by Christi Parsons
John and Elizabeth Edwards stepped back into the political spotlight today – briefly – to offer a newly recast version of the message of their defunct presidential campaign.
In short, it goes like this: If you’re upset about the economy, you should be upset about Iraq. And you should call Republicans to account for your family’s budget woes.
The country is spending billions of dollars every month in Iraq, the former Democratic candidate said in a morning press conference, and “at the same time we’ve got 40-plus million Americans who don’t have health care coverage.”
From their home in North Carolina, the Edwards participated in a telephone conference with several progressive anti-war groups, including MoveOn.org, the Center for American Progress and the Service Employees International Union.
Essentially, the groups were pledging to collaborate on a $20 million campaign to draw a link for Americans between their economic concerns and the war in Iraq.
And the Edwards agreed to headline the call in order to call attention to the cause, which intertwines many of the messages of the presidential campaign they called off in late January.
As Elizabeth Edwards put it, after her husband handed the phone to her: “If the economy is your number one issue when you’re voting, the war is, too.”
How do the Edwards plan to highlight their message? That’s not clear, because they didn’t stick around for questions. They hung up after their opening statements and let the advocates talk about their campaign.
Republicans have their own ideas.
After the call, Republican National Committee spokesman Chris Taylor had this to say: “Like Sen. Clinton and Barack Obama, John Edwards and these liberal fringe groups will continue to do and say anything to distract voters from their overall goals of retreating from the War on Terror and instituting devastating tax hikes on hard-working Americans.”