The Kerry-Edwards Ticket: The Limousine Liberal and the Litigious Lawyer Unite

Now that Senator John Kerry has named Senator John Edwards as his vice-presidential running mate, we need to examine the reality behind the images that both men have projected.

Senator Kerry has been busy posing for the media shooting guns, playing hockey, declaring himself as having "conservative" values, and even saying that life begins at conception. The point of all this is to counter any attempt to depict him as a limousine liberal, out of touch with the values of mainstream Americans.

It is an insult to our intelligence to act as if posing with guns is as significant as how the Senator has voted on gun control laws during his 16 years in Congress. It is an insult to our intelligence to claim conservative values when both liberal and non-partisan organizations have rated John Kerry's voting record as the most liberal in the Senate, more liberal even than Ted Kennedy's.

The political packaging of Senator Kerry's personal military record in Vietnam in the 1970s is far less important than how he has repeatedly voted in the Senate since then to cut military spending and to cut spending for the intelligence services.

People who will vote for candidates on the basis of election-year images, rather than bothering to find out the facts, perhaps deserve whatever officials they elect. But, when you are electing a President of the United States especially, you are electing someone whose actions will affect generations yet unborn -- who have no vote, but who deserve something better than someone with a well-contrived media image.

Selecting Senator John Edwards as a vice-presidential running mate was more image-making. Senator Edwards has had few, if any, achievements during his one term in the United States Senate, and savvy political observers question whether he would have been re-elected if he had decided to run again for the Senate. But he brings more image -- a more lively and engaging image -- to spice up John Kerry's dullness with his own more gushing sparkle.

Just as Senator Kerry's long-ago military tour of duty in Vietnam is exploited politically today, so Senator Edwards' working class origins are being similarly exploited. But John Edwards has long since grown rich as a lawyer suing for millions of dollars in medical malpractice lawsuits.

Edwards' specialty was suing when babies were born with brain defects, which he -- like other lawyers cashing in on junk science and gullible juries -- blamed on the failure of doctors to have had those babies delivered by Caesarian section.

Since then, Caesarian operations have increased greatly, but without reducing those birth defects that Edwards and others had blamed on a lack of Caesarian deliveries. Studies validated by leading medical authorities, here and overseas, have found no such link between birth defects and a lack of Caesarian births.

Meanwhile, lawyers like John Edwards could laugh all the way to the bank.

Like so many liberals who talk about "bringing down the cost of health care," John Edwards has in fact been driving up the cost of medical treatment. "Defensive medicine," such as unnecessary Caesarian operations, is not cheap. Defensive medicine protects doctors from slick lawyers far more than it protects patients.

Senator Edwards has already shown the same blithe disregard for facts as a politician that he showed as a lawyer. He has used the old liberal claim of "hunger in America" during this year's primary campaign, even though studies show no such thing -- and in fact show obesity to be more common in the lower income brackets.

"Hunger in America" claims were once big stuff in the media but hard facts have long since shot down this contrived alarm. John Edwards must know that "hunger in America" claims are bunk, but he obviously doesn't care.

The big question this election year is whether the voters will care about facts or will be overwhelmed by phony images and political spin.

Thomas Sowell has published a large volume of writing. His dozen books, as well as numerous articles and essays, cover a wide range of topics, from classic economic theory to judicial activism, from civil rights to choosing the right college.

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