Edwards Says He's Like the Red Sox

(CBS)

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. -- John Edwards looked more rested for this evening's event and it was certainly his best performance of the day. He was loose, relaxed but still focused on his new message as the underdog to fight for change.

My savvy colleague, CBS News Correspondent Chip Reid, noted that the crowd size was bigger than the Bonnie Raitt/Jackson Browne concert that took place in the same venue just a few weeks ago. I disagreed slightly since the room was set up smaller than last time so it just LOOKED like there was more people. But it was a very impressive crowd nonetheless.

"The voters of New Hampshire and the people of New England know a little something about what it's like to be the underdog and to run against a team from New York with all the money in the world," said Edwards in reference to the hometown Boston Red Sox.

(To be fair, this is would have been an apt metaphor if it were three or four years ago. Today you can hardly call the Sox underdogs, seeing as they've won more World Series titles since the turn of the century than anyone else, while domintaing the rival New York Yankees on the field with clutch performances - like when they rallied back from a 3-0 deficit in the 2004 ALCS - and off the field with brilliant moves by the front office in trading for Josh Beckett and winning out on the bidding war for Japanese pitching sensation Daisuke Matsuzaka.... And, yes this digression was just about as fun to write as you can probably imagine.)

Edwards also warned the voters not to be blinded by the celebrity and glitz that comes with Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

"The New Hampshire voters are gonna be blitzed with television, with money, money, money, with some glamour - which the media loves," he said.

An interesting moment came in the Q and A when a woman, impressed with Edwards's claim to speak for those without a voice, asked about speaking for unborn babies.

"Nobody made me God," said Edwards, who explained that the government should not have a role in telling women what to do.