I'm so accustomed to being cynical under the rule of King W. and rightfully so, and so I too have felt pangs of skepticism towards Edwards' sincerity. After all, wasn't the base of the right-wing seduced by the aww-shucks facade of W.? And we all now know his good-ol'-boy charm was just a mask for the insecure, cruel, frat-boy asshole that we all know he really is. Could John Edwards be the same? Could it be an act?

But that all disappears when I think about how passionately and unequivocably he is giving voice to so many issues that I care about and desperately want to see become a part of our national dialogue. His background does matter, we know what someone's upbringing does to shape or, as in the case of W., mis-shape their character. The man seems to get it on a personal level, and thank god for all of us that he also happens to be an extremely gifted orator. It is a welcomed change and a necessity frankly that all of America hear John Edwards articulate the need for universal health care, worker's rights, fair trade and an environmentally sustainable economy.

These are populist issues. They can only propel a candidate to the Whitehouse if there is a massive wave of support for them that can overwhelm the politics-as-usual elites that survive on their corporate donors and meandering pandering centrist ways. So if you're gonna stir up the people by talking about big issues like these, you'd best deliver or you'll be ten times as unpopular twice as fast if you turn your back on the people who put you there. It'll work much the same way as things did under Bush and Cheney, but instead of the president guiding policy towards the whims of neoconservative thinktanks and Halliburton, he'll be guided by the needs of the people of the United States of America.

So I'm not as much supporting a candidate, as I am supporting all of the issues that I care most deeply about by hiring the most passionate and effective advocate for them that I can find. Right now that's looking like Edwards to me and a lot of other folks.

It's easy to observe the campaign rhetoric and say, "Edwards is the most left of the top-tier candidates." And that may be the case. But this essay completely misses a more glaring difference between Edwards and the other two candidates: he's a white male .

I'm not saying we should give Obama and Clinton a free pass. But for those of you who think Obama and Clinton have sold out, just think about this: how much easier is it for Edwards to be a progressive than it would be for either of them?

I would submit to you that there is an underlying bigotry to this statement. If I were to contort that to say that Barack's rhetoric is somehow more or less authentic based solely on the color of his skin with no other reasonable evidence to back it up, I hope I would be called a racist. Just because I'm white does not mean that I as a human being am any less of incapable of understanding and honestly empathizing with the difficulties women and minorities have faced. Nor does belonging to one of those two categories automatically earn you my respect and trust all on its own. It's all just silly.

It's time to get beyond race and start seeing that we're all connected and to think better of one another. That our differences are far outnumbered by our similarities. Those who are in power now have view everyone around them with suspicion and unwaivering cynism. That is the underlying reason why they have no faith in government. If we are going to turn this country around we have to remember what makes us different, that we believe in the basic underlying goodness of our fellow human beings. That when people believe in the best of one another it tends to bring out that result.

Loved the entire piece, but this line in particular stood out to me:

Most of them young women with very little knowledge of the law, but a very strong sense of doing what they’re told.

That's what the right wing movement is ALL ABOUT. The paradox of the right wing is that there is nothing they are more about than obeying authority to a small number of elites. It is the reason that they have no problem enabling or turning a blind eye to election theft. At a core, fundemental level the right wing hate the masses and consider them unfit to select their own leaders. They all need a Daddy to tell them what to do and how to think. Religion serves this purpose well, and it is why the neoconservatives have adopted it as their primary means of recruitment and indoctrination.

The most eye-opening thing I've read in the last year is The Authoritarians (available from the author to read in PDF format here: http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/) by Bob Altemeyer. This book is a psychological breakdown of your common hardcore right-winger. While it might be no surprise to most readers of Salon thaat right-wing authoritarians are capable of some astounding intelectual dishonesty and a penchant for hypocracy, this book demonstrates the underlying psyche behind such behavior with incredible detail and analysis.