Edwards Steps Up

It was supposed to be perfect: a slow news week, an announcement from the Lower Ninth Ward. Turned out that the death of a former President, and an Internet glitch which led to his campaign website going live a day early kind of got the whole thing off to a shaky start. But everyone knew that Edwards was running anyway, and the Ford tributes got out of the way enough for him to merit some coverage this morning.

Kicking off the campaign in the Lower Ninth was a powerful signal, one that suggests his will be a different kind of campaign, talking to and about a different class of people, on a different plane than some of the other candidates. That might work, or not, but in a crowded field with so-called "celebrity candidates," it's the best chance Edwards has to flip the script.

From his email to supporters:

I'm writing to you from New Orleans, where tomorrow I will announce that I am a candidate for president of the United States.

I'm announcing here because no place better demonstrates the two Americas I've talked about for a long time. But even more important, no place better demonstrates the power people have when they -- not Washington -- take responsibility and take action to build the America we believe in.

I'm running to ask millions of Americans to take responsibility and take action to change our country and ensure America's greatness in the 21st century.

We know what we need to do. Changing our country means:

Providing moral leadership in the world -- starting with Iraq, where we should begin drawing down troops, not escalating the war

Strengthening our middle class and ending the shame of poverty

Guaranteeing health care for every single American

Leading the fight against global warming

Getting America and the world to break our addiction to oil

That's not just my vision –- it's our vision. And we can't wait for the next president to take office to begin fundamentally changing our country.

And the truth is, we don't have to wait. Since I left Washington, I've seen firsthand the power that ordinary people have when we work together.

We worked with thousands of volunteers to raise the minimum wage in six states – and we got it done. We're making the first year of college free for young people in Greene County, North Carolina. And we've been working from the grassroots up to organize workers so they can stand up for their rights and earn a decent living.

And this week in New Orleans, I've been working with young people who gave up part of their Christmas vacation to work on rebuilding and helping those in need -- just like the hundreds of college students who came here to work with me during their Spring Break earlier this year.

This is the kind of commitment to solving our problems that I've seen time and time again over the last two years – and it reaffirms one of the great lessons of my whole life. The power of America doesn't lie in Washington; the true power of America is in the people of America.

That's why we're getting ready to launch a campaign that says to everyone who wants to take responsibility for our future: we can't wait until tomorrow. We must act now.

Tomorrow begins today.

I honestly didn't think much of John Edwards in 2004. He came off to me as too slick, as if he were selling me a monorail in Springfield. The stump speech was so polished it appeared to me to be out of a musical. "You know what I'm talking about! You work hard, two, three jobs just to make ends meet..." Its cadence was too familiar, too perfect. Over the last couple years I've seen Edwards grow into the role, become more human. His focus on poverty is disarming because it's so novel.

He's one of the candidates I'm taking a look at for 2008.