John Edwards’ strategists just held a conference call to debut their “America Belongs to Us” project. It’s an expansion of Edwards’ argument against politicians who take money from lobbyists or special interest PACs; this time, he’s not asking candidates to pledge not to take the money, he’s asking voters to pledge not to work for or caucus for those that do take it:
I pledge not to vote or caucus for a Democratic presidential candidate that accepts campaign contributions from Washington lobbyists and special interest PACs
The conveniently narrows the frontrunner race in Iowa down to Edwards and Obama (or not), and also frames the race as one not about change, experience, audacity, hope or being the first anything, but rather as an ethical contest of sorts… and also change. T his is the time to do it. As Edwards’ deputy campaign manager, Jonathan Prince put it, “All year, it’s been about celebrity and cash. Now it’s crunch time.”
Their goal is to have 1 million pledges by February 5 — which is about 10x as many people as actually participate in the Iowa Democratic caucuses (and half the number of registered voters of any party in the state) so maybe there’s some audacious hope happening after all. Or maybe he’s betting on Nevada to come through.
But speaking of overcompensating….America Belongs to Us has what is perhaps the most redundant blog feature ever: Outrage of the Day. You have to love it. I mean that. You HAVE TO, ok?
You can listen to the entire conference call here. (Take that, Page! We have multimedia too!)
