IN DEFENSE OF EDWARDS (AGAIN). The main point of Dana's post -- that John Edwards is hiding behind Elizabeth on certain controversial issues -- is certainly true. He shouldn't get a pass on bad positions just because his wife is more progressive. But the examples Dana uses to critique John are slightly unfair, as some commenters have pointed out.

First, Dana writes, "Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama made it to the Planned Parenthood conference. John didn't -- he sent Elizabeth." As I've written here before, Senators Clinton and Obama were working down the street from where the conference was taking place, whereas Edwards was traveling through poor rural regions discussing poverty. This is not a question of whether reproductive health or poverty is the more important issue (they're obviously inextricably tied together in many, many ways), but a question of why Edwards should be criticized for not attending a conference when he was doing something else that was also important and worthwhile.

Second, she writes, " Elizabeth's support for marriage equality doesn't undo John's quibbling." Fair enough. But Obama and Clinton also oppose gay marriage, so it looks like the Democratic frontrunners are each quibbling on gay rights in their own individual ways. Except for Kucinich and Gravel, every Democratic candidate's position on this issue is pretty much equally indefensible.

--Steven White