HE STRIDES into an Iowa primary school where more than a hundred people have skipped their lunch to hear him, wearing jeans and flashing a smile that could sell toothpaste. He begins, as always, by mentioning his wife, who was diagnosed with incurable cancer in March. \u201cShe’s doing great.\u201d\u009d But within seconds, John Edwards dives into the details of his health-care scheme. Then on to questions. The subjects range from high medical costs to the influence of Iran. \u201cHere’s what I think,\u201d\u009d he answers, before launching into a detailed plan to fix the problem.<\/p>\n
Mr Edwards is a man of big plans. No other presidential candidate, of either party, can match the sheer quantity, let alone the ambition, of his policy ideas. He has grand, progressive, goals\u201d\u201dto end the war in Iraq (obviously), provide universal health care, address global warming, eliminate poverty in America within 30 years\u201d\u201dand detailed blueprints of how to do it all.<\/p>\n
All this is a big change from 2004, when he first ran, unsuccessfully, for the Democratic nomination and then (equally unsuccessfully) as John Kerry’s vice-presidential running-mate. Those campaigns were built around his youthful charm, made-for-politics biography (the son of a mill-worker in North Carolina; the first member of his family to go to college) and a rousing stump speech about \u201ctwo Americas\u201d\u009d, one for the rich and one for the rest.<\/p>\n