I continue to feel bad for John Edwards, one of my favorite Dem presidential candidates.
He formally kicked off his presidential campaign today in his hometown of Robbins, N.C., with high-school marching bands and fans of the former trial attorney from all over the state.
Edwards even had some good lines, such as, “George Bush’s guiding principle is a twisted reflection of the American bargain: Instead of ‘opportunity for all, special privileges for none,’ he’s given us ‘opportunity for all the special interests.'”
He also appeared on my favorite news show — the Daily Show with Jon Stewart — last night and was pretty good, complete with the self-deprecating humor I like. When Stewart asked what the point of an announcement speech in September is after months of campaigning, Edwards said, “If you’ve been reading the polls, Jon, I think you’ll see it will come as news to a lot of people that I’m running for president.” Cute.
Unfortunately, through no fault of his own, Edwards’ timing is awful. He couldn’t have known in advance, but he would have been much better off announcing last week.
Alongside every article about Edwards’ speech today is another article about Wesley Clark’s decision to enter the presidential race. Instead of enjoying a day or two of positive press following the formal kick-off speech, like Kerry got a couple of weeks ago, Edwards has to share the spotlight with the former supreme allied commander of NATO.
Even worse, Edwards was in his home state of North Carolina to make the announcement — while most of the state is preparing for a major hurricane that is barreling towards them.
As a result, tomorrow’s headlines will be divided in a way that won’t do Edwards any favors. In North Carolina and across the country, it will be Hurricane Isabel above the fold.
Just as an aside from election history, I wanted to mention that Edwards’ unfortunate timing isn’t the worst luck I can think of for presidential announcements. That honor belongs to Dick Lugar.
The senior Republican senator from Indiana announced on April 19, 1995, that he would challenge Bob Dole for the Republican nomination to lose to Bill Clinton in the ’96 election.
What else happened on April 19, 1995? Timothy McVeigh blew up the federal building in Oklahoma City, which, at the time, was the worst domestic act of terrorism in U.S. history.
Lugar’s announcement, in the process, was completely ignored. He ended up with 4% in the Iowa caucuses (finishing 7th) and 5% in the New Hampshire primary (finishing 5th). He dropped out a month later and endorsed Dole.
Did the fact that his campaign kick-off was completely ignored doom his candidacy? Probably not; his campaign had other problems. Nevertheless, Lugar’s timing, through no fault of his own, couldn’t have been much worse.