Top of the fold: Kerry-Edwards -- The "one went to war -- one grew up poor" dream ticket... Well, a nightmare, perhaps... No sooner had John Kerry's veep advances been spurned for the umpteenth time by his sweetheart, John McCain, than he announced Plan B: Erstwhile trial lawyer John Edwards would instead join the Demo ticket. Of course, it only took a New York second for Edwards' opponents to launch their criticism. "In the Senate four years -- and that is the full extent of public life -- no international experience, no military experience.... The American people want an experienced hand at the helm of state. This is not the time for on-the-job training in the White House on national-security issues. ... I think that the world is looking for leadership that is tested and sure." Hard-hitting criticism, to say the least, but that's just what Kerry had to say about Edwards prior to tapping him for the bottom of his ticket. So, just who is John Edwards, and why is the man who selected him so skeptical about his ability to lead? As has already been made clear by Demo strategists adhering to their "divide and conquer" class-warfare play-book, Edwards grew up POOR -- in stark contrast to John Kerry. Edwards' father was a mill worker -- an honest job, in stark contrast to his son, a trial lawyer who made his millions suing doctors. Indeed, John Edwards pocketed millions by parading cerebral-palsy babies before emotional juries and winning massive "negligence" awards against obstetricians. Here, the Edwards legacy is an onerous one: Obstetricians, afraid for their professional lives, are now performing four times as many dangerous Caesarean sections as in previous decades -- this despite an utterly dubious link between natural childbirth and cerebral palsy. What's more, the cost of malpractice insurance for obstetricians has gone through the roof, while the number of obstetricians has, understandably, gone through the floor. (The American Medical Association lists 20 states that now have critical shortages of obstetricians.) Through it all, POOR John played his drama parts well, socking away 30% of those multi-million dollar awards. Of course, he picked his cases carefully, turning away the families of children who died in childbirth because living "CP" babies reap much higher awards. (For the record, it is worth noting that most cases of fetal-brain injury occur long before labor begins -- but that inconvenient fact never seemed to deter Edwards.) Who pays for POOR John's luxury accommodations and motor vehicles? You do, of course. The cost of such litigation adds about five percent to the cost of all products and services -- in effect, a hidden tax of about $3,200 on the average household. But we digress. The question was: Who is this POOR John, and why is his running mate so skeptical about his ability to lead? If you want the long answer, link to the Internet's most comprehensive resource on Kerry and Edwards: http://Kerry-04.com/ or http://Kerry-Edwards04.info/ (That's right, seasoned readers of this column know that The Patriot tagged the Kerry-Edwards ticket long ago. Indeed, as noted in The Washington Post this week, we purchased the aforementioned domains in order to develop a strong web presence -- a presence dedicated to telling folks the truth about John Kerry.) As for the short answer, Edwards' only presidential resume builder is that he's a first-term senator. Having spent much of his professional life making money on human misery, POOR John has held no other elected office, and his Senate campaign was funded mostly by fellow trial lawyers. (And, boy, did they ever get their money's worth! Edwards has devoted most of his short tenure in the Senate to blocking any measures aimed at tort reform.) Perhaps most telling about his effectiveness as a legislator is this little statistic: Of the 74 bills he sponsored, not a single one has emerged from committee for a floor vote. The same is true for most of his amendments and resolutions.) Kerry's aforementioned reservations about Edwards notwithstanding, he changed his tune this past Tuesday morning when announcing his pick. Kerry, who can flip-flop faster than a professional pancake maker, chortled, "I want you to know we think this is a dream ticket. We've got better vision. We've got better ideas. We've got real plans. We've got a better sense of what's happening to America. And we've got better hair." We'll certainly cede him that. Kerry, ever a man of the people, spends some $150 for a hair cut at DC's hoity-toity Cristophe Salon. As for John Edwards, well, he actually looks like a Breck Girl. Yet despite their glorious coiffures, Kerry can't be giddy about Edwards' anti-growth (read: anti-jobs) voting record, or his anti-military voting record, or his anti-family voting record, or his anti-tax-cut voting record. In these respects, Edwards does anything but "balance" the Kerry ticket. To the contrary, his populist rural Southern gentlemanly facade simply doesn't square with his hard-Left Senate voting record. In fact, the non-partisan National Journal, which has been rating voting records for a long time, puts Edwards a close fourth behind Kerry, who is rated the most Left-voting member of the Senate. Without question, then, this is the most liberal major-party ticket in American history -- a ticket that outflanks even Mondale-Ferraro. So what can Edwards realistically deliver to the Kerry ticket? Did we mention he grew up POOR? Financial footnote: On the subject of poverty, John Kerry, already the wealthiest member of Congress, is really raking in the bucks. Campaign Kerry has dwarfed the Bush campaign's cash intake this year, reporting more than $175 million in donations -- much of it from his Left elite cadre of Hollywonk glitterati. In addition to all the free Leftmedia advertising, Kerry also gets a bounce from America-hating fiction films like Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11. Quote of the week... "It solidifies the fact that John Kerry is a liberal. ...[It] really solidifies the fact that this is the most liberal ticket that the Democrats have put up for, basically, modern times. If you look at the voting records of those two guys, they are way out there in left field." --Jeb Bush On cross-examination... "Simply put, if Kerry really thought the war on terror was as big a deal as Bush does, there's no way he would pick John Edwards. Edwards is simply not qualified to be one heartbeat from the presidency.... Indeed, during the primaries even Kerry asked his aides about Edwards, 'What makes him think he can be president?'" --Jonah Goldberg "By choosing John Edwards over Dick Gephardt, the Democrats today transferred power in their party from the labor unions to the trial lawyers." --Grover Norquist "I guess with John Kerry's choice of John Edwards as his running mate, he really does want to stand up for all Americans, from those worth only $60 million to those worth in excess of $800 million." --Ann Coulter Open query... "Why would new countries join the U.S.-led coalition [under a 'President' Kerry] when Kerry and other Democrats fail to recognize the sacrifices already made by the United Kingdom, Australia, Italy, Spain and other countries that sent troops -- when the party dismisses Bush's coalition as 'unilateral'?" --Debra Saunders This week's "Alpha Jackass" award: "For this administration, the truth hurts; that is, when the truth is available to the American people. Instead, they often find bliss in the induced ignorance that comes when they deprive the American people of access to information that they have a right to. What are they hiding, and why are they hiding it? In the end, for this administration it is all about power. This lie about the invented connection between al Qaeda and Iraq was and is the key to justifying the current ongoing constitutional power grab by the president. So long as their big, flamboyant lie remains an established fact in the public's mind, President Bush will be seen as justified in taking for himself the power to make war on his whim." --Al Gore The BIG lie... "I oppose abortion, personally. I don't like abortion. I believe life does begin at conception. But I can't take my Catholic belief, my article of faith, and legislate it on a Protestant or a Jew or an atheist...who doesn't share it. We have separation of church and state in the United States of America." --John Kerry Let's dissect this one, just for fun: Kerry spoke about his Catholic "faith," then violated the Demo-faith (in the Abortion god), called abortion a matter of religion (as opposed to life and death) and further, accused good Protestants and Jews of being in favor of abortion. Who's he kidding anyway? Senator Kerry must be getting awfully comfortable in the polls to be speaking of his "personal" beliefs against abortion. The following response from Boston Globe columnist Eileen McNamara, anything but a conservative herself, should make Kerry think twice: "If you believe that life begins at conception, doesn't your conscience compel you to vote in concert with that belief?" asks McNamara. "Just as, if your conscience tells you capital punishment is state-sanctioned murder, you would vote against the death penalty? Or if you believe that gay marriage is a fundamental civil right, you would vote against a constitutional amendment to ban it? I, and I suspect many others who support legal abortion, had mistakenly assumed that, on this very personal issue, Kerry's conscience was at odds with the teaching of his church. His consistent record in favor of abortion rights, family planning, and reproductive freedom was, I thought, a courageous reflection of an independent mind. Now, I don't know what to think. I cannot respectfully disagree with him as I do with an abortion opponent whose conscience prompts her to work to unseat lawmakers like Kerry. I understand her. She is acting on principle, lobbying to change laws antithetical to her conscience. I don't understand him, voting consistently in opposition to what he now tells us is one of his core beliefs." DEMO-gogue campaign quotes... The Flip: "In the Senate four years -- and that is the full extent of public life ' no international experience, no military experience, you can imagine what the advertising is going to be next year.... When I came back from Vietnam in 1969, I don't know if John Edwards was out of diapers then." --John Kerry, January 2004 The Flop: "John Edwards is ready for this job. He is ready for this job." --John Kerry, this week, following the Edwards announcement
Actually John McCain has stated in several interviews (including one with Ton Snow on Fox) that Kerry never asked him to be VP. I'm trying to find a transcript right now.
JSRacing: I hope you can back up your post, because if you're spreading lies there's an atheist c*ck s*cker around here who's going to hound you about it for days.
Doesn't matter. If you do not specifically disclaim, you will not be allowed to rest until a certain poster has the last word. And this certain poster MUST have the last word.
