John Edwards was clearly an also-ran in this presidential campaign. With the Democratic base revitalized on the tails of two groundbreaking and charismatic candidates. The potential to elect the nation’s first woman president in Hillary Clinton has always been intriguing while the incessant rockstar-worship that Barack Obama has been getting has definitely ignited a fire under the idealist youth who support the Democratic Party. This sort of fanfare leaves John Edwards, a former senator from the State of North Carolina and John Kerry’s running and losing mate during the last general elections a stale commodity being sold next to fresh, exciting and more appealing products.
Edwards never had the privilege of being the front runner in this tight race. In the opinion polls, media spins and debates, people have always felt that it has been largely a battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Edwards was often just an afterthought and an under card to the main event type of clash that the senators from New York and Illinois had to offer.
It is why it’s not surprising that Edwards has decided to quit the race to White House after losing in the first four states holding caucuses and primaries. Edwards had a strong showing in Iowa, but when the results from New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina came in, it was clear that it was going to be a very hard uphill climb to win in the so-called Super Tuesday states. Taking his party’s sake into consideration, Edwards chose to withdraw his bid and said that he will endorse a candidate at a later time.
Now that Edwards is gone, this sets up the race between Hillary and Obama. Hillary leads Obama in virtually all the Super Tuesday states as of now, but if Obama can connect to the orphaned Edwards supporters, we may be in for a really super duper Tuesday.