Edwards Speaks: But Who Listens? Edwards Endorses Obama
May 14th, 2008 by DR. CLARISSA PINKOLA ESTÉS, TMV Columnist
Today John Edwards is endorsing former competitor Barack Obama…
It is a late endorsement, given when the horses are already in the home stretch, and one horse is the stronger runner long distance, but the other horse has more than a neck and neck lead, and also appears to be running on the inside track next to the rail.
Clinton won over Obama by more than 2 votes to 1 in West Virginia. And it is said that so-called “white, working-class voters” also supported Edwards before he dropped out of the nomination race.
Edwards’ endorsement could be seen as an effort to bolster that group and to perhaps draw them to Obama now.
Senator Edwards, dropped out of the nomination race after three months of hoofs to the track hard running.
The AP reports:(writers Nedra Pickler and Stephen Ohlemacher in Washington, Gary D. Robertson in Raleigh, N.C., contributed…)
A person close to Edwards, speaking on condition of anonymity, said he [Edwards] wanted to get involved now to begin unifying the party. Obama also signed on to Edwards’ anti-poverty initiative, which he launched Tuesday with the goal of reducing poverty in the United States by half within 10 years.
David “Mudcat” Saunders, a chief adviser for Edwards on rural affairs during his presidential campaign, said the timing of the endorsement couldn’t be better given Obama’s resounding loss in West Virginia on Tuesday.
“For Barack Obama, I think he ought to kiss Johnny Edwards on the lips to kill this 41-point loss,” he added. “The story is not going to be the 41-point loss. It’s going to be Edwards’ endorsement.”
Maybe.
But there are other overt and covert considerations to evaluate… even though most of the big news media has decided today to frame this news as being about Obama only, rather than seeing that it may also massively stimulate his opponent to more determined than ever. Among those considerations to weigh might be these:
If the endorsement is meant to show solidarity by one party member toward one of the candidates, that is a fait acoompli. Unifying the party at this point is likely premature. Unifying isnt done by one person saying ‘unify now.’ It is a far more many layered process that includes more meeting and greeting with many groups and people. That would be later. Not now.
Also, Edwards may be looking to see if there might be a place as VP should Obama be the Democratic candidate. Edwards was John Kerry’s VP pick in the 2004 election, which was lost to George Bush and Dick Cheney.
Certainly Edwards holds to liberal ideals, and/ but endorsements dont mean what they once did. Many ho-hum over endorsements and go ahead and vote as they saw, see, and still see fit. John Edwards can endorse Obama or the moon, and it wont change the mind of those with dedicated circuitry otherwise. Not Dems, not Repubs, not Indies.
BUT:
–Obama has a total of 1,887 delegates, needing only 139 delegates short of the 2,026 required to ‘winner take all.’
–Clinton has 1,718 delegates, according to the latest tally by AP, 308 short of the 2,026 required for “winner take all.”
AND:
this is the crucial part:
Edwards has 19 pledged delegates he won in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. According to AP, most of those delegates have already been selected, meaning they are technically free to support whomever they choose at the party’s national convention, regardless of Edwards’ endorsement.
THAT, I think, is the meat of this news, as well as its possible momentum.
And though most voters with their own ideas about who they’ll vote for, may not care who Edwards endorses… you-know-who is surely listening and strategizing about those ‘freed up’ superdelegate votes….
It may be a show-down at the OK corral at the Democratic Convention in Denver, after all.
As I wrote at TMV yesterday, contenders who are given a win by default are one kind of winner. And, winners who take it to the absolute lung-busting last moment, are an entirely different kind of winner altogether.
What will come now in terms of each candidate’s strategies, is anyone’s guess.
____________
see Tully’s take at blog “Stubborn Facts,” re endorsers/superdelegators positioning themselves in order to reap the bounty for themselves and their interests for the next four years, here.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 14th, 2008 at 4:21 pm and is filed under Newsweek Blogitics, Primaries, DNC, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Dick Cheney. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
