John Edwards And The "Are We There Yet?" Generation

The following piece was produced by the Huffington Post's OffTheBus project.

On Thursday MySpace and MTV launched "A Presidential Dialogue" with John Edwards, and MySpace members submitted questions during the video stream by IM. An ongoing real time reaction chart was shown, not unlike cable debate coverage, but here is where it gets meta.

Edwards had a chance to adjust his responses based on feedback texted to MySpace when viewers didn't feel he answered a question adequately. It would have been interesting to see Tavis Smiley include a "Here's how you're going over so far" or "What?" follow-up during the debate he hosted the same day.

Speaking to a generation touched by Operation Enduring Freedom, Edwards took questions including "What are your plans on preventing troops from having more than one active term of duty?" He told the New Hampshire audience that when he hears their concerns including whether "Some president like Bush is going to send you off to a war in Iraq, I think America's a lot better than this."

The MySpace / MTV series contrasts with the CNN / YouTube debates in that Republican frontrunners are in the mix, with the notable absence of Romney and Thompson.
The alphabetical lineup is: Brownback, Biden, Clinton, Dodd, Giuliani, Gravel, Hunter, Kucinich, McCain, Obama, Paul and Richardson. For those who want a seat in the room, adding The Impact Page Presidential Forum to their Top 8 Friends qualifies them for the chance to attend. The page also takes voter registration applications. Video clips are listed, with titles like, "Does John Edwards Make You Nervous?" and "You Brought the Heat."

As the candidate who kicked off his campaign in New Orleans and is auctioning off the chance to build a house with him there, Edwards fielded questions from more than one New Orleans native. This as a growing influx of volunteers in Mercy Corps / Teach America / Common Ground / Acorn / Americorps and church groups are coming south to gut and rebuild homes. MySpace paid for a few bloggers to attend, not me, but as a displaced New Orleanean and Off the Bus correspondent I watched with particular interest.

Levees, police, hospitals, schools and job programs were at the top of his list. "Instead of having Halliburton contracted to come and rebuild New Orleans, let's have the people of New Orleans rebuild their own city. Let's give them a good job with decent pay and decent benefits." Edwards is also proposing "Brownie's Law", where, "If you're going to be in charge of an important federal agency, you actually have to have some experience at doing the job." That drew applause, but then a viewer texted a hardball:

"Ask him about foreclosing on homeowners in New Orleans." So Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post did.

Edwards went into a discussion of predatory lending post-Katrina with subprime mortgage foreclosures. "I worked for a company that had some investments in one of those companies that was doing the foreclosing. I got my money out of that because I didn't want anything to do with it." Then he stayed in damage control mode describing an ACORN foreclosure prevention fund he works with.

The forum's real-time graph included the categories: "Dodged Questions, Out of Touch" or "Understands Reality." With his closing comments, Edwards answered Instant Message follow-up questions with a sentence touching on everything from Darfur genocide to global poverty to global warming to New Orleans to universal healthcare.

I recently asked a Midwestern high school student who the current sentimental favorite is at her high school. "It was Obama, but now it's Burma," she said. "Today a freshman was giving out red ribbons to wear in solidarity for Burma, but he ran out of ribbons."

Following generation Y Should I Vote, it's possible that for this era empathy is replacing emo. Based on his MySpace / MTV Presidential Dialogue, Edwards is hoping so. And hoping that enough of them will be old enough to vote by the primaries to make a significant difference (or that Ron Paul will somehow manage to drop the voting age to 16).

One young MySpace member posted on the Presidential Dialogue page today: 'You can LOVE YOUR COUNTRY but you better FEAR YOUR GOVERNMENT! Actually it's the world's rich that run the world (the illuminati) LOL."

The Illuminati and Laugh Out Loud? The beat goes on.

See the event yourself by clicking here.

Read more OffTheBus coverage and get involved by clicking here.

Comments

[dandjus]

There is nobody--not even Al Gore--who is more phony than this guy. I understand support for Hillary or Obama or Biden--even Kucinich. But this guy makes your skin crawl.

[JoAnnCr]

I take issue with what you are saying about John Edwards.

The top of my list for this guy is "trustworthy".

I have met him in person as he comes through Iowa. He looks you right in the eye and sometimes tells you what you want to hear and other times what you don't want to hear. In both cases he is being honest but he is also thorough and knowledgeable.

Edwards has enemies in this contest. He polls the better than any other Democratic candidate when matched against Republican candidates. He also does well in fundraising in red states. Both are a worry to his competition.

Your view of Edwards being so diametrically opposed to mine makes me think Rovian politics has been at work here. The political strategy made popular by Karl Rove twists a competitor"s top asset into a top liability by attaching it to a hot button issue. It requires a media buy in to get it perpetuated and we certainly have seen some of that with John Edwards.

To fend off such shady politics, read the candidates" websites and when you listen to the MSM ask yourself "Is this true?" and "Does this make sense?" so you can sort the truth from the politicking. I guarantee your skin will not crawl.

[texanna]

It would be nice of the media were not trying to report this primary race as if it were a horse race. Or, better yet, if they hadn't already decided that it was Hillary vs. Obama and frame everything they report in that context, leaving Edwards out. Once again, we are going to have the traditional media outlets to thank for how our politics plays out a la Gore v Bush. By their own admission they framed that contest in favor of Bush and look how well that turned out. John Edwards' voice is little heard, but has much more to say than either Hillary or Obama. While I would love to see a woman in the WH or a person of color, the better candidate turns out to be another southern white guy -- go figure! It would be great if Gore would take the reins we'd all love to give him, but if he's not going to do that wouldn't it be great if he'd publicly support somebody?

[deadscout]

I'm leaning toward Edwards. He seems to be the only one who can speak genuinly and honestly. He has detailed plans for all the problems we face. He is for the working, middleclass, and poor. Obama and Hillary seem to be just more of the same and corporate (money) controlled, The rich will always get theirs no matter who is in power. We need someone to stand up for the average person.

[Subtle]

It's not just young people who are responding to him. My parents, in their 70s, have him as their favorite though they feel the field is strong.

[Camel54]

More of these types of events, actually connecting with citizens, giving them a feeling of personal attention can only help his appeal. However, how do you translate that into dollars and then to primary votes? He should start making direct appeals at events such as this, tell people point blank that if they like his answers, if they like him, they need to get out there and vote for him in their primary.

In general, as the republicans steer further away from direct connections with Americans, actually belittling citizens for their quirks, avoiding minority events will certainly help all the dems. However, they need to aggressively take advantage of it. Young voters feel distanced from politics. Personalizing it for them is the key to motivating them. Kudos Mr. Edwards.

[Mrrar]

To be fair, the generation before us would have said "(the jews) lol!"

So if you put it in that context, we're on our way up.

[jeanruss]

as uaual John Edwards breaks the ice where the other candidates fear to go-the Publicans are terrified of this format-anything that forces them to deal with those who disagree with them is anathems to them-Neither Clinton nor Obama seem to have the courage to say what they really think, which is just what their corporate owners prefer in their candidates-Edwards will never raise as much money because corporations will never choose America over profits.

[Kakie]

John Edwards is appealing to a lot of young people I know. They especially like his history of working on behalf of the poor and disenfranchised and his humanitarian work, not only in his own community, but in Asia and Africa. His service on an urban ministries board is also very appealing to them.

Edwards is the "real deal." I have a friend who worked with his law firm years ago, and she says he always had a passion for the underdog and was very genuine in his care and compassion for the "commmon man." She said he always had a passion for the underdog.

Obama, the rock star, is unfortunately, more of the same thing and just added a big lobbyist to his payroll.

Go, Edwards!

[Andy823]

The more people hear him speak, the more they like him. He not only talks the talk, he walks the walk, and no matter what your age, you end up believing this man will be good for our country!

[NCGigi]

Absolutely. He is the real deal.

[ihavenobias]

I totally agree and I can't believe he's a distant third in the polls.

In large part it has to be the media portrayal of him, as they paint him as a guy who's all style and no substance (haircut anyone?).

Of course this is ironic considering he was the FIRST of the major candidates to put forward a healthcare plan, a foreign policy plan, etc.

If anything *he* has shown the most meat of "The Big Three", and he's also shown the most willingness to stand for the average citizen of The Big Three (which is something the democrats have lost touch with in the last few decades).

Oh well, I can only hope that people start to actually pay more attention in the coming months.

PS---As much as everyone talks about how Hillary is the most popular in the polls, why is it rarely mentioned that she also has the highest *disapproval* rating of the candidates?

While that's fine in a primary, it could spell disaster in a general election.

And of course there's the fact that she's taken more money from the healthcare industry than ALL other candidates (including the republicans)...