McCain refers to Edwards as Vice President (jokingly)

[JI7]

i thought some of this was interesting because the details show how closely the reporters follow every little thing to try to figure out what kerry is going to do. and how sometimes every little thing is made out to be far bigger than is.

<Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona, who rejected overtures that he join Kerry on a ticket that crossed party lines, walked by him on the Senate floor at one point and leaned over to greet his fellow Vietnam War veteran. Kerry remained seated, the two men grasped hands and chatted briefly.

Edwards, a first-term North Carolina senator, was present on the Senate floor for nearly the entire time in the morning that Kerry mingled, but the two men stayed in separate orbits.

They met a few hours later, when they repaired to a small room and closed the doors for a private word. The session did not appear on either man's schedule and lasted only a few minutes. Aides to Kerry sought to minimize the political significance of the meeting. For his part, the Massachusetts senator appeared taken aback afterward when he realized photographers were waiting for the two men to leave the room. He spoke to Senate aides, who then informed waiting photographers he did not wish to have his picture taken.

At one point during the day, McCain jokingly referred to the North Carolina senator as "Vice President Edwards."

"I didn't think it would start that quick," came the reply. >

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2004/06/22/politics1816EDT0713.DTL

[salinen]

1. If McCain really said that

it's an endorsement for the Kerry Presidency. And it's also a slam at chimp.

[Doosh]

2. he gets those in from time to time

with McCain, it's tough to tell whose side he's on, he seems like a sometimes loyal repug, who perhaps wants to come out of the closet to be a Dem.

[JI7]

3. mccain is up for re-election this year

i'm sure that's why he campaigned with bush. you know how nasty the bush people are and they would try to defeat him . i don'tthink we should look to mccain to be like democrats, but we can behappy when he is on our side at times.

i liked the response edwards gave after mccain called him vice president edwards.

[salinen]

4. Also

McCain and Kerry are buds. McCain might actually know.

[Doosh]

5. fact is

it's not really a well kept secret :)

[Scoopie]

6. I didn't write this, but I'm posting it anyway

Kerry's speech was magnificent. As many of you know, I had dissed Kerry's oratory, saying that the music was all wrong. I take it all back. He was funny, warm, compassionate, sincere, and passionate.
Referring to the contribution level, Kerry noted that "people came to Colorado for gold and silver. Well, so did I." Much laughter. For 25 minutes, Kerry articulately spoke with intelligence and sincerity, with no notes whatsoever. He ended with the theme, "Let America be the America it used to be." I liked that. Very close to a theme I had discussed with an Internet buddy just last night (see below).

I was told that Kerry would not work the crowd after his speech. He did so for about 30 minutes. There was a continuous crowd around him, not the least of which were four rather robust young men with Walkman earphones in their ears. They don't smile very much. So I passed one of my "John Kerry's Wes Wing" business cards to his aide.
On the back the card said, "Sir, I would very much like to put this on my car as a bumper sticker: 'Kerry-Clark04: The Old
America...Again!' " However, a few minutes later, I had an
opportunity to get closer to Kerry. Since my business card was gone, I removed my lapel pin and thrust it to him past two rows of people in front of me. The pin said on the top in circular fashion, "John Kerry's Wes Wing." In the middle was a picture of Kerry and Clark taken when Clark endorsed Kerry in Wisconsin on February 13, two days after Clark announced the termination of his active candidacy. At
the bottom written horizontally it said, "John Kerry for President."
Kerry studied the pin, smiled broadly, looked at me in the eyes, and put the pin in his pocket. No words were exchanged.

A side note: Several people saw my pin and my four gold stars on my lapel and asked if I thought Clark would be Kerry's VP. I told them there was about a 50% probability, depending on the extent to which international relations, foreign policy, and national defense/security were crucial to Kerry. Then I added that I was in the ABE camp: Anybody But Edwards. When asked why, I told them that the "son of a millworker" was really the son of a plant manager and that Edwards had never done a pro bono case, and three people who had
favored Edwards as VP abandoned ship on the spot.

[AP]

7. Did the guy think Kerry was going to give the pin back?

And if I gave those three people Four Trials to read, so they could know the true story about Edwards's family and the cases on which he worked, they'd be right back in Edwards's camp.

I think any Democrat should be ashamed of trying to mislead people into not liking ANY Democrat. Why can't they just explain what's good about their candidate rather than mislead about other VP candidates?

[Scoopie]

8. Huh?

I think you missed the point regarding the pin.

[AP]

9. I think the point was, "Kerry likes Clark for VP because he took the pin

and gave a knowing look."

But if people think they're the first person to try to tell Kerry who they like for VP, and if they think Kerry doesn't have the sense to treat all these people like he agrees with him, then they don't understand how not unique they are.

If someone walked up to Kerry and said he should pick David Sedaris as his running mate, Kerry is going to treat that person like they were giving him the most valuable opinion he heard that day.

Which is why I asked, what else was Kerry going to do? Not take the pin? Groan?

[Doosh]

18. I'm sick of Clarkies telling these tall tales

got them nowhere during the primaries.

[Tom Rinaldo]

19. Just watch me change stripes...

... and fall into line as a big Edwards booster if he gets the VP slot lol. It is almost impossible to express how much I would prefer having Edwards a heart beat away from the Presidency rather than Cheney. There are a lot of good things to be said about Edwards. I know, I read them here on DU all the time being said by Edwardians. I'll say them too if he gets the nod. Same thing about Gephardt or whoever. I hope most Edwards supporters will do the same for whoever Kerry picks if it isn't their guy.

[AP]

20. I don't think it's a lie. But I think it's a misperception of reality.

If someone came up to me and started telling me about Edwards's rich father and his greedy trial lawyering for injured people suing negligent corporations, my response might be to smile, nod and back away slowly. Especially if it's were told to me in the sort of tone some peope use around here.

I could understand if the person who said that went back home, logged into the internet, and related to the world the misperception that he or she "converted" me.

[efront]

23. I really think they live in an hallucinatory universe

where everything they say/believe is absolute truth and fact, and anybody who dares disagree with them is simply an idiot and/or liar. I do enjoy their conspiracy theories regarding the media though. They're quite amusing and often bring a smile to my face during a boring day in my office.

[Protected]

26. I think you take internet message boards far too seriously. (NM)

.

[Bread and Circus]

16. Well, I guess all the primary candidates should be ashamed....

because they all fulfilled the misdeed of this statement:

"I think any Democrat should be ashamed of trying to mislead people into not liking ANY Democrat."

That's what they ALL did to each other throughout the primaries.

LOL.

[spooky3]

17. The key word is "mislead." Good candidates don't do that.

[AP]

21. Good candidates don't need to do that. It should be enought to tell

the world what you got, rather than tell the world what the other guy doesn't have.

Or at least the contrast should be clear.

But there's not even a contrast here. It's just a slam that isn't meant to even say anything about your own candidate.

[King of New Orleans]

10. Call me naive

, but i don't believe three people were converted by telling them Edwards was the son of a plant manager (I just took a couple of minutes to look that up and of course it'n not true, Edwards Dad did work his way up into a supervisory position in his 36 years of textile work, as you would hope one would, but he never was a "plant manager") and that Edwards has never done pro bono work (haven't checked that one). I would just blink or shrug if someone used these arguments to discredit someone.

Of course, I've read silly stuff intended to discredit Clark here too. It all sounds ridiculously petty after awhile.

[AP]

11. Re pro bono work:

Edwards’ legal career was not noteworthy for public-interest law or pro bono work. And while Edwards’ clients were typically sympathetic victims, their good fortune in the courtroom also was his. The firm typically received 25 percent to 40 percent of the judgment as its fee — standard for lawyers who work on a contingency basis. Edwards’ firm would receive nothing for its work in a lost case.

“The practicing of law wasn’t about money to John Edwards,” said Kirby. “It sounds like a ‰ disconnect here, but that’s true. He was financially secure for a lifetime. He could have retired at age 40. He practiced law because of the mental challenge. He was a fierce competitor, and most importantly, he practiced law because he truly loved his clients.”

http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/12/features-blume.php

[AP]

12. Incidentally, the LA Weekly is the same paper which

printed the article claiming that Edwards's father was wealthy. A couple weeks later they published this article, and then they ended up endorsing him.

Legal triumphs did, in fact, allow Edwards to join the ranks of the wealthy. But he started from near scratch, as the eldest son of teenage mill workers who lived in a three-room company house. His father would labor all his life to creep into the middle class, and watched with pride as the boy he christened “Johnny” became the first family member to attend college. After graduation from law school at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, he married Elizabeth Anania, a girl he’d noticed in his first class, someone whom he’d immediately concluded was smarter and more sophisticated than he’d ever be.

http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/12/features-blume.php

[Still_Loves_John]

25. I'm calling you naive, because you have no idea what you're talking about

I've heard you say this a couple times, and it annoys me every time. Plaintiff's lawyers don't do pro bono cases, because they don't charge a fee for their services. They work on contigency, they get a cut of whatever they win. If they lose the case, they get no money. Their clients never really have to pay them, unless you count the cut they take.

[wjsander]

13. Hearing that makes me want to abandon the Edwards ship, too.

Errr, no, not really. :7

[Darkamber]

22. So...most people jump into management with no experience?

I'm so tired of people making that swing on things. Lets take the additional steps in there.

Edwards father started on the floor and worked his way up into management. Then the higher ups decided that they only wanted people with a college education to have management positions and Edwards father had to train his replacement before he was let go. This is part of the reason why Edwards holds having an education so important.

As for the pro-bono work...personally, I'm glad that Edwards was defending victims. In pro-bono he could have been using his skills to get off drug dealers or woman beaters or anything. You don't get a choice, only what the court gives you and you have to do your best to help them even if they are a gang leader.

And if the people changed their minds on the spot then they never knew anything about Edwards to begin with.

[Killarney]

14. Wow, that was a slam on Bush

from McCain by calling him Vice President Edwards because that's the assumption that Kerry/Edwards would win.

[phillybri]

15. I see that as a shot @ Bush...

He didn't call him Mr. Candidate...Vice President Edwards...

It sounds good!

[ArkDem]

24. Did he say anything about Clark?