In Edwards Scandal, a Chapter Winds Down

Published: September 19, 2009
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. — The story of the spectacular rise and fall of John Edwards, with its sordid can’t-look-away dimensions, is moving slowly but deliberately to its conclusion here in North Carolina.


Mr. Edwards, the one-term senator who came close to being elected vice president in 2004 and ran a credible campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008, remains largely secluded at his 100-acre estate here.

But a federal grand jury in nearby Raleigh is investigating whether any crimes were committed in connection with campaign laws in an effort to conceal his extramarital affair with a woman named Rielle Hunter. At the same time, Mr. Edwards is moving toward an abrupt reversal in his public posture; associates said in interviews that he is considering declaring that he is the father of Ms. Hunter’s 19-month-old daughter, something that he once flatly asserted in a television interview was not possible.

Friends and other associates of Mr. Edwards and his wife of 32 years, Elizabeth, say she has resisted the idea of her husband’s claiming paternity. Mrs. Edwards, who is battling cancer, “has yet to be brought around,” said one family friend, who like others spoke about the situation on the condition of anonymity, pointing to the complicated and delicate nature of the issue.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/us/politics/20edwards.html?_r=1

he'd have acknowledged the whole thing from the beginning and everybody would shrug and say, "So what?" Yes, it's tough on the wife, especially when she's sick, but it's really nobody's business but theirs.

Consider the antics of both Sarkozy and Berlusconi and the lack of pursed lips political fallout in their own countries.

Unfortunately, we're a puritanical society with poor personal boundaries and we expect our politicians to be candidates for sainthood and obsess over every sordid detail if they're not while feeling personally wounded by their bad behavior.

Yes, he was a fool to cover it up and yes, he was a rat of a husband. However, he did nothing more than 54% of men and 43% of women reading this board have done.

He also failed to do what the right wing does: deodorize a tacky affair by abandoning his family to marry the floozy.

While it means the scandal will remain ongoing, especially with her moving to NC, it also speaks to some fairly solid priorities in his life.

Edwards set himself up with all his pious shit about his marriage and that being why he couldn't support marriage equality. Your wrong that in any other country this would simply be shrugged off. His lying and the fact that his wife has terminal cancer, preclude that. I don't expect politicians to be saints and I expect a certain degree of hypocrisy, but Edwards went way over the line.

Your sexist crap where you put all the blame on the culture and "that floozy", is sickening.

as a reason for your own post.

Your use of the word "sexist" is as appropriate as a right winger's use of the word "socialist."

to feather his own nest. Mature? Hardly.

If doing what 54% of the men on this board or 43% of the women (can't imagine how you got your figures unless you've interviewed them all) on this board have done makes a thing right or mature, its news to me.

And it should be news to you.

Edwards lied. Badly. Perhaps the other world leaders that you mention lie better. Can't say as I don't live there.

for the "liberal media" to investigate him ... otherwise, the "liberal media" just didn't ask anything about his doings ...

Then move on with your life. If Bill Clinton had taken my advice he would have been in a lot less trouble. We all make mistakes, some big, some small. Any person who says they have not made a big mistake is a liar.

The right was looking for ANYTHING they could get him out on. ANYTHING. If he admitted adultery they would have hammered him on immorality without ceasing.

You seem to think there was a possibility for appeasing them. There WASN'T. They would have impeached him for jaywalking if they had film of him crossing against the light.

Take a look at the ridiculous fuss about "czars" and realize that appeasement was NOT an option.

took actually breaking a law to bring about impeachment.

I think I agree that he would have been in less trouble had he 'fessed up. No Monica Lewinsky hearings and all the lurid details.

But yeah, they are totally off their collective rocker. I would be so ashamed if I were a member of their party. Remember when there was a flap about him not wearing a tie in the Oval Office? :eyes:

If he got away with Lewinsky THEY WOULD HAVE TRUMPED UP SOMETHING ELSE.

It is the most ridiculous delusion to believe otherwise. And it really bothers me that Democrats talk as if the Republicans were asking only what was reasonable and just. THEY WEREN'T. They were yammering about Lewinsky while they were seeing prostitutes, wearing diapers, humping their assistants, and cheating on their wives. There was no "reasonable" about it and the truth would not have set us free.

What is completely overlooked by all the headshaking righteous is that they had NOTHING on Clinton till they found this. They examined him down to his UNDERWEAR DRAWER and they had NOTHING. Do you think they wanted to go with adultery and end the free pass on their own scandals? There was NOTHING else.

He told a lie about a question they had no business asking pursuant to a case so egregiously worthless it was tossed out of court.

And we still behave like it was a big deal. No. That's their construct. They behave like torture, murder, flaunting congressional subpoenas, and LYING THIS COUNTRY INTO WAR is no big deal. And we quietly and apologetically agree and leave them alone about it. Stop buying Republican attitudes and wearing them for your own.

'He wrote that Mr. Edwards once calmed an anxious Ms. Hunter by promising her that after his wife died, he would marry her in a rooftop ceremony in New York with an appearance by the Dave Matthews Band.'

it doesn't make a difference. This was the first I'd heard he was thinking about admitting it. His lawyer sounded as though that may be the case.

boy and girl who are about eight or so.

I remember her saying a few years ago that she would raise the younger children if her mother couldn't.

Very disappointed that he would have run knowing this was a ticking rime bomb