When Mr. Obama first started trying to organize the state earlier this year, he began in the usual way, seeking endorsements of traditional power brokers. The campaign offered a $5,000-a-month consulting contract to state Sen. Darrell Jackson of Columbia, a longtime legislator and pastor of an 11,000-member church, who also runs an ad agency.
Mr. Jackson’s ability to turn out the vote — or suppress it against rivals — is the stuff of local legend. In 2004, he helped clinch a primary win for North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, even as Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry was coming off wins in Iowa and New Hampshire. At the time, Mr. Edwards was paying him consulting fees of roughly $15,000 a month, according to federal records.
Mr. Jackson says he seriously considered the offer from Mr. Obama, but instead became a paid consultant to Mrs. Clinton, essentially running her state operation for substantially more than what the Obama camp offered. “A lot of our hearts were torn — it wasn’t an easy choice,” Mr. Jackson said. He drew more than $135,000 from the Clinton campaign from February 2007 through September 2007, the latest figures available, according to federal election filings, and remains on the payroll.
January 23, 2008
Paying the preacher to play
November 18, 2007
Hubris Hypocrisy and Greed
John Edwards launched his slight public career — one Senate term, two presidential candidacies — with the money and reputation he made as a trial lawyer. Today he is the candidate of a small fraction of the electorate but a sizable portion of America’s trial lawyers. Edwards says Washington is “corrupt.” Well.
Within Edwards’ lucrative trial bar constituency, there has been a flurry of criminal indictments. Their target has been what Fortune magazine calls the law firm of Hubris Hypocrisy and Greed. (See Peter Elkind’s jaw-dropping report in the issue of Nov. 13, 2006.) The real name of the nation’s foremost securities class-action firm is Milberg Weiss.
It has been indicted as a “racketeering enterprise” that obstructed justice and committed perjury, bribery and fraud while collecting about $250 million in fees from about 250 cases using paid plaintiffs, which is illegal. Several of the firm’s members, past and present, also have been indicted.
Since 1965, the firm has won, often by tactics indistinguishable from extortion, $45 billion from corporations — more than $1 billion a year for plaintiffs claiming to have been cheated as investors. Plaintiffs firms such as Milberg Weiss are paid contingency fees — they are paid only if they win, but up to 30 percent of what is won. Mel Weiss, whose case is going to trial, and his former partner, Bill Lerach, who specialized in volatile stocks of Silicon Valley companies in the 1990s and is now going to jail, each pocketed — it would be strange to say they earned — more than $100 million in the 1990s. The firm itself has been charged with paying $11.4 million to three serial plaintiffs who testified in 180 cases over 25 years, claiming to have been repeatedly defrauded.
snip
Until Lerach pleaded guilty he was a fundraiser for Edwards, for whom he collected $64,000 from lawyers in the firm he founded after he had a falling out with Weiss. Remember this when next you hear Edwards’ populist riff about trial lawyers as white knights protecting little people.
Real Clear Politics 11/18/07
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2007/11/legal_troubles_mount_for_edwar.html
November 14, 2007
Iowans are seeing a different Edwards
Iowans embraced Edwards in the 2004 race, pushing him to a second-place finish in the caucuses that helped him land the nomination for vice president. Now, most analysts agree that Edwards must win Iowa’s caucuses on Jan. 3 to have a shot at the 2008 nomination
Some voters are welcoming his tactics, saying candidates need to differentiate themselves. But others wonder whether Iowa voters will align themselves with a candidate who attacks his rivals.
Iowa “voters are very sophisticated,” said Rep. Bruce Braley (D-Iowa), who has not decided whom he plans to endorse. Speaking at his “Bruce, Blues and Barbecue” fundraiser in Dubuque after Edwards spoke, he said, “They are looking for a candidate who’s going to inspire and motivate them, not win by taking down another candidate.”
Steve Larson, an assistant precinct captain in Polk County and an Edwards supporter, said he was growing increasingly frustrated by the rising negativity among the Democratic candidates.
“It turns neighbor against neighbor,” said the 51-year-old Des Moines resident. “I don’t like to see it.”
Edwards was once the front-runner in Iowa polls, but now, outspent and out-staffed, he has fallen behind Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama in recent polls, though he remains within striking distance.
Los Angeles Times 11/14/07
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-edwards14nov14,1,1173111.story?page=1&coll=la-news-politics-national
November 13, 2007
Which John Edwards is the real John Edwards?
DES MOINES – Night was falling, and John Edwards was an hour late for a campaign event at a recreation center in Williamsburg, Iowa.
When Mr. Edwards finally strode into the room, he immediately started into his opening remarks, thanking his audience for being patient, assuring them he was working hard, updating them on his wife’s health, telling them he wanted to hear their questions and warning them “we might be the first generation of Americans that doesn’t leave our children a better life than we had.”
It took 45 seconds.
snip
He has sharpened his criticisms of Mrs. Clinton so much that Gordon Fischer, chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party when Mr. Edwards campaigned in 2004, said his demeanor was “much more of an attack dog” than before.
“It really made me question his authenticity as a person and as a candidate,” said Mr. Fischer, who is supporting Mr. Obama. “I wasn’t sure which John Edwards was the real John Edwards. Was it the Southern moderate of 2004 or the full-throated liberal of 2008?”
New York Times 11/13/07
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21767010/
October 22, 2007
Southern candidates in New Hampshire primaries
New Hampshire has been favorable to Southern Democrats running for president during the last three decades. Jimmy Carter (Georgia) and Lyndon Johnson (Texas) each won the New Hampshire primary twice. Bill Clinton (Arkansas) came in second on his way to his first nomination. But John Edwards (North Carolina) was a distant fourth, and Ernest Hollings (South Carolina), Wilbur Mills (Arkansas) and Reubin Askew (Florida) finished well behind.
News Observer 10/22/07
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/745072.html
October 12, 2007
John Edwards (re)defines himself
BOSTON (AP) — John Edwards once lived in the heart of Washington’s Georgetown district, was squired around the Capitol by Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and led the presidential field in fundraising thanks to donations from trial lawyers.
Today the Democrat is running for president as an anti-Washington candidate who will take public financing to avoid the influence of special interest groups.
snip
Edwards has been among the most aggressive in trying to define — or redefine — himself. The 2004 vice presidential nominee moved back to North Carolina from Washington after completing his lone term in the Senate, and the multimillionaire went on to found a poverty center at the University of North Carolina.
The candidate who agreed to use military force in Iraq now labels his October 2002 vote a mistake and criticizes Clinton, the New York senator leading the Democratic field, for not working hard enough on a troop pullout.
“Every member of Congress who believes this war must end, from Senators Obama and Clinton to Senator (John) Warner, has a moral responsibility to use every tool available to them, including a filibuster, to force the president to change course,” Edwards said last month in a statement.
The former senator has been similarly critical on the subject of campaign financing.
Last month, he announced he would accept public financing for his primary campaign, after watching his fundraising total decline quarter by quarter from $13 million to $9 million to $7 million. He did the same when he ran for president four years ago, when he went from leading the field with $7.4 million in first-quarter receipts — boosted by his fellow trial lawyers — to trailing John Kerry and Howard Dean with only $2.6 million in third-quarter receipts.
“It’s time to get back to focusing on the issues that matter to the American people,” said David Bonior, Edwards’ campaign manager. “That’s why John Edwards has decided to play by the rules that were designed to ensure fairness in the election process by capping his campaign spending and seeking public financing.”
Associated Press 10/12/07
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jZ3EMKn2uF_H0v5AincS0ngX-yRgD8S7MB5O0
October 5, 2007
Former “Trippi Kids” go for Obama over Edwards
Donors who made Howard Dean the Democratic presidential front-runner ahead of the 2004 Iowa caucuses have flocked to Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), helping him raise more money than any other White House candidate this year, according to a review of fundraising records.
During the first half of 2007, 634 Dean donors contributed $200 or more to Obama’s campaign. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), Obama’s chief rival, collected such contributions from 413 Dean donors. Former Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.), who has tried to appeal to the Democrats’ liberal base with fiery rhetoric, collected contributions from 371 so-called Deaniacs.
snip
A professor of political science at Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., Steven Smith, said that Obama has attracted many Dean donors because Clinton has positioned herself toward the political center with an eye on the general election.
“There’s no doubt that when the opening volleys of the Democratic primary were cast many months ago it looked like Senator Clinton was positioning herself to the right of the rest of the candidates,” Smith said. “There were stories that she had been doing so deliberately and that her aim was to win the general election and she wanted to moderate her image as much as she could.”
As a result, Smith said, many Democrats began looking for a liberal alternative. Edwards positioned himself to the left of Clinton in hopes of filling that role, but Obama supplanted him.
“When Edwards showed he couldn’t compete with Clinton, Obama stepped in and quickly championed the spectrum to the left of the Clinton,” Smith said.
snip
Number of Dean donors giving to candidate:
Obama-634 Clinton-413 Edwards-371Number of contributions from Dean donors:
Obama-812 Clinton-612 Edwards-432Money raised from Dean donors:
Obama-$878,000 Clinton-$945,000 Edwards-$417,000Source: Federal Election Commission data
The Hill 10/5/07
http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/deaniacs-open-their-wallets-for-08-hopefuls-2007-10-05.html
September 27, 2007
2008 Edwards frequently at odds with 2004 Edwards
* Edwards was very sharp, needling Clinton frequently, without being overly aggressive. I think he probably helped himself the most last night, except he stumbled slightly when Russert reminded him that in 2004 he said the nation couldn’t afford universal health care, described it as “not achievable,” and “not responsible.” Edwards said he’s changed, “and so has America.” It was a subtle reminder that 2008 Edwards is frequently at odds with 2004 Edwards.
The Carpetbagger Report 9/27/07
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/13021.html
September 18, 2007
Edward’s incuriosity surpassed that of Bush
I reviewed Robert Draper’s new book, “Dead Certain: The Presidency of George W. Bush,” for The New York Sun. I was amazed that much of Draper’s original and exclusive reporting was relegated to an epilogue.
While I didn’t write about it, I thought it was interesting to learn what the Bush Team circa 2004 thought of John Edwards, who is once again running for the White House. “As a senator, Edwards wasn’t one for detailed briefings, or details of any kind. Colleagues who had seen great promise in him, like John McCain and Joe Biden gradually grew disillusioned. They observed that Edward’s incuriosity surpassed that of Bush — who at least read history books and never argued, as John Edwards had in the summer of 2002, that the best reason for invading Iraq was Saddam’s nuclear program … a program that, as it turned out, never existed,” Draper writes. Not exactly a glowing endorsement from a reporter whom Republicans are labelling a Democratic sympathizer.
Seth Gittell 9/18/07
http://gitell.wordpress.com/
September 13, 2007
Edwards holding on to Fieger money unless feds convict
Clinton this week took extraordinary steps to distance herself from Norman Hsu, a felon fugitive convicted on grand theft charges years ago, by returning to donors about $850,000 in bundled contributions he raised for her current and past campaigns.
Critics continue to hound her campaign, though, because it has said it will allow — and indeed hopes — the donors first recruited by Hsu will re-contribute the funds on their own.
snip
Clinton’s Democratic competitors, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois and former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, have taken less drastic steps to inoculate themselves against donor problems.
snip
The Edwards camp is staking out a similar position on donations generated by Geoffrey Fieger, who is accused of using employees as surrogate givers to Edwards’ 2004 presidential campaign to get around campaign finance limits.
Eric Schultz, a campaign spokesman, said Edwards has cooperated with the federal investigation of Fieger, who is not raising money for this year’s race.
“Once this prosecution concludes, if Geoffrey Fieger is found guilty, the campaign will donate all the money in question to charity,” Schultz added.
The Politico 9/13/07
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0907/5806_Page2.html
