The Closing Argument For John Edwards

The Closing Argument For John Edwards

by Miles Mogulescu


To Democratic caucus-goers in Iowa: For the past 9 months, the mainstream media has tried to turn the race for the Democratic Presidential nomination into a two-person race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, although not a single voter has cast a ballot.

Tonight, you have the ability to force the media to change their story by voting for John Edwards.

It is not surprising that the mainstream media should try to prematurely shut Edwards out of the race, because he is the one leading Democrat who truly challenges the political dominance of corporate America. And after all, the mainstream media, largely controlled by horizontally and vertically integrated corporations, is but one arm of corporate America with a vested interest in maintaining the status quo in Washington. Edwards challenges that status quo.

Hillary Clinton is intimately tied in to corporate America. She has received more campaign contributions from pharmaceutical makers, commercial banks, Wall Street investment houses, and the real estate sector than any other candidate, Democratic or Republican. Her politics of triangulation plays progressivism off against conservatism to effect small-bore change that doesn't challenge the powerful special interests or the way that Washington does business. The very premise of her campaign is that she can work the present Washington system better than her opponents, not that she will change the way Washington does business. Hillary won't promise to withdraw all American comat troops from Iraq before 2012, voted for the Kyle-Lieberman Iran resolution encouraging the aggressive militaristic stance of the Bush Administration, and calls for increasing the size of the Army by 100,000, thus taking money away from pressing domestic needs.

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Obama can be inspiring in speaking about change. But his calls for change are largely symbolic and lack substance. Obama has raised almost as much money from Wall Street investment bankers as has Clinton. As New York magazine has reported, the difference between Hillary's Wall Street backers and Obama's Wall Street backers is largely generational with investment bankers in their fifties and sixties supporting Clinton and those in their forties supporting Obama.

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John Edwards responds that "some people argue that we're going to sit at the table with these people and they're going to voluntarily give their power away. I think it's a complete fantasy; it will never happen." If Obama thinks the way to bring change to Washington is for a bunch of insiders to sit around the table with the corporate special interests, he is dreaming. These special interests are all about using their money and power to manipulate the government to increase their bottom lines. Insurance companies and drug companies are not interested in universal health care for all Americans. Big energy companies are not interested in developing alternative fuels, capping greenhouse gases, or ending America's reliance on oil. Hedge fund managers are not interested in having their billion dollar incomes taxed at a marginal rate of 28% like the wage income of the companies they invest in, instead of at the special rate of 15%. Edwards will use the bully pulpit of the Presidency to mobilize the American people to take on these special interests in the name of the public good. He is the most progressive major party candidate since Bobby Kennedy, perhaps since Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

More at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/miles-mogulescu/the-closing-argument-for-_b_79413.html