More interviews with Elizabeth

Elizabeth Edwards
Gregg Easterbrook rightly shines some spotlight on Elizabeth Edwards. She is a great asset to the ticket in both the aesthetic-political-as-figurehead way, as well as her pure smarts.

Here's some from Easterbrook:

Most focus on candidates' wives falls somewhere on the spectrum between inane and condescending. But it's there nonetheless and must be taken into account: The media and voters have become obsessed with top-of-the-ticket wives, and except for Steinberg, the wives have responded by racing toward the cameras. I could be wrong about this, but I think the wife star of the 2004 campaign will be Mrs. Edwards.
...She's smart and well-spoken, well versed in the issues, poised in public. She had an impressive professional career--law school, clerk for a federal judge, then law practice--and gave it up to become a traditional mother for the couple's four children. The Ivy League crowd may belittle traditional motherhood, but millions of Americans admire this role. Elizabeth Edwards bore four kids, which is a service to humanity in and of itself, and two are little--the Edwards are the only ones in the race with young children, and cute kids have an inherent charm that will draw voters to the couple's story. Elizabeth Edwards has endured every parent's worst nightmare, the death of a child, Wade, in a car crash at age 16. Family tragedy is among the most potent forces that can enter a person's life; to lose a child is on the short list of the most horrible experiences a human being can have. Mrs. Edwards has faced family tragedy; large numbers of Americans have also faced it; those who can face family tragedy and still get up in the morning are deservedly admired. She'll get such admiration.

Next, and don't chortle, Elizabeth Edwards is overweight but still attractive. There's a huge demographic of Americans who are overweight though still striving to look good: Elizabeth Edwards could become their champion! On the serious side, many women have gone through the life experience of being slender in youth--check the Edwards's wedding-day photo, Elizabeth is a lithe beauty--then simply not being able to keep the pounds off following the double whammy of childbearing followed by child-rearing, which means, oh, 20 years or so without time to exercise. By being an overweight yet still attractive traditional mom, Elizabeth Edwards radiates "I am a real-world person" in a way that none of the other three wives can.

Now consider Elizabeth Edwards on political substance. During the Democratic couples' joint "60 Minutes" appearance on Sunday, Mrs. Edwards not only outshone Teresa Heinz by a hefty margin, she might have bested both men, too.
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Asked the wealth question, she replied by noting that senators Kerry and Edwards both voted against the tax cut bills that would have brought each large sums of money. She then asked, "Isn't that what we want? A leader who looks at the greater good instead of what simply what benefits the person himself, or the people in his own class or their donors or whatever else you're looking at? These men did what was right for all Americans and it seems to me that's an enormous test of character--whether you're willing to step out and do something against your own self interest."

Amen, amen. Perfect answer. And if you're thinking, well, maybe a consultant coached her to say that, a consultant clearly had not coached the presidential candidate himself with a good answer. Elizabeth Edwards cut through the B.S. to what mattered about the biggest question the Democratic four have so far been asked together. Maybe she should be the one doing the coaching of the candidate.

(Owens note: I skipped over some large chunks wherein Easterbrook seemed to use the article as an excuse to diss the Kerrys.)