Edwards: We stumble over lots of things

I’m late to the news, but then I hadn’t been following the Edwards-affair story; I generally don’t pay a lot of attention to these salacious details about a politician, because while they’re sensational, people do tend to forget that there are always hurting spouses and children involved, and it usually goes too far.

I think I did mention somewhere, in passing, that once again, the press has been curiously incurious about the behavior of a Democrat when they would have taken a similarly-behaved Republican to the cleaners. And then they wonder why the press polls lower than the congress, which is standing at an approval figure of 9%

John Edwards’ betrayal of his wife is a private affair – to a point – once it’s out there, though, it’s “out there.” In refusing to report a story once it was “out there” the press committed a kind of betrayal, too – one that breaks the public trust just as surely as Edwards broke a private one. That, to me (and many others) was always the bigger story. Remember, had it not been for Drudge, Newsweek would have spiked Isikoff’s story on Clinton and Monica, too. Another story I didn’t like, but which told us a lot about the press and how they treat different members of different parties.

Instapundit has a thoughtful round-up and another here (Thanks, Glenn, for the link!)

Here is Edwards’ whole statement. I don’t think he did himself much good by it. Nor does Hot Air.

Althouse says Ugh. Go away.

Vanderleun thinks of 1936.

Okie has the story on Edwards, and STACLU says “I guess the press can stop ignoring this.”

In light of John Edwards’ admission, someone wrote that I should repost this piece from March of ’07: The Stumbling Block of Elizabeth Edwards’ Cancer

What is it about Elizabeth Edwards’ battle with cancer that makes so many trip up?

The woman has cancer; it has returned and is sadly incurable but “treatable.” She and her husband have made a decision about how they will live their lives in the face of it. They’re entitled to make that decision without having to justify it to you or to me.

It never occurred to me that the Edwards would be “using” her terrible illness to gain sympathy and support for her husband, and while I am no fan of John Edwards, I still reject that notion and suggest that those who offer it might do well to look inside themselves and see if all they’ve offered up, by making such a charge, is a nasty bit of projection.

We tend to accuse others of precisely the thoughts and motives we harbor in our own hearts. I daresay there may be people in the world who would use a terminal illness to further an ambition, but such people…well…they’ve already lost something vital in their humanity. I don’t think Elizabeth Edwards has. Yes, yes, I know, she’s the one who supposedly loves the leftwing netroot blogs, but I still don’t think that means she is an unfeeling automaton of ambition. So, sue me.

I suspect Elizabeth Edwards is, in dealing with her cancer, simply holding to an old bit of advice: “begin as you mean to continue…” And if that is her choice, I applaud it. Had she and her husband decided that they’d prefer to be a bit more subdued and inward-centered just now, I’d applaud that, too.

But, it does seem that Elizabeth Edwards’ cancer is problematic for others. Katie Couric, in a dreary monotone that relied heavily on her patented “some say [insert a charge perhaps no one but Couric is actually making] technique,” peppered the Edwards with all sorts of questions about their motives in continuing the campaign, and yes, she overdid it. She way overdid it. But in reading the transcripts, one sees that the Edwards comported themselves well and seemed pretty genuine. One reads the transcripts and gets the impression that Couric was not listening to the Edwards’ actual answers – that she was simply waiting for them to stop talking so she could come at them with a different “some say.” That might have worked well in a morning program, on a couch with a cup of coffee…it did not work well in this case.

To be fair to Couric, she endured her husband’s death from cancer and she worked (as did her husband, newsman Jay Monahan) until very nearly the end, and so who knows what sort of interior dynamic was going on inside Katie Couric, coloring her questions. For all we know, she may have been doing the interview on autopilot while remembering how much she had wished she’d worked less (or more) during that experience. Perhaps she was simply the wrong person to do the interview. In any case, Couric stumbled badly on Elizabeth Edwards’ illness. But she’s not the first to. Not too long ago, Hillary also took a tumble over it.

It wasn’t a great tumble, mind you, and you didn’t read much about it, because Hillary’s tumble was a silent one. She made the mistake of completely ignoring Edwards when a fuller humanity (and a more fully-human politician) might have rushed out to embrace a moment, and I have long suspected that it was because Hillary did not know what to do with the fact that Elizabeth Edwards was a cancer survivor.

What happened, briefly, was that Edwards – in a magazine interview – dared to opine that she believed she was a more joyful person than Hillary Clinton. Clinton said nothing in response, which made it pregnant with uneasy meaning, and within a news cycle, Edwards was issuing a mealy-mouthed apology toward Don Hillary Clinton and kissing the ring (and blaming the poor publication for “getting it wrong”).

That might sound like Edwards had stumbled, no, it was Hillary’s gaffe, as I wrote here at the time:

…she might have made a thoughtful and, if not self-deprecating, at least gracious statement, herself. Something along these lines:

“Mrs. Edwards has survived treatment for breast cancer, and it is not surprising that, coming out the other side of such an ordeal, she has managed to find real joyfulness in her life. That’s a blessing. I’m both happy for Elizabeth and grateful that she has reminded me – reminded all of us – that every life has its share of gifts and burdens, and that if we must endure the burdens, we ought to try to remember to find the joy in the gifts. Indeed, joyfulness is something I need to work on, myself. And, hey, I can feel some joy coming on…for all of us…on November 8th!”

It’s not really that difficult. It takes a willingness to drop the imperiousness, think a thing through and be a little warm. Instead, Hillary did the silence, then the apology-acceptance, but she left us all with the same sense we’ve always had of her: Joyless, humorless, entitled, Godfather-esque. Kiss the ring and back out. Very good. You can go back to your little life, now, Mrs. Edwards, and when I need you, you’ll be there for me.

I believe had Edwards not just come off a cancer episode, Hillary would have addressed the “joyful” comment. But Hillary is a gallumpher of a politician – a lumbering Tandem 18-wheeler full of heavy and toxic cargo – it makes her too careful and a bit skittish. To answer the charge without some grace could have been dangerous for Hillary, and so she was cowed by Edwards’ cancer. It tripped her up.

I’m sure Elizabeth Edwards is in for one hell of a rough time, as is her family, and my heart goes out to all of them. And who knows, in six months, they may make another decision, a different one than the one they’re currently committed to. But my goodness…professional journalists, professional politicians and others really shouldn’t be handling it all so badly.

Meanwhile – Kathy at Cake-Eater Chronicles has some personal cancer news. She is promising/threatening a Part II. Do go visit her and lend her some support.

And Siggy is trying to think the best of Edwards while remembering all the reasons he is inclined to think the worst. He also links to some useful medical perspectives.