“Uncharted Waters”

It’s Friday afternoon. It’s time to write my column. True to form, I procrastinate. It’s off to the grocery for sodas and chips.

I’m on my way to the checkout when I see Henderson. He’s a nice guy. But Henderson is not the sort of person you ever have a short conversation with. Normally I avoid Henderson. But with the blank computer screen awaiting me, I’m delighted to see him.

“Saywhat?”

We talk about Kobe Bryant’s phenomenal corkscrew jump shot three-pointer. We talk about filing our taxes—neither of us has. Soon we reach the point of the conversation where I normally would say goodbye and move on. But Henderson leans toward me and says, “I had a strange experience last night.”

Henderson leaves for work every morning at the same time. He returns from work almost every evening at the same time. He and his family have chicken cacciatore for dinner every Wednesday. He has been playing golf on Sunday afternoon with the same three other guys for nearly a decade. Every Sunday afternoon he leaves to play golf at the same time. You get the picture. When Henderson says something strange happened, well it’s enough for you to sit up and “Saywhat?”

“You’ve got to see this”

Henderson says, “Last night. It’s after dinner. The kids are in bed. My wife says, ‘You’ve got to see this.’

“She cues up a videotape. It’s from C-Span. My wife whose tastes are about as normal as they come has taped something from C-Span.”

Henderson steps a little closer and speaks in a whisper, “She’s taped a press conference.”

My first thought is, Hey wait a minute. I’m the one in the neighborhood who watches C-Span. I’m the geek who watches press conferences. Henderson’s wife made fun of my viewing habits at a party not all that long ago.

“So we’re on the couch and John Edwards and his wife come down this staircase thing, and they stand on this lawn and Edwards goes on about how his wife has had some tests.

“For a while I’m looking at my wife. I’m looking at the TV. I’m thinking, What in the heck is going on? It’s Thursday night. The basketball tournament is on. I have some e-mails to read.

“But as the news conference continues, I get more interested in what’s going on. And then Edwards says his wife’s cancer has returned. And they stand there and take questions and talk with more than some degree of intelligence and to the whole world they’re saying words like “breast” and “not curable” and they’re standing there in the sunshine . . . and I can’t take my eyes off the television. I look to my left and my wife is crying. And then I realize I’m crying.”

The Facts Mam

John Edwards is running for the Democratic Presidential nomination. He has consistently been running third in the polls—behind Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama. But Edwards is leading the polls in Iowa—the first state that holds an official caucus.

Edwards was Kerry’s Vice Presidential running mate in 2004. Before that he was a senator from North Carolina. Edwards and his wife were lawyers. She played an active roll in his campaign in 2004. She has been playing an active roll in his campaign this time around the track.

When John Edwards was young, his family was poor. His wife, Elizabeth came from a military family. He made a mint as a lawyer. They had two children. The boy, Wade, was a little too good to be true. He was an honors student, modest, likeable—he even had a dry sense of humor. In 1996 Wade Edwards was killed in a car accident. After their son died, John and Elizabeth Edwards had two more children.

Shortly before the election in 2004, Elizabeth Edwards was diagnosed with breast cancer. She was treated and the cancer retreated. This week John and Elizabeth Edwards and everyone who cared to notice learned that the cancer had resurfaced in a rib. There also may be small portions of it in her lungs.

Political pundits are using phrases like “uncharted waters” to describe John Edwards’ political status right now. Many Americans are applauding John and Elizabeth Edwards for their candor and their poise. Many Americans think John and Elizabeth Edwards should fold up their tent and go home.

Truth and Politics

Almost all politicians have a very unusual relationship with the truth. For some politicians the truth is like clay—something that can be molded to suit them. For some politicians the truth is something to be danced around. Most politicians like to tell their version of the truth. Indeed, one of the maxims of politics is, The candidate who tells the best story wins. This is almost always the version of the truth the candidate likes to tell.

I have a theory that great presidents make the most of the truth. A good example of this is President Johnson’s vigorous efforts to pass Voting Rights legislation. The same theory suggests that awful presidents avoid the truth. In the long term, such habits are ruinous to the country. A good example of this is President Johnson during the Vietnam war. He couldn’t change the awful truth about the war. By denying the truth about the war, he insured the US would lose the conflict, that his often glorious presidency would be marred by it, and that the suffering the war caused would be magnified.

Let’s be honest. Most politicians want as little to do with the truth as is possible. Telling the truth creates problems. You start telling truth, and soon people want more of the stuff. Pretty soon voters start asking questions that require honest solutions. And if you want problems, nothing creates them more than honest solutions. Can you imagine the tsunamis of vitriol that would be created by an honest solution to the deficit? What about all the damage to honor and tradition that an honest response to the war in Iraq would produce?

There is another maxim of politics—script everything. This is because bloopers travel at a speed faster than light. Bad news travels through the American media at a volume that is louder than your average rock concert. Campaign events are scripted so thoroughly to minimize the chance of bloopers will mar or even ruin a campaign.

Which is what made the Edwards press conference so unusual.

They spent the whole time—the whole time—talking about the awful truth of Elizabeth’s cancer. They spent the whole time speaking without a script. And they looked alternately poised and serious--and cheerful and open.

And There’s More

No one in our culture can say the word “cancer” without eliciting a great deal of emotion. Most of us live most of our lives knowing and caring about and praying for a few people who have cancer—or are in what we will hope will be a long period of remission from it.

But on Thursday, John and Elizabeth Edwards stood on a grassy lawn in North Carolina in front of reporters and a host of cameras. And they told the truth about an emotionally charged topic.

Some, like my friends the Henderson’s, thought them noble and grand and more than a little heroic.

A Few Comments

The obvious reaction is for someone like me to comment on it all. Obviously, for a few days the public eye will turn toward John and Elizabeth Edwards. Obviously, whatever many may think about John and Elizabeth Edwards, most will applaud their candor and their dignity. Edwards’ positive ratings will go up. His character ratings will go up. For the short term, he probably will become more popular in the polls. For a very brief period of time comics will not tell jokes about him. The news of Elizabeth’s cancer will require the candidate to add yet another balancing act to his repertoire. Now, in addition to being all the things all candidates have to be, John Edwards will have to balance being an energetic and dedicated campaigner with being a kind, attentive, and sympathetic husband.

But as I write these words, I really have only a few thoughts that amount to a hill of beans. I hope Elizabeth Edwards lives to be a hundred and twenty. I hope she outlives all of the people who think she should go home and stare at the walls of her house and wait to die. Whatever she ends up doing on Inauguration Day 2009, I hope that she continues to be as candid and as articulate and as gutsy and as brilliant and, yes, as mind bogglingly beautiful as she was in front of all those cameras last Thursday.



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Too Serious A Matter provides intelligent, provocative, and often funny commentary about the often convoluted intersections of politics, strategy, and history. The title of the blog comes from De Gaulle’s comment, “I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.”