John Edwards resurfaces

By Richard K. Barry

I doubt it has much to do with electoral politics, but The Washington Post reported yesterday that John Edwards has reactivated his law license and is getting ready to hit the speakers circuit. 

It does make you wonder what with Mark Sanford reviving his political career and Anthony Weiner trying to do the same, could someone ever come back from what Edwards did? You would have to say no, but times change, and he is merely 60 years old. 

Edwards has remained largely out of public view since his May 2012 acquittal on one charge of campaign finance fraud. A judge declared a mistrial on five other criminal counts after jurors couldn’t agree if Edwards illegally used campaign money to hide his pregnant mistress as he ran for president in 2008.

I don't think there is much doubt about his talent, and those who know talk about his abilities as a trial lawyer, so perhaps getting back to that is what he should do.  

To refresh your memory:

The six-week-long trial recounted the most intimate details of Edwards’ affair with former campaign videographer Rielle Hunter, with whom the then-married presidential candidate fathered a daughter. At the time, Edwards’ wife Elizabeth was batting cancer; she died in late 2010.

At issue in the criminal case was about $1 million in unreported funds secretly provided by two wealthy campaign donors used to care for Hunter during her pregnancy, moving her across the country on private jets between a series of luxury resorts and homes.

For a while back in 2008 a lot of progressives were excited by John Edwards' statements and his more progressive political stands. While Obama and Clinton fought over center-left terrain, Edwards sounded more like someone who understood what it actually meant to be on the left. 

Too bad. 

(Cross-posted at Phantom Public.)