August 13, 2007 10:30 PM

The boy on the bus

View larger image Photo by M.E. Sprengelmeyer

Former Sen. John Edwards threw down the guantlet to reporters riding his campaign bus in central Iowa on Monday.

He and his wife, Elizabeth Edwards, were talking about how they've learned to keep campaign speeches short here in the Hawkeye State, because in Iowa, the "real meat" of the meet-and-greet sessions comes in the question-and-answer periods.

Said the candidate:

"Through the course of the day...everything gets covered. Like, when we did the YouTube debate, the national press would say, 'Oh, could this be uneasy for you? You don't know what you're going to be asked.' (But) it's very hard to come up with something you haven't been asked in Iowa. It's just hard, unless it's really eccentric. Even the melting snowman -- it's still something we get asked 10 times a day out here..."

So the challenge was issued. Could the reporters come up with something original?

We tried -- starting with a co-questioner who wanted to know if the senator had a habit of being late. (They had started the day more than an hour late that morning, but the senator and the inquiring mind disagreed about whether it was a regular thing.)

Keep reading to see other attempts at asking something new.

And be sure to check out the old timey, folded version of the Rocky Mountain News on Tuesday morning for THIS EXTENDED STORY about the wheels on the bus going 'round and 'round, 'round and 'round, 'round and 'round.

View larger image Photo by M.E. Sprengelmeyer

Before a lengthy discussion of that morning's tardiness was out of the way, it devolved into questions about North Carolina dairy products. We'll spare you the details.

But then someone wanted to know Edwards' policy on policy papers.

Did he rush to give voters a series of detailed proposals at the start of the year -- earlier than some other candidates -- because of something he learned in the 2004 campaign?

Said Edwards:

"I think the early impressions they have of you matter, and to the extent that it's rhetoric and superficial, it raises questions in caucus-goers minds about whether you're ready to be president."

Elizabeth Edwards wanted to weigh in:

"If you don't have ideas about what you want to do about the problems that face us, what's your motivation for being president?"

Edwards brushed aside a question about former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack's endorsement of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and whether that had led to an erosion of his support from the governor's loyalists. He said he saw no evidence of that.

He was asked if he was surprised that in Jefferson, Iowa, that afternoon, somebody already was asking him to compare himself to Sen. Barack Obama, one-on-one, and someone else wanted to know if Obama could be his vice-presidential running mate.

Said Edwards:

"That was surprising. It does seem early for that..."

I wanted to know if he thought his two leading rivals, Obama and Clinton, might be damaging the Democratic Party's chances in 2008 with their recent debate over diplomatic strategy. Afterall, Clinton had called Obama "naive" for saying that he would agree to meet with leaders of some adversarial nations including Iran, Syria and Cuba in his first year in office.

Wouldn't the "naive" tag make an easy bumper sticker for Republicans to attack Obama? Could that effectively disqualify him from being anybody's running mate?

"I understand the question. I'm not interested in being a political commentator... I'm running for president."

On a follow-up question, he did elaborate on his recent speech in Missouri, when he said the Clinton-Obama spat was exactly the sort of thing that turned off voters.

"I watched the thing play out and it was: Sen. Obama says 'X.' Sen. Clinton says Sen. Obama is naive because he said 'X.' And then it turns out that Sen. Clinton said 'X.' That's the way it looked to me. That's just classic, you know, what people get so sick of -- politicians fighting with each other, and the distinctions don't seem to be meaningful, and from the perspective of an Iowa caucus-goer or a voter, it just seems like they're fighting with each other for the sake of fighting with each other."

Before the bus pulled into Carroll, Iowa, and the reporters got kicked to the curb, Edwards used another question to repeat his recent line about looking forward to facing any of the Republican contenders in the general election.

"They are George Bush on steroids," Edwards declared.

Sadly, we forgot to slip in the question that came to mind when he used the line in his speech earlier: Does he support steroids testing for presidential candidates?

And really, the best question of the day was posed by Edwards himself, when the group chat started with a little conversation about former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson, who dropped out of the Republican contest after finishing sixth in the Iowa Straw Poll in Ames.

"Why did he say if he didn't finish first or second he was going to get out?"

Good question, Senator.

Maybe you'd be a good political commentator afterall.

Photo by M.E. Sprengelmeyer

Posted by M.E. Sprengelmeyer at 10:30 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack