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February 14, 2004

Still don't understand why Edwards moves people?

This piece by EJ Dionne pretty much says it all:

Sen. John Edwards, who has had perfect rhetorical pitch in this year's presidential campaign, altered the opening of his stump speech this week. The change is a warning to free-traders: Guys, you'd better wake up. There's rebellion in the country, a justified revolt by workers who cannot understand why the economic recovery has produced so few new jobs.

Edwards told the tale of a father coming home from his factory job to put his daughter to bed. "He knows his night is over when he gives her a hug," Edwards said, speaking in Milwaukee Tuesday. "But tonight . . . he'll be coming home to tell her that his factory is closing, that he's about to lose his job."

It's worth hearing Edwards to understand the power of this issue. He's not telling an economic story. He's offering a morality tale about a decent American hammered by the system. "It's not because he's done anything wrong," Edwards said. "He's done what he's supposed to do, he's been responsible, he's worked hard, he's raised his family."

Nor is the factory closing because the company decided to stop making its product. "The problem is they're going to make it somewhere else," Edwards says. "They're going to make it somewhere outside of his community, outside of his country."

Why? "They only care about profits, they have lobbyists everywhere and they own this White House." The people in charge, he says, "don't hear the other America. They don't see the face of this father who had to come home and tell his little girl that he no longer had a job."

Now, contrast Edwards's evocative language with the cold words of the new Economic Report of the President and you'll understand why even Republicans such as House Speaker Dennis Hastert are furious at President Bush's economists.

"One facet of increased services trade is the increased use of offshore outsourcing in which a company relocates labor-intensive service industry functions to another country," the report says dryly, italicizing the key phrase. But not to worry. "When a good or service is produced more cheaply abroad," the president's report lectures, "it makes more sense to import it than to make or provide it domestically." Makes sense to whom? On Tuesday a group of 19 Democratic senators, led by New York's Charles E. Schumer and including Edwards, called on Bush to repudiate the report.

Posted by Mike at February 14, 2004 02:45 AM

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