Edwards Jabs Obama and Clinton

(CBS)
HENDERSON, NEV. -- John Edwards ripped Barack Obama for praising the way Ronald Reagan brought about change when he was President of the United States.
“When you think about what Ronald Reagan did to the American people, to the middle class to the working people,” said Edwards.
“He was openly – openly – intolerant of unions and the right to organize. He openly fought against the union and the organized labor movement in this country. He openly did extraordinary damage to the middle class and working people, created a tax structure that favored the very wealthiest Americans and caused the middle class and working people to struggle every single day. The destruction of the environment, you know, eliminating regulation of companies that were polluting and doing extraordinary damage to the environment.”
“I can promise you this: this president will never use Ronald Reagan as an example for change.”
Edwards was addressing comments made by Obama during a sit-down interview with the Reno Gazette-Journal. According to Edwards spokesman Mark Kornblau, Edwards was addressing these specific remarks from the interview:
"I don't want to present myself as some sort of singular figure. I think part of what's different are the times. I do think that for example the 1980 was different. I think Ronald Reagan changed the trajectory of America in a way that Richard Nixon did not and in a way that Bill Clinton did not. He put us on a fundamentally different path because the country was ready for it. I think they felt like with all the excesses of the 1960s and 1970s and government had grown and grown but there wasn't much sense of accountability in terms of how it was operating. I think people, he just tapped into what people were already feeling, which was we want clarity we want optimism, we want a return to that sense of dynamism and entrepreneurship that had been missing."
CORRECTION: This blog post originally included an inaccurate and unverified quote, provided by the Edwards campaign, in lieu of the Obama quote used above. CBS News regrets this error.
Edwards also took another shot at Obama earlier in his speech:
“There’s this back and forth that’s been going over the last 24 hours or so between Senator Clinton and Senator Obama, with Senator Clinton saying what we need in a president is somebody who knows how to run the bureaucracy, who knows how to manage, somebody who knows how to shuffle the papers around and Senator Obama saying no, what we really need is a President of the United States who knows how to give a good speech,” said Edwards. “Here’s what I think, I think what we need in the next President of the United States is somebody with some guts and fight and determination.
Neither you nor Edwards seem to have understood what he was saying about Reagan. There was no praise of Reagan in those remarks.
What the statement said was that Reagan tapped into public discontent with the direction of the country and that he stuck to his beliefs in doing so and didn''t try to compromise his principles.
There was no praise for what Reagan did to the working class and there was no holding Reagan''s policies as an example of the change we need.
Johnny One note relates everything back too his populist message.
Fighting for what you believe is great but if you can''t persuade others you''ll be fighting alone.
Kudos to CBS for actually giving us the full context.Who''da thunk it?
And how''d the gipper manage to make Carter look so bad? Had Jimmy been doing something terrible to kittens?
http://onlysayin.blogspot.com/2007/10/has-jimmy-carter-been-raping-kittens.html
Is very ironic that Obama is prising Reagan who one of his goals was to destroy unions and organized labor and who started Reaganomics and tax breaks for the rich. Obama is doing that just to attract some dissatisfied Republicans and simply playing politics.
Edwards attack and belittling comment about Obama just wanting to "give a good speech," are baseless and cheap efforts designed to score political points. He''s better than that... but this is the game they all seem to resort to when the chips seem to be stacked against them.
According to this site, it wasn''t in the original interview...
http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/1/17/15929/4799
And the position it takes is the exact opposite of Obama''s strategy, which is the whole Unity Pony / Kumbaya with the Republicans.
Did he really say those words???
With the limited amount of air time and press coverage that has been alloted to Edwards, he needs to go for it!
With the limited amount of air time and press coverage that has been alloted to Edwards, he needs to go for it!
With three potential candidates in the running, it''s time to get past all the issues upon which they agree and get down to business of where they are different. It''s the only way to determine who is best suited to run against the eventual Republican nominee and who is the right person to tackle the growing number of crises which await our next President -- recession, Iraq, health care, environment...
With the limited amount of air time and press coverage that has been alloted to Edwards, he needs to go for it!
for the love of pete, can''t hillary and barack NOT put their foot in their mouths? just for a few days? the general election isn''t even here yet...what kind of nonsense is gonna spout out of their pieholes by then???
and, WHAT WAS OBAMA GOING ON AND ON ABOUT IN THAT LAST DEBATE??? notice none of the media want to cover that??? barack, darling, we don''t wanna know that you can''t handle paperwork, even if it is true...what the heyyyy does obama think being president''s about? "inspiring" the bureaucracy to work??? no no no no...my husband''s a fed employee, and trust me, inspiration will not help...
With three potential candidates in the running, it''s time to get past all the issues upon which they agree and get down to business of where they are different. It''s the only way to determine who is best suited to run against the eventual Republican nominee and who is the right person to tackle the growing number of crises which await our next President -- recession, Iraq, health care, environment...
With the limited amount of air time and press coverage that has been alloted to Edwards, he needs to go for it!
"Former President Bill Clinton and his wife, Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, issued a statement that praised the former president for his optimistic outlook."
The CNN report continued:
"''Hillary and I will always remember President Ronald Reagan for the way he personified the indomitable optimism of the American people, and for keeping America at the forefront of the fight for freedom for people everywhere,'' their statement said."
More interestingly--and in retrospect understandably, given their common penchant for lying--President Bill Clinton eulogized Richard Nixon at his funeral like this: "May the day of judging President Nixon on anything less than his entire life and career come to a close."
Now the Clinton camp followers hypocritically make Obama''s statement of fact--that Reagan ushered in a sea-change in U.S. politics, whether you agreed with his direction or not--into some claim that Obama is less than genuine in his politics.
Talking point No. 1: That Reagan busted unions, therefore Obama must been less than committed to the labor movement. Good spin, perhaps, but factually and morally wrong.
Meanwhile, people forget that Bill Clinton pardoned the union-busting international financier Mark Rich.
Martin Edwin Andersen
Churchton, Maryland
$7 million dollar challenge - go to johnedwardsDOTcom (remove DOT put a period, obviously) and donate - get the word out everywhere! here, on youtube, blogs, DONATE TO EDWARDS TODAY FRIDAY THE 18th!!!
Vigdor
GOOGLE: LOVERS OF DEMOCRACY
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by be_free
January 20, 2008 1:41 PM PST
- Obama is not "comparing himself to Reagan", or making any references to Reagan''s politics at all. He''s talking about change, and that change under Reagan was possible because people were ready for it. Obama also wants change, and the anaology simply refers to that like under Reagan, now people are ready for change as well. Obama being a democrat, obviously has a different type of change in mind, a change for this time, for people in todays America. Was that really so hard to understand? I pity the small minds who always twist words refusing to listen to the content of the message. There are more ways to deliver a message than through a jingle, or sounding like a used car sales man like Edwards. Come on now.
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