To ask two people to drop everything for you and then drop them at first attack can only mean that we can't trust him to fight for us either.
http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/
my thought is (if they get fired), if this is the way he treats people in the face of adversity, how can we believe he'll protect ANYONE? i always get annoyed with the "how can he protect america if he XYZ" argument, but in this case it kinda applies.
I don't think this means he's incapable of being a strong leader, but any democrat is gonna get attacked right and left. he's gonna be out of staff real quick unless he actually hires malkin to run everything for him.
I have to admit that I have been extremely leery of the Edwards campaign from the beginning, and this has been my reason why-- that though I like Edwards' message, and I like his politics (with one exception), I don't consider him credible as someone who can actually stand up for himself (or the rest of us) enough to run a campaign for President. I was significantly disappointed by Edwards in 2004, as over the course of that year I watched people I originally had high hopes for fail to communicate a message, fail to make any noticeable effort to connect with voters, and repeatedly respond to attacks-- when they responded at all-- by abandoning ground rather than trying to claim it.
The Democrats really need to stop letting people like this speak for them-- people like Kerry was in 2004 and Gore was in 2000, people so risk-averse and scared of offending the public that they never let the public know who they are or what they stand for. I would like to think Edwards is not like this. I would like to think that the message I like so much will endure past the primaries and not disappear into the memory hole as soon as Edwards stops thinking he needs to impress the lefties in the primaries and starts thinking he needs to impress the proverbial red state stereotype. I would like to think it is unfair of me to hold against Edwards the behavior of the 2004 campaign of which he was only one part. But I also don't see any real reason to be trusting here, and if Edwards in 2008 is going to act like Edwards in 2004 then I for one don't want to see him as the Democratic nominee.
This situation, I think, provides a very good test case for whether that will happen.
If Edwards responds the way Salon seems to think he did, I will consider most of my misgivings about him absolutely confirmed.
If on the other hand Edwards takes the initiative and actually takes steps to publicly defend his staff against the Donahues and Malkins driving this story, I'm going to have to rethink my position and give him a second chance.
(Meanwhile if the Edwards campaign just passively issues a statement saying Salon's reports of firings were incorrect and then drops the subject while letting the smears hang in the air, I'm not really going to conclude anything.)
it means the guy will cave at the first sign of trouble. this, if it turns out to be true, combined with his wambly "won't take attacking iran off the table" stance, has made me severely reconsider supporting him.
