Edwardians chill out. A parochial issue, Yucca Mountain, did him in in Nevada.

[jackson_dem]

I too was shaken by the results at first (it is tougher for me because this is my first real presidential campaign). Entrance polls showed Edwards getting 8-9% of the vote. Earlier in the week he was as high as 25-27%. He was never lower than 8% in Nevada polling (going back to the end of 2006) until the last Zogby had him at 6%. While he was never close to Hillary in any Nevada poll prior to this week, he was usually very close to Obama and sometimes even ahead of him. Clearly something drastic happened and Hillary's attack on him for Yucca Mountain is the only plausible explanation for it. It is ironic. A man who has been swiftboated for a year, especially since February of 2007, for lacking principle and doing only what was in his political interest may have lost the Nevada caucus because he took a stand on disposal of nuclear waste. The easy thing for any politician with presidential aspirations to do is vote "no" on any bill to dispose of nuclear waste because whatever location is chosen is going to be furious at you. Did you ever notice those who complain the most about Yucca never offer an alternative site for the waste? There is a reason for that. In the real and responsible world you can't just "hope" it goes away.

To put a final bullet point on this, we should not put much stock in what happened in Nevada.

[cali]

1. As this is your first presidential campaign, let me tell you that you are wrong.

Yucca Mt, may well have been a factor, but it certainly wasn't the only reason he didn't do better. JE constructed a path that was exceedingly narrow when he put all his eggs in the baskets of IA and NH. He knew it and so did Trippi. They miscalculated. The polls in NV re Edwards were unlikely to have ever been accurate. Polling a caucus state is notoriously hard. People who liked him evidently didn't like him enough to come out and caucus for him. I also believe that people in NV didn't feel they knew him well enough. He did virtually no advertising and he didn't spend much time there.

[jackson_dem]

2. I followed the 2004 primaries but wasn't as personally invested as this time

I didn't follow the entire thing closely either like I did this time from the moment Edwards announced at the end of 2006.

You may be right. Even under your theory Nevada remains an anomaly. Edwards ran zero television ads there and basically gave up on the state earlier in 2007 in favor of Iowa. I don't think Nevada foreshadows things to come.

[cali]

4. I actually still think that JE is a factor in this race

He's a factor in SC and on 2/5 if he can rally his supporters. SC is next week. If he can get 20% plus there, he can pick up delegates on 2/5 and beyond. If he gets in the single digits in SC, then he probably can't do anything on 2/5. Nevertheless, having promised his supporters that he'll stay in all the way to the convention, he should at least stay in through 2/5.

[jackson_dem]

6. I agree. As long as he does ok in SC he can do well, and win a state or two on Super Tuesday

[sunonmars]

3. If I was a candidate.......

I'd pick an alternative site for the nuclear dump, like somewhere we aint ever gonna win, somewhere like Wyoming, Cheney's back garden

[jackson_dem]

7. Yucca wasn't chosen randomly. It was a product of a govt. study I believe.

Edwards didn't write the bill. He merely did the responsible thing in face of a lack of a better alternative and voted for it.

[bananas]

10. It was called "The Screw Nevada Bill"

"Poll finds Nevada voters strongly oppose Yucca"
http://www.lvrj.com/news/11882701.html

"Ed McGaffigan, a veteran member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said Monday that the Yucca Mountain program is deeply flawed and that the Nevada nuclear waste site should be scrapped."
http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2007/Jan-23-Tue-2007/news/12133717.html

"MIT Technology Review: Is the Yucca Nuke Dump All Wet?"
http://www.technologyreview.com/Energy/13339/

"politics has had more to say to the siting of high-level nuclear waste than the science. After Members of Congress from the Northeast began to openly oppose placing the dump in the Northeast, the Department of Energy unilaterally decided to take them off the list. When placing the dump in the southeastern part of the country came up as a campaign issue in 1984, President Reagan unilaterally decided to take the southeastern part of the country off the list."
http://berkley.house.gov/legis/otr/statements/2000/fs_2000_0321.html

[sunonmars]

8. Anyway in Jan 2009 Crawford TX will have its own toxic dump

waste manager.

[sunonmars]

5. doubled edged sword here

If he goes into SC and gets a major league drubbing in his own homeland, well he'll be a huge laughing stock. It would be a major blow.

First he couldnt take NC in the VP slot 2004 and then couldnt take SC in the primaries.

I mean how far does he want to look like the poor relation in votes

[aquart]

9. That's a ridiculous reason to quit. Ridiculous.

You have no idea of the strength of the people running if you even suggest that.

[dogman]

11. Too bad he has a record.

Apologies are not leadership.