
Which is probably a good, timely Valentine's reminder about many things... including Barack Obama.
I was wondering if you were going to get to the "elephant in the room" on this topic of image vs. substance.
Posted by: jinb | February 17, 2010 at 03:00 AM