Friday, January 18, 2008


For people who claim John Edwards is so progressive, hold on

That list, of course starts with John Edwards himself. But a real progressive Democrat, Sen. Russ Feingold, strongly begs to differ:

I did notice that as the primaries heated up, all of a sudden, all the presidential candidates — none of whom voted with me on the timeframe to withdraw from Iraq — all voted with me and when we did the Patriot Act stuff.

The one that is the most problematic is (John) Edwards, who voted for the Patriot Act, campaigns against it. Voted for No Child Left Behind, campaigns against it. Voted for the China trade deal, campaigns against it. Voted for the Iraq war … He uses my voting record exactly as his platform, even though he had the opposite voting record.

When you had the opportunity to vote a certain way in the Senate and you didn't, and obviously there are times when you make a mistake, the notion that you sort of vote one way when you're playing the game in Washington and another way when you're running for president, there's some of that going on.

That sums it up pretty well. And, it goes far beyond the complaint/observation of Edwards’ sudden conversion to more populist economics, and gets straight to his voting record.

(That's all.)