REVIEW & OUTLOOK
Senator Sizzle
Why did Kerry pick Edwards? Not for his experience and depth.
If Bill Clinton is right that the choice of a running mate is any candidate's first "Presidential" decision, then John Kerry's selection of John Edwards is a disappointment.
Granted that the 51-year-old North Carolina Senator is a media favorite and at least for a while will fire up the Democratic base. The former trial lawyer can grab and hold a crowd, and he brings vigor and charisma to a ticket that needs both. Perhaps in that sense Mr. Kerry is addressing a weakness that he perceives in his own candidacy--a sign of self-awareness that is attractive in any President. As an articulate Southerner, Mr. Edwards also reminds many nostalgic Democrats/reporters of Bill Clinton without the character flaws.
But to continue that comparison, Mr. Edwards is also Mr. Clinton without the experience and depth. By the time he ran for national office, Mr. Clinton could drill down several levels into education, welfare, trade and other policy debates. Mr. Edwards is known around the Senate as a smooth talker of no particular expertise. He is smart enough to quickly grasp talking points, but the doubt is whether he knows enough to be an asset in White House counsels if the ticket is elected.
Among recent Vice Presidential candidates, Mr. Edwards compares in experience to Geraldine Ferraro (1984) and Spiro Agnew (1968) but knows much less about defense than Dan Quayle (1988). Compared to Joe Lieberman, Dick Gephardt or Dick Cheney, Mr. Edwards will require on-the-job training, especially in foreign policy. In a year when national security is once more at the top of voter concerns, this strikes us as a mistake in judgment by Mr. Kerry, and perhaps also a political error.
All the more so since Mr. Edwards has shared Mr. Kerry's slipperiness on anti-terror policy. In the wake of 9/11, Mr. Edwards was calling Iraq "the most serious and imminent threat to our country" and declared that "I don't think we should be bound by what the United Nations does." But this year he has assailed Mr. Bush for pursuing precisely this advice. Like Mr. Kerry, he voted for the war on Iraq only to vote later against the money to finish the job. And he too voted for the Patriot Act only to rail against it during the Democratic primaries.
These votes aren't likely to help Mr. Kerry much in the South or other swing parts of the electorate. Perhaps the Kerry campaign has polls showing that Mr. Edwards "moves the needle" more than Mr. Gephardt among, say, married suburban women in South Succotash. But Mr. Edwards barely won his North Carolina Senate seat in 1998, and one reason he isn't running for re-election is because he wasn't sure he could run to the left for President and then tack back to the right to prevail in a Senate run. The National Journal reports that in 2003 Mr. Edwards had the fourth most liberal voting record in the Senate (after only Maryland's Paul Sarbanes, Jack Reed of Rhode Island and Mr. Kerry himself).
Voters will also soon learn much more about Mr. Edwards's trial-lawyer provenance, with unpredictable political consequences. His selection over Mr. Gephardt, a favorite of private-sector unions, shows how powerful the trial bar has become within the Democratic Party. Mr. Edwards is especially close to asbestos-suit kingpin Fred Baron, who will now mobilize the trial bar cash machine for Senator Kerry. And don't forget Ralph Nader, who is himself a creature of the trial bar and has publicly suggested that the presence of Mr. Edwards on the ticket might curb his third-party enthusiasm.
On the other hand, Mr. Edwards's rise may finally force Republicans to drop their political ambivalence and make legal reform a major campaign issue. With tax hikes harder to pass, Democrats have seized upon lawsuits as the best way to redistribute income. For many doctors and business owners, this issue has become more important than taxes or health-care reform. They understand that a Kerry-Edwards victory could kill prospects for any national tort reform for years to come--and so they are likely to respond if President Bush takes up the other side.
It's always possible that the Edwards choice means that Mr. Kerry also wants to have this fight this year. During his primary run, Mr. Edwards was most famous for his "Two Americas" speech, a Dickensian stem-winder depicting the country as a place where the powerful few dominate everyone else. In announcing Mr. Edwards yesterday, Mr. Kerry specifically praised him for noting "the great divide in this country--the 'Two Americas'--that exists between those who are doing well and those who are struggling to make it from day to day. That concern is at the center of this campaign. It is what it is all about."
If a ticket composed of a rich trial lawyer and a rich Senator who married the Heinz fortune can make this faux populism sound credible, they're bound to win. If they can't, Mr. Kerry may regret he chose sizzle in a year when the voters are looking for substance.
