Thursday, January 31, 2008

Edwards quits presidential race for second time

NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (Teurders) -- Former Sen. John Edwards dropped out of the race for the Democratic presidential nomination for the second time today in front of a dozen supporters and local news enthusiasts.

"It is time for me to step aside again so that history can repeat itself," Edwards said in New Orleans, the same city where he dropped out of the run for the 2008 Democratic presidential race race earlier this week.

With his wife, Elizabeth his side, Edwards said he could predict "who will take the final steps to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.," but would not support the winning candidate until either secured a loss in the general election.

"We must be audacious if we want to live up to the future change this country hopes to represent," he said. "The future is change".

Earlier, an aide said that Edwards was happy to be getting media attention for a change, especially now with the other candidates vying and hovering over his former supporters like vultures.

Edwards campaign earned him 3 delegates and raised a total of 8 million dollars. “Campaign money was not the issue,” the aide said. “The issue now is what we are going to with our lives ...”

Edwards has trailed Sens. Hillary Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois, who is black, in every way, including a dismal third-place finish in Tuesday's Florida primary with 14 percent of the votes.

Edwards said he has spoken with Obama and Clinton and received their pledge to make poverty a top issue of their campaigns to which both responded "sure thing", this according to campaign aides.

Reacting to Edwards plan to bow out of the race for a second time, Obama clicked his heels and did a jig.

"He made a some bad decisions – talking about the New Orleans child without a home, the West Virginia miner without a job, all that sort of depressing stuff. What he should have focused on was change, man," Obama said Wednesday.

Clinton called Edwards a “Champion of the coal-miners and ditch-diggers”.

"John Edwards ended his campaign today …what is left to be determined is how we can carve up his political carcass and divide his electoral innards," Clinton said in a statement.

Some political pundits predict Edwards' supporters are more likely to lean in Obama's direction in order to jump on the band wagon.

Edwards had campaigned on the message that he was standing up for the little guy, people who are not traditionally given a voice in Washington, and that he would do more to fight against his own special interests.