WHERE'S ELIZABETH EDWARDS?

I don't know why I should feel disillusioned because John Edwards endorsed Obama. I was an Edwards supporter until he dropped out of the race (because of his anti-poverty campaign, largely), but I wasn't heartbroken when he did because I was already getting, via the debates, the sense that Hillary had a broader, better-thought-out agenda. And to tell the truth, the smell of sexism and the "good ole boys club" was starting to bother me. And now Edwards' end-game endorsement of Obama smacks of more of the WWTSBQ? activity than a true meeting of the minds.

Still, it's a disappointment. I thought better of him. Obama has done nothing to indicate that fighting poverty is a priority for him, and from what I can tell from his resume and his books, he’s done about zero for poor people in his life. For crying out loud, he didn’t even take care of his own constituents who were freezing in his pal Tony Rezko’s tenements!

Sure would be nice if Elizabeth would endorse Hill. She was noticeably absent from the stage during the endorsement announcement. She's a smart, pragmatic feminist that has much in common with HRC and has stated that she prefers Hillary's healthcare proposal to Obama's. John even indicated on Morning Joe last week that he and Elizabeth had voted differently, which I take to mean she voted for Hill.

ELIZABETH EDWARDS KICKS MCCAIN'S BUTT ON HEALTHCARE

Whooee. You don't want to be flippant or condescending towards this lady when it comes to one of the issues closest to her heart.

I freely admit that I am confused about the role of overnight funding in repurchase markets in the collapse of Bear Stearns. What I am not confused about is John McCain’s health care proposal. Apparently Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a senior policy advisor to McCain, thinks I do “not understand the comprehensive nature of the senator’s proposal.” The problem, Douglas, is that, despite fuzzy language and feel-good lines in the Senator’s proposal, I do understand exactly how devastating it will be to people who have the health conditions with which the Senator and I are confronted (melanoma for him, breast cancer for me) but do not have the financial resources we have. In very unconfusing language: they are left outside the clinic doors.

Then she goes on to address the weaknesses in the McCain plan.

Hillary's plan for universal coverage is much closer to the Edwards' proposals than Obama's.

ELIZABETH EDWARDS FOR PRESIDENT

Frank Rich. Allelulia, amen.

The more Elizabeth Edwards is in the spotlight, the more everyone else in the arena will have to be judged against her. Next to her stark humanity, the slick playacting that passes for being “human” and “folksy” in a campaign is tinny. Though much has been said about how she is a model to others battling cancer, she is also a model (or should be) of personal transparency to everyone else in the presidential race.
...
Whatever Mr. Edwards’s flaws as a candidate turn out to be, he is not guilty of the most persistent charge leveled since his wife’s diagnosis. As Ms. Couric phrased it, “Even those who may be very empathetic to what you all are facing might question your ability to run the country at the same time you’re dealing with a major health crisis in your family.”

Would it be better if he instead ran the country at the same time he was clearing brush on a ranch? Polio informed rather than crippled the leadership of F.D.R.; Lincoln endured the sickness and death of a beloved 11-year-old son during the Civil War. In the wake of our congenitally insulated incumbent, who has given our troops neither proper armor nor medical care and tried to hide their coffins off camera, surely it can only be a blessing to have a president, whether Mr. Edwards or someone else, who knows intimately what it means to cope daily with the threat of mortality. It’s hard to imagine such a president smiting stem-cell research or skipping the funerals of the fallen.

Indeed, of all the reasons to applaud Elizabeth Edwards’s decision to stay in politics, the most important may be her insistence, by her very action, that we not compartmentalize the harsh reality of death and the imperatives of public policy, both at home and at war. Let the real conversation begin.