Clodwatch for August 8th, 2008

We have an old saying here in the Clodwatch newsroom: “There’s no kind of clod like the clod that cheats on his wife, suffering from breast cancer, before/during his presidential primary campaign.” Today we honor a man who has just outed himself as just such a clod: John Edwards!

Edwards has done some amazing work here, advancing the work of clod-kind worldwide. Without even getting into the morality of cheating on your wife while she lives with temporarily in-remission cancer, just take a moment to acknowledge the pure claudacity* of what he did.

On the one hand we would have had the hordes of Republicans. Veterans of Monica Lewinsky, bloviators with years of experience talking up the Moral Values crowd. Men and women with no way of life beyond slinging mud. Forget their own indiscretions, never mind the hypocrisy. Every normally venom-toothed liar would have suddenly become gravely offended by the very notion that a human being could do this. Combine their tenacity with the gravity of Edwards’ sins and the ensuing media fecal blast would reach epic heights.

On the other hand we would have had John Edwards, whose affair surely would have been discovered, likely even sooner, running for President on behalf of the Democrats. Democrats in every state from the top end of the ticket all the way down to tiny local posts depend on the presidential candidate to help them out. How could Edwards even consider running, to say nothing of actually making a serious go at it?!

If you ever wonder why the Democrats have spent so long sitting powerless, unable to defeat Republicans, consider this: of the top three Democrats in the presidential primary this year, two have been proven entirely willing to destroy the party, without any real chance of winning in the general election.

John Edwards, you are a clod.




*See what I did there? Yeah.