A Populist in the Heartland
Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards has bet his campaign on winning early in the primary season, and no place is more important to him than Iowa. He hasn't stopped running there, he says, since he finished second to John Kerry in 2004's first-in-the-nation contest. Though consistently in third place nationally behind Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, the former North Carolina senator has had outsize influence on his opponents, staking out aggressive positions on issues from providing universal healthcare to rejecting contributions from lobbyists. During an Iowa bus tour last week, with his wife, Elizabeth, at his side, Edwards sat down with U.S. News.
What is your plan for Iraq?
I would draw down 40,000 to 50,000 [troops] immediately. I'd take them largely out of the north and the south. I would begin a steady redeployment of combat troops out of Iraq so they were all out in nine or 10 months. I would say to [Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-] Maliki and the Shia-led government that we're leaving. We're going to help you, but you need to reach a political compromise. I would send the secretary of state to talk with Iran and Syria and other countries in the region to get them engaged to help stabilize Iraq as America leaves. The Iranians, the last thing they want are a million refugees coming across their border, and they also don't want a broader Middle East conflict between Shia and Sunni.
How would you confront the significant issues with Pakistan?
In the short term, we want to ratchet up pressure on [Gen. Pervez] Musharraf, and we have huge leverage because of all the aid that Pakistan receives from America. We ought to use that leverage and force him to aggressively go after al Qaeda. If I had actionable intelligence on where [Osama] bin Laden was, I would go get him, wherever he was.
Has your campaign moved from an emotional appeal to Iowa voters that proved effective in 2004 to a more cerebral, issues-oriented approach?
I think it's the opposite. I think what you're seeing from me now is coming, all of it, from here [touches heart]. It is true that I have very specific, substantive policy proposals that caucusgoers insist on. And that is a distinction from 2004. But when I talk about the outrage that I feel, there is nothing intellectual about that. It's very real.
What do you make of polls that, for the first time, show you not leading in Iowa, where you've staked your success?
I know from having been through this that I start from a very strong position, but you have to be able to maintain the belief that you are ready to be president and that you're the strongest candidate for the general election. We know how to run in Iowa, and we know how to run in New Hampshire, because I've done it.
Why would you make a better president than Senator Clinton or Senator Obama?
I have a long history of taking on these entrenched interests and beating them. There's a difference in the way that I would achieve change versus Senator Obama. Which is I don't believe you can compromise and negotiate your way to change. I think you have to stand up and fight. These people will not voluntarily give away their power.
Given your wife's cancer diagnosis, how do you balance hope and fear?
You have hope until you have no choice, and that's exactly how we live our lives. And we have been through the experience, we've reached a place where hope is gone with the death of our son, and as long as hope is alive, and it is very much alive, in the case of Elizabeth's cancer—it's treatable, we're optimistic about it.
If elected, what legacy would you want to leave?
This is a president who made opportunity available to everybody. Period.
You are running on the theme of two Americas. How would you address the country's growing wealth disparity and address the deficit?
We are at the worst income and asset disparity that we've had in America since the Great Depression. If you want to reduce the deficit, the most important thing to do is to deal with the structural deficiencies in the American economy: a dysfunctional healthcare system, addiction to oil, access to college, and the general economic inequality that exists. If you address those, in a serious, comprehensive way, it will strengthen the middle class, grow the middle class, lift millions of people out of poverty, and strengthen America's economy, and the deficit will be reduced.
Has it been more difficult than expected to be a wealthy candidate running on a have-have-nots theme?
People in the world who have an entrenched interest and don't want to hear this message on fairness, equality, trade, tax policy, healthcare, etc., they will assault anytime anybody challenges their interest. This will not stop. This will continue. And they will use anything they have available to them. Anything. The bad news for them is they will never silence me no matter what they do.
This story appears in the August 27, 2007 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.