I did some things today I've never done before, and it's largely because of what I've witnessed this week in my state.
Here's the first of three parts of my diary for today; I hope you'll bear with me.
On Sunday, my sweetheart and I happened to be in Myrtle Beach and happened (our lives are sometimes charmed this way) to pass the Palace Theater, where she caught sight of the CNN bus. We knew the Democratic debate was coming up the next night but didn't know exactly where, and this turned out to be the place. Being adventuresome folks, we turned around and stopped in. An hour later, we had photos of ourselves at the podiums with all the sound and lighting technicians going about their business.
The next night, back at home, we watched the brawl on that stage as everyone else did. The Clinton-Obama skirmishes were pathetic. And as usual, Edwards shone. In that debate, I thought Obama made one valuable and salient point: The Clintons' rope-a-dope strategy was wearing thin -- now it's Bill making news with a jab, now it's Hillary with a left hook, now it's Bill again with an uppercut. But what-the-hay -- you expect a candidate's spouse to stick up for them, campaign for them, and all three said something like that. That's how it is.
Then something strange happened and it took a day or so for people to catch on. Hillary left South Carolina. She vacated the premises. She's spent Monday morning in Columbia for the King Day rally (and was late getting to it, which held up the program), flew to Myrtle Beach in time to make her bout with Obama, then completely left the building, the town, the county, the whole state. There are lots of diaries and comments on this point, but to South Carolinians who caught on after the fact, it sent a signal.
But if that one elephant in the room isn't enough, Hillary left behind another to keep us occupied: Bill.
Now, Bill deserves an entire website of diaries on his own, considering all the good he did, and considering all the bad he did. I love Bill, like most others, but I'm also disappointed as hell in Bill, like most others. When I consider the potential that he squandered... I conclude that it's better to remember the good times and let the rest go. Life is too short.
Except that, in leaving Bill behind to campaign for her, she does two things: She doesn't let us forget the bad, and she proves Obama's charges right. Neither of which appeals to me.
Then came the footage of Bill dressing down the CNN reporter. Is this what it's going to be if Hillary's the nominee? A daily or weekly diatribe from Bill, all caught and aired on CNN, or YouTube, or whatever will come after YouTube?
It's sickening to me that this is happening in my back yard, in my state. So sickening that I called in sick this morning and took the day off. I needed therapy, and I got it.
Which leads me to Part Two of my diary.
Today, I made some personal history. Did some things I'd never done before. I've written before http://www.dailykos.com/... of crossing paths with John Edwards several times during the past nine years. Some of those were coincidental and other intentional. Today, it was definitely intentional, because I wanted to feel hopeful again, to wash off both the ambiguity of the Obama enterprise and the dirty feeling I get from Clinton 3.0.
First, I went to the Beacon. Any candidate who comes to the Upstate of South Carolina and intends to get any kind of blessing from voters must make a pilgrimage to the Beacon in Spartanburg. Edwards has been there several times before, I understand, and he made another trip there this morning.
When I got there, the place was already packed, standing room only, and he was in full swing. He absolutely shone. I heard most of his remarks from a rear doorway, and appreciated seeing a good number of African-American voters there too. (It turns my stomach to hear that the primary vote is going to fall along racial lines when we ALL have a winning combination in Edwards.) In fact, one came to the doorway and stood by me for a moment before weaving his way toward the front, and it took me a minute to recognize that it was Danny Glover. He's much thinner in person than on the screen. Glover didn't speak, but he did work the crowd with Edwards.
As we the crowd migrated outside following Edwards's remarks, I met Cindy Lowe, the wife of James Lowe, whose story Edwards has told hundreds of times in his speeches and debate appearances. Cindy said she and James were pleased to be supporting a candidate with Edwards's passion and commitment to them and to others in their circumstances. Though her family had been involved in local politics in eastern Kentucky years ago, she said they'd never been involved in something on this scale. The bonus, she said, was getting to know the people involved with the campaign.
And as if on cue, there came Madeleine Stowe, who starred in "Last of the Mohicans" with Daniel Day-Lewis. To people living in the Carolinas -- more specifically, ones tied to the mountains of the Carolinas -- that film is like a cherished love letter to us because it was filmed in locations around Chimney Rock, Linville Gorge, and places nearby. That Stowe had come back to the region to travel with the Edwards campaign was altogether fitting and proper.
The Edwards caravan moved from Spartanburg to the little town of Laurens, in the neighboring county of the same name, for a stop at Whiteford's Giant Burger. Whiteford's is a local landmark, and it was already packed to overflowing, and spilling out the front and side, when the Edwards bus arrived. Outside the front door stood Dave 'Mudcat' Saunders and James Lowe himself, the retired coal miner from southwestern Virginia whose severe cleft palate prevented speech for 50 years because he lacked health insurance and couldn't afford the surgery on his own. Thankfully, a surgeon volunteered his services last year and Mr. Lowe is able to speak.
For those who haven't read it, I recommend Mudcat's column on HuffPost http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
I enjoyed talking to Mr. Lowe and hearing his perspective on the campaign. As we waited outside, his wife Cindy joined us. James said that Edwards has been "like a brother" to him, and Cindy agreed that the two men "clicked" as soon as they met. Lowe and Edwards are only three years apart in age and grew up in rural towns less than 300 miles apart. Though it might not appear true at first blush, the two men have a lot in common.
Before we even got to the front door, I could hear the bluegrass music. It's hard to mistake a banjo, fiddle and upright bass when they're being used right. In one corner of Whiteford's, Dr. Ralph Stanley's bright white mane stood out, and the Clinch Mountain Boys around him were wrist-and-elbow-close to the audience they played for.
And announcing Edwards's arrival was former Congressman Ben Jones of Georgia. (Or, if you like, "Cooter." If I'd played "Cooter" on "The Dukes of Hazzard," I would have tried as hard as I could to erase that nickname from my life. But Rep. Jones seems to have made peace with it.) Jones introduced the Rev. James Blassingame, pastor of Zion Missionary Baptist Church of Sumter, South Carolina (not Fort Sumter, which is off the Charleston coast, but Sumter, which is southeast of the capital). I wondered why the Edwards camp had brought the pastor all the way from Sumter, 120 miles away, but Blassingame himself explained it: Blassingame, a native of Edwards's hometown of Seneca, worked at the same mill as Edwards's father, Wallace. It has since closed and the jobs there moved elsewhere. Now it made sense to me.
Blassingame introduced Edwards, and he shone again.
Leaving Laurens, the convoy traveled 30 miles west to Lander University in Greenwood. Obama was at Lander two days ago, and I don't know the size of the crowd he drew. But an audience of probably more than 500 had packed Lander's main auditorium to hear Edwards, and more stood along the walls. When I arrived, Rep. Jones was on stage, recalling memories of the "Dukes" set, celebrating the benefits of syndication on cable television, and finally explaining what a "yellow-dog Democrat" was and why he was one. He told of a little boy's encounter with Teddy Roosevelt, "the last great Republican president." That exchange went this way, Jones said:
Roosevelt: Are you a Democrat or Republican?
Boy: A Democrat, because my daddy and my granddaddy are Democrats.
Roosevelt: But what if your daddy and granddaddy were horse thieves? Would that make you a horse thief?
Boy: No, sir. That would make me a Republican.
The crowd was warm, to say the least. It got even warmer when Jones brought Madeleine Stowe to the microphone, who said she took a closer look at Edwards after his behavior on Election Night, 2004. As it became clear that voting irregularities in Ohio and Florida had left the race tight, Edwards wanted to fight until every ballot was accounted for and the irregularities clarified. But, Stowe said, Sen. John Kerry gave up.
In the years since that night, Stowe said, she'd watched Edwards's leadership on issue after issue, consistently stepping forward with one bold proposal after another, and watching other candidates ultimately adopt Edwards's positions or his policy proposals. If he's the one bringing up the right ideas at the right time, she asked, why go with the candidates who are following him? Why not choose him in the first place?
Sounded like sound logic to me.
Following Stowe was Dr. Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys, who earned a standing ovation after only a few minutes' performance. Then came Rev. Blassingame, who brought out Edwards.
I've heard Edwards's stump speeches and paid attention in his debate responses. Today, he struck a note that I'd not heard before, and it suited the audience's ears perfectly. Rural voters, he said, are constantly ignored in election after election, and ignored between elections when you consider the policies put forth in recent decades. Rural voters are ignored by the Republican Party because Republicans take their votes for granted. They're ignored by the Democratic Party because Democrats believe they won't win the rural vote from the Republicans. As a result, they get no attention from either side, and it shows: South Carolina's rural communities have been the first-hit and worst-hit by trade policies that close plants and send manufacturing jobs elsewhere.
Of the three candidates left, Edwards is the only one who came from rural America. "I won't ever forget you, because I won't ever forget where I came from," he said. His remarks were interrupted many times with applause, even with several "amens".
Even without Edwards saying it, the awareness of Sen. Clinton's absence from the state this week offered a perfect example of the point. While his competitors were absent, or were squabbling over their histories -- slum lords, Wal-Mart and other things -- Edwards has been "the guy working in the trenches to make your lives better," he said. More amens.
He highlighted the themes you've heard before. He pledged his positions on trade that's fair to American workers, on education, on college affordability, on ending the war, and on universal health care. He told James Lowe's story again and, in case if anyone needed clarification of its details or the impact that lacking health insurance had on James Lowe's life, he introduced James Lowe himself, standing at one side of the auditorium.
Edwards' speeches are powerful anyway. The grace notes today added an intangible dimension.
"But I need your help," he concluded. "I don't know any other way to say it."
He asked listeners to work the telephones tonight and tomorrow, calling the friends and neighbors of BOTH parties. Under South Carolina's election laws, Independent and even avowed Republicans can vote in the Democratic primary IF they didn't vote in last week's Republican primary.
Then I saw a sight I never imagined I'd see. Dr. Stanley and Rev. Blassingame flanked Edwards on stage, the three joined hands, and with the audience on its feet, Stanley led the room in singing "Amazing Grace," a capella.
Anyone who experienced the hour without feeling chills, or without tears welling up, or without being overtaken with a soul-deep need to go to the polls on Saturday and taking others with them, just doesn't have a heart, or red blood for a heart to pump.
So I did something I'd never done before. I got in line like everyone else. Nine years after first riding down an elevator with Senator-elect Edwards on Election Night 1998, I waited my turn, shook his hand and thanked him, and wished him good luck on Saturday.
That's where I left the campaign today and headed home. Back at Whiteford's Giant Burger at 3 p.m., regulars who had seen the morning event were still talking about Edwards and his chances on Saturday. "I'd like to see him in office," one said. "I'm not voting the party anymore -- I'm voting the man."
Part Three
If you've stayed with me this far, maybe you'll stay a little longer.
I've read several diaries in the past couple of weeks that assume Edwards will leave the race. Or that suggest he should leave it. And ones that ask who voters will or should move to in that event.
My response to them, and my answer to those questions, given all I know and all I've seen, is this:
Whatever his flaws, John Edwards is all the combination of change, and hope, and experience, and vision, and passion, and commitment, that I believe we need. If he leaves the race, I've asked who I have left to choose. I've asked why I should vote at all. If our Democratic nominee is aligned with the forces that harm us, or is ambiguous to the point of leaving us confused about policy priorities, then does it matter who the Republican nominee is? Does it matter who is elected?
And don't tell me it's about the Supreme Court. The Court is so packed now that no compromise-centrist band-aid offered by either Clinton or Obama will have much influence on decisions over the next 30 years. And compromise centrists are what I fully expect from either of them. So the Court argument falls flat.
So if Edwards is not an option, do I go to Obama, or to Clinton?
Given my discomfort at having to "hope" that Obama's priorities reflect mine because no evidence exists to suggest it, and given my distaste at facing eight years of past Clinton fatigue rolled up and spat at us over the next eight months, I choose none of the above. I'd likely not vote in the general election presidential race -- a first for me.
And before anyone slings criticism about making a principled decision to support the platform rather than the candidate, I would assert that I HAVE made a principled decision, and it is to vote for Edwards.
Like so many others, I predict that if our nominee is not John Edwards, we will wake up after Election Day, and the many mornings that follow, feeling sorrow and regret. Unnecessarily.
Then again, maybe we deserve a term or two of a McCain administration. If we can't get past the stars in our eyes to see the clarity of what Edwards offers, do we really deserve better than what we've had for seven years?
Good luck to us all.